Coffee is made to put a pep in your step, and we have all been guilty of chugging too many cups of Joe to get through a morning after a long night. Still, coffee does so much more than that, and it actually has many health benefits for your daily life. But how was coffee originally discovered? Who were the crazy folks that decided to brew up those beans to get some energy?

Firstly, you can start the coffee story with talking about a goat herder in Ethiopia. You had no idea that Java drinking started with goats, did you? You may be familiar with the fact that coffee trees are made up of berries, which house the beans inside. When you split open the berries during the harvesting process, there will be two beans inside each berry. Back to the story, this goat herder in Ethiopia centuries ago noticed that his goats were eating the berries off of this plant. After that fact, the goats were acting very energized and crazy, and he began to wonder exactly what they were eating. From that point, this herder had the idea to eat the berries, which allowed him to have the same energy as the goats. I am guessing that people were lined up to his hut around the block to get this new snack that would allow them to have energy throughout their day! Interestingly enough, these Ethiopian tribes actually rolled the coffee plant berries with animal fat to eat them. This is what we would now call an energy bar, which is an interesting concoction to be made by the early Ethiopians.

Arabs were also a part of the coffee discovery because they were the ones that got creative enough to brew the beans into a drink. This is something that became a part of the Arabic culture, and they have so much to offer us in the way that coffee is ground and brewed today. From there, coffee was passed on to Turkey, and into Europe. If you are familiar with Turkish coffee, then you will know exactly how they like to drink it, which is with a very, very fine grind that will then sit like sediment in the final brew product. Turkish Coffee is not for the weak because it is a very strong way to prepare coffee, which was made popular from the ancient days of coffee drinking in Turkey. After that, coffee was discovered by the European traders who were dealing in Turkey, and they had the pleasure of sampling the brew. They too discovered the energy benefits of coffee to put some pep in their step and get them through the day, which made them bring it home to Europe. I don't blame them!

All of this, just to get your cup of Joe in the morning? It is amazing to think of all that coffee has been through to be commercialized and socialized the way that it is in our American culture. You have a goat to thank!