Coffee's Journey Through History
So a goat herder walks into a monastary and tells a group of monks his goat found magic beans...what sounds like the start of another corny joke actually blooms into the beautiful story of how billions of people came to start their days with coffee.  Once the Sufi Mystics realized how much they enjoyed coffee, experiments began - first eating the fruit around the beans, then to eating the roasted beans like an energy snack, dialing in the perfect way to enjoy this new discovery.  The Sufi Mystics began largely distributing coffee and soon it was all across the Middle East, North Africa, and the Ottoman Empire (by the end of the 17th century it could be found across the known world).  Eventually folks caught on to brewing coffee similar to the way we do today (it probably looked like what we call Turkish Coffee today (which is delicious)) and coffee houses began springing up around academic centers.  They didn't have the luxury of coffee grinders and drip machines at home, so people would gather at coffee houses to enjoy hot fresh coffee.  Similar to today, these coffee houses would attract people of all classes, trades, and ethnic groups where they would come together.  They would discuss politics and share ideas in this neutral space where everyone was equal, crazy how some magic beans can bring people together isn't it? 

Of course, anything this popular has to have haters too.  Some religious leaders worked to ban coffee claiming it was an intoxicant, caused idleness, and that people were discussing scandalous topics under the influence of caffeine (gasp).  Thankfully there are two sides to every argument, different religious leaders were in favor of coffee and proclaimed coffee heightened senses and kept people in moral control of their decision making.  The truth is a lot of this controversy is likely because it brought people who normally would not share a room together into a space where they could discuss politics and ideas of the public started changing.  Coffee provided a space for people to come together, share ideas, and change political landscapes.  This cycle of love and hate would continue for some time.  Eventually it reached Europe and Pope Clement VIII baptized coffee, saying that something so good should not be exclusively enjoyed by "infidels".   

Once coffee grew its presence in Europe, the Musilm world's culture around coffee was adopted as well and coffee houses began popping up around London.  By the end of the 17th Century coffee houses were where people would meet for business, as a news hub, and of course still as a social common ground.  These coffee houses were beginning to grow some esteem too; London's scientific group The Royal Society would regularly meet at the Grecian Coffee house, stock brokers would come together at Jonathan's Coffee House where the London Stock Exchange would eventually be born out of.  Coffee culture changed the path of history by bringing people together like nothing else.  Well, almost.  The next most common drink of the time was beer, and a common practice was heading to your favorite coffee house after a long night with some pals.  Has much really changed?

The pivot from alcohol into coffee is arguably one of the most influential changes in food history.  Prominent names throughout history like Johan Sebastian Bach, Voltaire, and Isaac Newton were avid coffee drinkers (so that almost means it makes you smart).  People were drinking more coffee, becoming more energetic, and provided a space where knowledge was now being circulated rather than siloed.  Even just sitting in a coffee house you could listen to discussion of others and learn something new.  

Of course, money on the mind, people were wondering how they could secure their own source for this precious plant.  At the time, all of the coffee in Europe was being sourced from the port of Mocha in Yemen. The Dutch East India Company was the first group to break the monopoly on the coffee gambit and started trying to grow it outside of Yemen.  Diversifying the industry and beginning a long, long path of finding the best places to grow coffee and mapping out the bean belt.