Before coffee beans reach our morning cups, it first undergoes a complicated process. There two general ways of refining coffee beans, namely the dry process and the wet process. However, among the two, the wet process is the most commonly used method of processing coffee, especially when it comes to first-class coffee beans.

The wet process begins after all the beans have been selected. They’re all soaked in water for washing and separating the good ones from the bad and unripe fruits that float to the surface. A certain machine that looks like a motor used in an RC glider, but a lot larger, is then used to squash the fruits. This allows all that pulp and skin to separate from the seeds.

Once the seeds are isolated, a fermentation process takes place. This removes all the remaining pulp and skin that may still be clinging to the coffee beans. Microbes are present in the fermentation to thoroughly clean the beans and remove all remaining parts of the fruit that we don’t need. The fermenting usually takes about several days or a week before they go through another series of washing. Some facilities may implement a wet or a dry fermentation, depending on which one they prefer. However, others skip the fermentation process by making use of machines that could scrub the coffee of all remaining debris.

After all these, the beans are now allowed to dry. This can be done by machine drying or, the more common method, sun drying. It is very important to observe even drying to retain at least 10 percent moisture. Many farms usually rake the sun dried beans every 5-6 hours to allow warm air to go through the pile of beans and promote even drying.

Once the beans are dried just right, the remaining skin and parchment are then peeled off. After all these steps are done, the coffee beans are then put through a series of other refining processes, and once all of that is done, commercial packaging and distribution then brings the ground coffee beans into supermarkets and eventually, to your home.