Is civet (luwak) coffee worth the price .....?!

Superlatively expensive, kopi luwak coffee is famously prepared for roasting by passage through a civet cat. Have you ever tried a food with a legendary reputation, and was it up to snuff?

 Coffee people' are not like the rest of us. I mean I'm a fan of a decent cup but the kind of people I meet who run the new independent coffee shops, the roasters and champion baristas, they're, well, intense. You might imagine the starey-eyed evangelism comes from drinking too much of their own product, but if you're brave enough to enter conversation you quickly work out that they're actually just extremely committed to the thing they love … and keen to share.

I first met Reiss Gunson a couple of years ago after I'd written a piece on domestic coffee makers for the Guardian. He turned up unannounced on my doorstep late one night with a grinder and a big box of beans and proceeded to demonstrate, in quite some detail, where I was going wrong. Reiss is a 'coffee person' par excellence. He takes coffee so seriously that he roasts and blends beans to order for individual customers, so when he asks me to try something I do. Even, as is the case this morning, when it's been picked out of cat shit.

Kopi luwak is variously marketed as 'cat-poo coffee' or occasionally 'the most expensive coffee in the world'. The reason it's so costly is that, rather than harvesting the coffee fruit (known as 'cherries') and extracting the bean by the usual methods, some Sumatran villagers collect the faeces of the civet cats which live on the plantations and pick out the beans. (I don't know, since you ask … tweezers? Some sort of sieve? For all I know they just use their fingers).

It's said that the beans taste better either because of something that happens to them inside the cat, or possibly because the clever little beasts pick only the finest and ripest of fruit. Either way, only about half a tonne is produced each year and the headlines just write themselves.

Which, in a way, is rather the problem. As a rare and luxury product with great story attached, kopi luwak - 'a great gift for the foodie who has everything' - tends to get packed into tiny little sachets, stored for ages and sold as a gimmicky gift and is as a result almost guaranteed to taste - well to be brutal, a bit like shit. Worse, according to industry gossip, up to 40% of the product sold as genuine kopi luwak is nothing of the sort. (We have to hope that any such sharp practice involves the passing off of regular coffee rather than passed beans through an inauthentic animal).

It would be easy to conclude that kopi luwak was just another of the world's great 'stunt eating' experiences. Great for gross-out stories, an opportunity for TV presenters to make gurning faces and poo jokes, but Reiss, 'coffee person' to the end, wasn't going to let that pass without trying me on the real stuff.

Kopi luwak producers have recently begun to set their little gatherers loose on Arabica rather than Robusta beans. This is a much better flavoured variety. With this as a starting point Reiss roasts batches specifically for the brewing method you're going to use (again, since you ask, it's still a Rancilio 'Miss Silvia' espresso machine souped up with a PID controller and a bottomless triple basket). As the beans mature and then begin to deteriorate after roasting, each bag is dated with a week long 'window' for consumption. My bag was intended for opening this morning, coincidentally, my birthday. If cat-shit coffee is ever going to taste good, today is the day.

I was up early this morning - frankly buzzing with expectation. I cut open the foil pouch and took a good deep sniff. It would have been idiotic to expect anything that had been roasted at such a high temperature to retain any fecal honk - in fact it just had a delicious fruity whiff from which, if I was truly pretentious, I should probably try to define the individual subspecies. That said, having absolutely no idea of the diet of a Sumatran moggie or any of the flora of the area, it would be fairly irrelevant.

To be a bit technical, the coffee brews faster than my regular blend on the same grind and produces a less oily shot with a pink tint to the crema. On first taste it's pretty fantastic with all of the higher notes you tend to get with a well-roasted bespoke coffee (regular civilian drinkers, myself included, seem to see coffee in terms of big, bassy low-end flavours and smells. Coffee people seem to seek the distinctions in the lighter, more evanescent notes) but the defining characteristic is a lovely, long, subtly nutty aftertaste that looks like it's going to carry on right through to the bacon sandwich I'm lining up as breakfast.

Will kopi luwak replace my regular blend? Yeah, right! On what I get paid it's going to be many many more birthdays before I can afford another pouch of this stuff. Of course I love the idea that it's been through a cat, what food lover wouldn't? And tonight I'm going to serve it to some food geek dinner guests with genuine delight.

Is it the best coffee in the world? I'm nowhere near enough of a connoisseur to be able to tell you. What I can say is that most of the reviews I've read of kopi luwak have been from disappointed people who've been sold a gimmick. If you ever get that chance to try the real thing it definitely rewards the effort.

I'd heard a lot about kopi luwak and tried quite a few bum lots before today, so it's a pleasure to finally discover that it actually deserves its reputation. But have you ever had the chance to try one of those legendary foods with a great story behind it? Did it live up to your expectations?

A matter of taste: the crappuccino delicacy

President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has raised a few eyebrows with his choice of a gift for the Prime Minister Kevin Rudd during the Indonesian president's state visit to Australia.

Kopi luwak or civet coffee comes from the rear end of a small furry animal found in the jungles of Indonesia and quite a few other countries in the region.

Perhaps it's no surprise that the Prime Minister's aides immediately and possibly ungraciously handed the unopened packet over to AQIS, the Australian Quarantine Inspection Service for a once over.

Kopi luwak is the rarest, the most expensive and most fabled coffee in the world. Selling for prices of $1,500 a pound or more in the United States and 50 pounds a cup in London , it's also the most counterfeited.

A few years back I went to the mountains of Sumatra to track down the source of kopi luwak for the ABC's Foreign Correspondent program.

Yes, kopi luwak really is the poo of the common palm civet, a small weasel-like animal found across Asia and Africa.

This is what it looks like "fresh" from the forest floor.

And this is where it comes from.

Jenny was the first civet domesticated by brothers Joko Basuki and Susanto when they set up their luwak farm at a secret location in the mountains near Lampung. Sadly I had a message recently from Joe to tell me that Jenny had died, but her fellow luwaks were still hard at work consuming the luscious red coffee cherries at the front end and producing kopi luwak at the other.

Sorting the precious beans from everything else that emerges is not the world's most glamorous job.

So what can Kevin Rudd expect from his precious gift?

This is how I described the taste for ABC online at the time:

"The aroma is smoky and pungent and even somewhat reminiscent of its immediate origin but the flavour is unique, mild and smooth with a hint of rich dark chocolate and secondary notes of earth and musk."

Luwak Coffe and Oprah Winfrey; "Expensive but Delicious!"

Even the famous presenter Oprah Winfrey wants to get a chance to try it! In a one famous television show "Oprah Winfrey Show" she reviews the enjoyment of this coffee, "It was unique and tasty," she said, although later she was amazed when discovered how to make this coffee.

Civet Coffee? Or Luwak Coffee, what kind of coffee is this? Yes, the coffee is not uncommon in the making process, it uses coffee beans taken from the remaining dirt mongoose/Palm Civet. Coffee beans are believed to have different tastes when eaten and passed through the digestive tract mongoose. Digestion of these animals had apparently naturally fermented with proteolytic enzymes produced by bacteria of the stomach, the effects of acid concentration and content of caffeine in coffee decreases.

The history of the past had a great story about the origins of this unique coffee, Dutch-owned coffee plantation workers in the early 19th century, in the morning time often sees the coffee beans scattered around the plantation. At first they were surprised, coffee beans come from? Eventually they learned that spills coffee beans were coming from civet droppings (Paradoxurus hermaphroditus) who likes to eat the coffee fruit. From the observations of this plantation workers see only digest meat civet fruit, coffee husk and seeds are still intact and are not able to digest.

Then they picked coffee beans from civet droppings are then washed, roasted, ground, then brewed with hot water, then created Luwak coffee.

After they are drunk fascinated with the taste, so tasty and not too sour on the tongue, soft, sometimes arise chocolate and caramel taste sensation, unlike they had ever drank coffee, the aroma was sharp. Even with a certain mixture is able to provide a variety of other flavor, such as scented soil. Great!

Luwak coffee taste is really different and special, especially for fans and connoisseurs of coffee.

Just unfortunately, because it's such a unique manufacturing process, it became a scarce product and not in every place we travel would be encountered.. The price is very expensive. As was reported in a CNN television when reviewing this coffee, the price reached 100 U.S. dollars a cup.

WinssCoffee is luwak coffe from west java Indonesia

Kami jatuh cinta pada kopi luwak asal Aceh Gayo,ini adalah kopi luwak arabika yang akan membuat indera penciuman anda tersenyum. Begitu kaya aroma rempah-rempah.

Datang dari kebun-kebun kecil milik petani di Takengon, brenjel kopi luwak–yang berharga–kemudian dijemur, dicuci bersih di air mengalir dan dikeringkan. Selanjutnya, gabah kopi dijemur dan dikupas kulit-luarnya dengan gosok manual untuk kemudian disortir dari kotoran-kotoran dan akhirnya disimpan untuk siap kirim segera ke Tangerang.

Pada cupping, Kopi Luwak WinssCoffee terasa aroma cocoa dari sangrai full-city, karamel, rempah-rempah, tapi juga lembut. Ini pengalaman hebat.

What is Coffee Luwak, why is it so special and how is it made?

The Asian Palm civet (Paradoxurus hermaphroditus) is responsible for the effects of this unique coffee. Related to the cat but belonging to the viverridae family, the same as the mongoose, it has a weasel-like face, cat-like body and long tail with fur which may be either gray or brown with various darker markings.

The Asian Palm civet of Indonesia is a musky grey-toned colour with darker stripes.

Beneath the tail of both sexes is a gland from which a fatty secretion is emitted to mark its

territory. This substance is collected to be used as a perfume fixative, main supplies coming

from the Indian civet (v. zibetha).

The omnivorous, tree-climbing civet cat prowls the coffee plantations at night picking and

consuming the finest and best ripe coffee cherries. These pass through the civet and are

collected in the droppings. Beans emerge without their fleshy coating, but entire and appear

undigested. They are extracted by washing and carefully cleansed before being processed.

It had long been considered as a legend that the civet (Luwak) consumed the best coffee beans which then passed through. their gut undigested, even entire with their cherry-like coating, the beans being washed and processed in the normal fashion. to make this highly selected top grade coffee. Some thought that the actual situation was that the best beans were selected 

according to the type civets would eat, and these processed without having actually been eaten by the civet cats.

Recently a researcher, Marcone, working with the African civet (Civettictis civetta) and later with the Indonesian civets, has suggested the beans are slightly digested during their passage, to the extent that an enzyme process has broken down some of the proteins allowing them to leach out, resulting in a less bitter coffee. Speculation is that a lactic acid 

fermentation may be a factor, however any attempts at trying to mimic the process have so far failed.

In areas of Java and Bali where civet cats roam, the Kopi Luwak is made in villages from these Arabica coffee beans.  The raw and cleaned beans are placed in a large stone mortar (lesung), pounded with a large wooden pole  to loosen beans from their covering shells and then winnowed by hand in a flat basket like tray  to separate the beans. Beans are then carefully hand-picked to remove any that are damaged, roasted in special local ovens and ground as required.

Tastes of Indonesia Kopi Luwak is produced according to village methods from the best hand-selected whole Arabica bean.

Luwak Coffee Sumatra Indonesia

Luwak coffee comes from the Indonesian island of Sumatra, an area well-known for its excellent coffee. Also native to the area is a small civit-like animal called a Paradoxurus. That's the scientific name, the locals call them luwaks These little mammals live in the trees and one of their favorite foods is the red, ripe coffee cherry. They eat the cherries, bean and all. While the bean is in the little guy's stomach, it undergoes chemical treatments and fermentations. The bean finishes its journey through the digestive system, and exits. The still-intact beans are collected from the forest floor, and are cleaned, then roasted and ground just like any other coffee.

The resulting coffee is said to be like no other. It has a rich, heavy flavour with hints of caramel or chocolate. Other terms used to describe it are earthy, musty and exotic. The body is almost syrupy and it's very smooth.

One must wonder about the circumstances that brought about the first cup of Kopi Luwak coffee. Who would think to (or even want to) collect and roast beans out of animal feces? Perhaps a native figured it was easier to collect the beans from the ground this way, rather than having to work harder and pick them from the trees? We'll likely never know. But because of the strange method of collecting, there isn't much Kopi Luwak produced in the world. The average total annual production is only around 500 pounds of beans.

Because of the rarity of this coffee, the price is quite outrageous. If you can find a vendor, the current cost for a pound of Kopi Luwak is around $300 or more. Some more adventurous coffee houses are selling it by the cup, but you won't likely find it at your local coffee shop just yet. The coffee isn't so spectacular that it's truly worth that amount of money. You are paying for the experience of enjoying such an unusual and rare delicacy.

Luwak Coffe Truly of Indonesia

Luwak coffee (Indonesian pronunciation: [ˈkopi ˈlu.aʔ]), or civet coffee, is one of the world's most expensive and low-production varieties of coffee. It is made from the beans of coffee berries which have been eaten by the Asian Palm Civet (Paradoxurus hermaphroditus) and other related civets, then passed through its digestive tract.^[1] A civet eats the berries for their fleshy pulp. In its stomach,proteolytic enzymes seep into the beans, making shorter peptides and more free amino acids. Passing through a civet's intestines the beans are then defecated, keeping their shape. After gathering, thorough washing, sun drying, light roasting and brewing, these beans yield an aromatic coffee with much less bitterness.^{[citation needed]} This coffee was widely noted as the most expensive coffee in the world with prices reaching $160 per pound^[2] since the Uchunari grade 0 coffee has been introduced on the international coffee market.

luwak coffee is produced mainly on the islands of Sumatra, Java, Bali and Sulawesi in the IndonesianArchipelago. It is also produced in the Philippines (where the product is called motit coffee in the Cordillera, kape alamid in Tagalog areas) and also produced in East Timor (where it is called kafé-laku). Weasel coffee is a loose English translation of its Vietnamese name cà phê Chồn, where popular, chemically simulated versions are also produced. However, Vietnam has 2 farms with 300 wild civets in Dak Lak. The farmers collect the coffee seeds and produce only 300 kg of authentic vietnamese chon coffee. The civets live in the wild and are fed beef. The processed civet beans are imported to the UK to the farmers' sole UK supplier.

The origin of Luwak coffee is closely connected with the history of coffee production in Indonesia. In the early 18th century the Dutch established the cash-crop coffee plantations in their colony in the Dutch East Indies islands of Java and Sumatra, including Arabica coffee introduced from Yemen. During the era of Cultuurstelsel (1830—1870), the Dutch prohibited the native farmers and plantation workers from picking coffee fruits for their own use. Still, the native farmers wanted to have a taste of the famed coffee beverage. Soon, the natives learned that certain species of musang or luwak (Asian Palm Civet) consumed the coffee fruits, yet they left the coffee seeds undigested in their droppings. The natives collected these luwaks' coffee seed droppings, then cleaned, roasted and ground them to make their own coffee beverage.^[3] The fame of aromatic civet coffee spread from locals to Dutch plantation owners and soon become their favourite, yet because of its rarity and unusual process, the civet coffee was expensive even in colonial times.

Luwak coffee is a name for many specific cultivars and blends of arabica, robusta, liberica, excelsa or other beans eaten by civets, hence the taste can vary greatly. Nonetheless, luwak coffee  have a shared aroma profile and flavor characteristics, along with their lack of bitterness.

Luwak coffee has a thick texture, and tastes vary depending on roasting levels. Usually, levels range from cinnamon color to medium, with little or no carmelization of sugars within the beans as happens with heavy roasting. Moreover, kopi luwaks which have very smooth profiles are most often given a lighter roast, though at first taste it can seem a bit strong in flavor. Iced luwak coffee  brews may bring out some flavors not found in other coffees. Other berries eaten by civets can give luwak coffee a pungent, sometimes bitter taste, though it varies depending on the diet of the civet.

Sumatra is the world's largest regional producer of Luwak coffee. Sumatran civet coffee beans are mostly an early arabica variety cultivated in the Indonesian archipelago since the seventeenth century. The major Sumatran kopi luwak production area is in Lampung, Bengkulu andAceh especially the Gayo region, Takengon. Tagalog cafe alamid (or alamid cafe) comes from civets fed on a mixture of coffee beans and is sold in the Batangas region along with gift shops near airports in the Philippines.

Coffe is the Indonesian word for coffee. Luwak is a local name of the Asian Palm Civet in Sumatra. Palm civets are primarily frugivorous, feeding on berries and pulpy fruits such as figs and palms. Civets also eat small vertebrates, insects, ripe fruits and seeds.^[4]

Early production began when beans were gathered in the wild from where a civet would defecate as a means to mark its territory. On farms, civets are either caged or allowed to roam within defined boundaries.^[1]

Coffee cherries are eaten by a civet for their fruit pulp. After spending about a day and a half in the civet's digestive tract the beans are then defecated in clumps, having kept their shape and still covered with some of the fleshy berry's inner layers. They are gathered, thoroughly washed, sun dried and given only a light roast so as to keep the many intertwined flavors and lack of bitterness yielded inside the civet.

Several studies have examined the process in which the animal's stomach acids and enzymes digest the beans' covering and ferment the beans.^[5][6][7] Research by food scientist Massimo Marcone at the University of Guelph in Ontario, Canada showed that the civet's endogenous digestive secretions seep into the beans. These secretions carry proteolytic enzymes which break down the beans' proteins, yielding shorter peptides and more free amino acids. Since the flavor of coffee owes much to its proteins, there is a hypothesis that this shift in the numbers and kinds of proteins in beans after being swallowed by civets brings forth their unique flavor. The proteins are also involved in non-enzymatic Maillard browning reactions brought about later by roasting. Moreover, while inside a civet the beans begin to germinate by malting which also lowers their bitterness.^[8][9]

At the outset of his research Marcone doubted the safety of kopi luwak. However, he found that after the thorough washing, levels of harmful organisms were insignificant. Roasting at high temperature has been cited as making the beans safer after washing.^{[by whom?][citation needed]}

Research into the palm civet's digestive processes and the transformation of the beans' proteins has led to the discovery of innovative ways to imitate the taste of kopi luwak without the civet's involvement. It is in response to the decrease in civet population, caused by hunting it for meat.^{[10][improper synthesis?]} Kopi luwak production involves a great deal of labor, whether farmed or wild-gathered. The small production quantity and the labor involved in production contribute to the coffee's high cost.^[11] The high price of kopi luwak is another factor that drives the search for a way to produce kopi luwak in large quantities, lowering the cost.

The University of Florida has developed a way to recreate how nature produces Kopi Luwak without the involvement of any animals. This technology has been licensed to a Gainesville Florida firm, Coffee Primero, which now produces and distributes that product at a price competitive with ordinary quality coffees.^[7][12]

The Trung Nguyên Coffee Company in Vietnam, through its work in isolating the civet's digestive enzymes, has patented its own synthetic enzyme soak, which is used in its Legendee brand simulated kopi luwak coffee.

Luwak coffee is the most expensive coffee in the world, selling for between US$100 and $600 per pound.^[1] The specialty Vietnamese weasel coffee, which is made by collecting coffee beans eaten by wild civets, is sold at $6600 per kilogram ($3000 per pound).^[13] Most customers are in Asia – especially Japan, Taiwan and South Korea.^[14] Sources vary widely as to annual worldwide production.^[15]

In November 2006 Herveys Range Heritage Tea Rooms, a small cafe in the hills outside Townsville in Queensland, Australia, put kopi luwak coffee on its menu at A$50.00 (US $35.00 PPP) a cup, selling about seven cups a week, which gained nationwide Australian and international press.^[16] In April 2008 the brasserie at Peter Jones department store in London's Sloane Square began selling a blend of kopi luwak and Blue Mountain called Caffe Raro for £50 (US $79.00) a cup.^[17] Peck in downtownMilan sells a small espresso cup for 15 euros.