Revised and updated, a compact guide to the beverage that keeps us running.
A freshly updated edition of the best introduction to one of the world’s most popular products, The Coffee Book is jammed full of facts, figures, cartoons, and commentary covering coffee from its first use in Ethiopia in the sixth century to the rise of Starbucks and the emergence of Fair Trade coffee in the twenty-first. The book explores the process of cultivation, harvesting, and roasting from bean to cup; surveys the social history of café society from the first coffeehouses in Constantinople to beatnik havens in Berkeley and Greenwich Village; and tells the dramatic tale of high-stakes international trade and speculation for a product that can make or break entire national economies. It also examines the industry’s major players, revealing how they have systematically reduced the quality of the bean and turned a much-loved product into a commodity and lifestyle accoutrement, ruining the lives of millions of farmers around the world in the process.
Finally, The Coffee Book, hailed as a Best Business Book by Library Journal when it was first published, considers the exploitation of labor and damage to the environment that mass cultivation causes, and explores the growing “conscious coffee” market and Fair Trade movement.
The Coffee Book: Anatomy of an Industry from Crop to the Last Drop, Revised and Updated Edition
Brilliantly and thoroughly researched by the authors, the history of coffee is presented with utterly engaging style. This book should be on everybody’s coffee table.
Rating: 5 / 5
If, while drinking a pot of Joe, you have ever wondered to yourself “What the hell is this stuff, and how did it get here?” then you need to read this wonderfully entertaining book. Incidentally, by “Joe” I mean “coffee.”
Rating: 5 / 5
I had hoped to read a thoughtful and measured history of coffee/the coffee trade. Instead, I found The Coffee Book to be heavy-handed, one-sided and didactic. Big Business Bad! Imperialism and Colonialism responsible for the Ills of the World! I had to force myself to finish it, and recently sold it for 50 cents at a garage sale. I feel a wee bit guilty; I think that the buyer paid too much…
Rating: 1 / 5
From Planeta.com Journal: – Excellent! Subtitled “from crop to the last drop” this squarish tome presents one of the most engaging reviews published this year. It’s crammed with coffee trivia, cartoons and most importantly, commentary. It examines the industry’s major players and explores the growing “conscious coffee” market. A must-read!
Rating: 5 / 5
I agree with most of the comments in the other reviews. One thing I will add is that this is a more concise book than “UNCOMMON GROUNDS”, but has much of the same information, from a different viewpoint of course. It is also around 6 years more up to date. For instance in “UNCOMMON GROUNDS” Vietnam was just starting to make a mark in the coffee industry, now it’s one of the top producers of Robusta beans. Also the Fair Trade / Bird Friendly etc. coffee is more common now. Information will be found on the various aspects of coffee, such as Starbucks, instant, caffeine-decaf, specialty coffee, which turned the industry around (if not on its head). There are sidebars of some of the major players such as Kraft, P & G, etc.
The authors also dealt with coffee advertising which was a significant part of coffee history during the 20th century. Whatever one thinks of the commercials or the coffee, Mrs.Olsen & Juan Valdez became stars. One interesting quote they reported had to do with why the ad-industry put out certain of the ads they did during the 50-60′s such as some from CHOCK-FULL-OF-NUTS & CHASE AND SANBORN. The people behind those ads said that they did it on purpose – they figured that the women went through the same thing in real life. Imagine the ad agencies trying to get away with some of those ads today.
So, if you are interested in the history of coffee but don’t have the time for the 400+ pages found in “UNCOMMON GROUNDS”, this is the book to read. Of course it would be hard to beat the cover.
Rating: 4 / 5