Jamaica Blue Mountain Coffee is one of the most desirable and therefore the most expensive coffees in the world. This coffee is from beans grown on coffee plantations located in the Blue Mountains of Jamaica. The certifying board in Jamaica not only specifies where the coffee must be grown in order to claim the name Jamaica Blue Mountain Coffee, but it specifies in great detail where the coffee is grown and at what altitude. For instance, only coffee grown in the parishes of Saint Andrew, Saint Thomas, Portland and Saint Mary at an altitude between 3000 and 5500 feet can be called Jamaica Blue Mountain Coffee. Coffee grown at elevations from 1500 to 3000 feet can be called Jamaica High Mountain and coffee grown at elevations below 1500 feet is called Jamaica Lowlands or Jamaica Supreme. No coffee is grown on the government lands located above 5500 feet, although the highest mountains rise to nearly 7500 feet.

The Jamaican certifying board for coffee is fiercely protective of the coffee and its reputation. The reputation for the quality of this coffee is well known in Japan. Attempts to buy the entire harvest have been attempted. Fines, criminal charges and confiscation can result for growers or sellers who try to circumvent these laws.

There are three quality classifications the branded coffee dependent upon size of the coffee beans, with all sizes of bean at 96% for size ranging from 17/18 down and 2% for visible defects on Grades 1, 2, and 3. The fourth grade is for pea berry with is a bean with no split and the fifth grade known as Blue Mountain Triage is a mixture of Grades 1, 2, and 3 with up to 4% defects. In no case are elephant beans allowed, and no black or sour beans are allowed.

The coffee is known for its intense aroma, sweet taste, and fairly good body (feel in the mouth). There are no off flavors. The berries are always bluish-green and uniform in size.

In addition to the premium coffee grown in the Blue Mountains of Jamaica, other Jamaican coffee is also well known for flavor and quality. This includes High Mountain Supreme which is coffee grown at high altitudes in Jamaica, but outside the four parish region specified as Blue Mountain. High Mountain Supreme is free from off-flavors, has good body and acidity and a fine aroma. It can be bluish green, green, or greenish in color and 2 percent maximum defects are allowed. There can be no sour or black beans allowed.

Jamaica Prime is also grown outside the Blue Mountain area and at lower altitudes. It has good aroma, body and acidity and is free from off-flavors. The color is green or greenish and the screen is at 16/17/18.

Jamaica Select is still a fairly good quality coffee with up to 4% defects and is greenish in color.

The peaberry is a type of coffee bean that grows naturally about 5 percent of the time. It is technically a defective bean, since it consists of a single fused pea shaped bean rather than two halves. The peaberry carries a stronger, more intense flavor and is prized by coffee drinkers as the caviar of coffee. It is quite expensive compared to other coffee. In other coffee growing areas, the peaberry is considered a defective bean and is discarded.

It is not enough that good and proper food material be provided; it must have such preparation as will increase and not diminish its alimentary value. The unwholesomeness of food is quite as often due to bad cookery as to improper selection of material. Proper cookery renders good food material more digestible. When scientifically done, cooking changes each of the food elements, with the exception of fats, in much the same manner as do the digestive juices, and at the same time it breaks up the food by dissolving the soluble portions, so that its elements are more readily acted upon by the digestive fluids. Cookery, however, often fails to attain the desired end; and the best material is rendered useless and unwholesome by a improper preparation.

It is rare to find a table, some portion of the food upon which is not rendered unwholesome either by improper preparatory treatment, or by the addition of some deleterious substance. This is doubtless due to the fact that the preparation of food being such a commonplace matter, its important relations to health, mind, and body have been overlooked, and it has been regarded as a menial service which might be undertaken with little or no preparation, and without attention to matters other than those which relate to the pleasure of the eye and the palate. With taste only as a criterion, it is so easy to disguise the results of careless and improper cookery of food by the use of flavors and condiments, as well as to palm off upon the digestive organs all sorts of inferior material, that poor cookery has come to be the rule rather than the exception.

Methods of cooking.
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Cookery is the art of preparing food for the table by dressing, or by the application of heat in some manner. A proper source of heat having been secured, the next step is to apply it to the food in some manner. The principal methods commonly employed are roasting, broiling, baking, boiling, stewing, simmering, steaming, and frying.

Roasting is cooking food in its own juices before an open fire. Broiling, or grilling, is cooking by radiant heat. This method is only adapted to thin pieces of food with a considerable amount of surface. Larger and more compact foods should be roasted or baked. Roasting and broiling are allied in principle. In both, the work is chiefly done by the radiation of heat directly upon the surface of the food, although some heat is communicated by the hot air surrounding the food. The intense heat applied to the food soon sears its outer surfaces, and thus prevents the escape of its juices. If care be taken frequently to turn the food so that its entire surface will be thus acted upon, the interior of the mass is cooked by its own juices.

Baking is the cooking of food by dry heat in a closed oven. Only foods containing a considerable degree of moisture are adapted for cooking by this method. The hot, dry air which fills the oven is always thirsting for moisture, and will take from every moist substance to which it has access a quantity of water proportionate to its degree of heat. Foods containing but a small amount of moisture, unless protected in some manner from the action of the heated air, or in some way supplied with moisture during the cooking process, come from the oven dry, hard, and unpalatable.

Boiling is the cooking of food in a boiling liquid. Water is the usual medium employed for this purpose. When water is heated, as its temperature is increased, minute bubbles of air which have been dissolved by it are given off. As the temperature rises, bubbles of steam will begin to form at the bottom of the vessel. At first these will be condensed as they rise into the cooler water above, causing a simmering sound; but as the heat increases, the bubbles will rise higher and higher before collapsing, and in a short time will pass entirely through the water, escaping from its surface, causing more or less agitation, according to the rapidity with which they are formed. Water boils when the bubbles thus rise to the surface, and steam is thrown off. The mechanical action of the water is increased by rapid bubbling, but not the heat; and to boil anything violently does not expedite the cooking process, save that by the mechanical action of the water the food is broken into smaller pieces, which are for this reason more readily softened. But violent boiling occasions an enormous waste of fuel, and by driving away in the steam the volatile and savory elements of the food, renders it much less palatable, if not altogether tasteless. The solvent properties of water are so increased by heat that it permeates the food, rendering its hard and tough constituents soft and easy of digestion.

The liquids mostly employed in the cooking of foods are water and milk. Water is best suited for the cooking of most foods, but for such farinaceous foods as rice, macaroni, and farina, milk, or at least part milk, is preferable, as it adds to their nutritive value. In using milk for cooking purposes, it should be remembered that being more dense than water, when heated, less steam escapes, and consequently it boils sooner than does water. Then, too, milk being more dense, when it is used alone for cooking, a little larger quantity of fluid will be required than when water is used.

Steaming, as its name implies, is the cooking of food by the use of steam. There are several ways of steaming, the most common of which is by placing the food in a perforated dish over a vessel of boiling water. For foods not needing the solvent powers of water, or which already contain a large amount of moisture, this method is preferable to boiling. Another form of cooking, which is usually termed steaming, is that of placing the food, with or without water, as needed, in a closed vessel which is placed inside another vessel containing boiling water. Such an apparatus is termed a double boiler. Food cooked in its own juices in a covered dish in a hot oven, is sometimes spoken of as being steamed or smothered.

Stewing is the prolonged cooking of food in a small quantity of liquid, the temperature of which is just below the boiling point. Stewing should not be confounded with simmering, which is slow, steady boiling. The proper temperature for stewing is most easily secured by the use of the double boiler. The water in the outer vessel boils, while that in the inner vessel does not, being kept a little below the temperature of the water from which its heat is obtained, by the constant evaporation at a temperature a little below the boiling point.

Frying, which is the cooking of food in hot fat, is a method not to be recommended Unlike all the other food elements, fat is rendered less digestible by cooking. Doubtless it is for this reason that nature has provided those foods which require the most prolonged cooking to fit them for use with only a small proportion of fat, and it would seem to indicate that any food to be subjected to a high degree of heat should not be mixed and compounded largely of fats.

Along with the popularity of specialty coffee shops such as Starbucks and Caribou Coffee is an increased interest in espresso coffee. In order to understand what espresso coffee is, you also need to understand what espresso coffee is not. Espresso coffee is not a grind, or a variety, or even a roast of coffee, although each of these factors plays a part in the flavor of the coffee. If you order a shot of espresso at a coffeehouse or bar, you will get a small amount of slightly thick coffee with foam head on top. This reddish-brown foam is called crema and is another of the distinguishing characteristics of espresso coffee. Often hot foamed milk is added to the shot just before serving. Espresso is meant to be consumed quickly after preparation for maximum flavor and effect.

Espresso usually consists of a blend of several beans with a dark roast, so that the bean looks dark and oily. The grind is very find, almost powdered. The ground coffee is packed very tightly into the upper portion of the espresso machine. The lower portion of the machine contains water. As the water is heated and placed under pressure, it is forced upward through the tightly packed coffee above. Some espresso machines incorporate a pump rather than relying solely on the water under pressure.

Until the mid 1940’s the espresso machine relied on steam pressure to force the almost boiling water through the finely ground coffee. Since that time, the espresso machine has made use of a spring loaded pressure lever. Because the proper mix of time, water temperature and pressure is needed to make great espresso, baristas (those who prepare the espresso) has become a well-respected occupation in European espresso bars. Baristas take pride in the skill and efficiency in managing the perfect shot of espresso each time. The Starbucks chain has adopted the term ‘baristas’ to refer to the people who prepare and serve all their coffee beverages, but the same pride of a chosen career does not apply to workers in the United States.

The espresso machine with a pump has one-way valves to keep the heated water from flowing back into the cold water reservoir. Because the water is under pressure when it is forced through the ground coffee, it processes fairly rapidly, usually in a matter of seconds. The barista, or person who is preparing the espresso coffee dose, must control the factors of the fineness of the grind, the temperature of the hot water and the length of time before the water is brought to a pressure of 220 psi. Usually a 1.5 ounce shot takes less than half a minute.

Espresso is quite thick and tends to taste sweeter than non espresso preparations, because of the concentration of the essence of the coffee bean which is naturally somewhat sweet. Espresso contains almost twice as much caffeine as a cup of coffee, which means a shot of espresso is often used as a delivery method for the caffeine stimulant.

Espresso is also used as a base for numerous other coffee beverages such as mochas, lattes, macchiati, and cappuccinos because of its high flavor concentration and intensity. Adding ingredients such as milk, syrups, and water changes the nature of the beverage, but espresso purists look with amusement on all the frills which can be added as part of a Starbucks order.

It is a mistake to suppose that any room, however small and unpleasantly situated, is “good enough” for a kitchen. This is the room where housekeepers pass a great portion of their time, and it should be one of the brightest and most convenient rooms in the house; for upon the results of no other department depend so greatly the health and comfort of the family as upon those involved in this ‘household workshop’.

Every kitchen should have windows on two sides of the room, and the sun should have free entrance through them; the windows should open from the top to allow a complete change of air, for light and fresh air are among the chief essentials to success in all departments of the household. Good drainage should also be provided, and the ventilation of the kitchen ought to be even more carefully attended to than that of a sleeping room. The ventilation of the kitchen should be so ample as to thoroughly remove all gases and odors, which, together with steam from boiling and other cooking processes, generally invade and render to some degree unhealthful every other portion of the house.

There should be ample space for tables, chairs, range, sink, and cupboards, yet the room should not be so large as to necessitate too many steps. Undoubtedly much of the distaste for, and neglect of, “housework,” so often deplored, arises from unpleasant surroundings. If the kitchen be light, airy, and tidy, and the utensils bright and clean, the work of compounding those articles of food which grace the table and satisfy the appetite will be a pleasant task.

It is desirable, from a sanitary standpoint, that the kitchen floor be made impervious to moisture; hence, concrete or tile floors are better than wooden floors. Cleanliness is the great desideratum, and this can be best attained by having all woodwork in and about the kitchen coated with polish; substances which cause stain and grease spots, do not penetrate the wood when polished, and can be easily removed with a damp cloth.

The elements of beauty should not be lacking in the kitchen. Pictures and fancy articles are inappropriate; but a few pots of easily cultivated flowers on the window ledge or arranged upon brackets about the window in winter, and a window box arranged as a jardiniere, with vines and blooming plants in summer, will greatly brighten the room, and thus serve to lighten the task of those whose daily labor confines them to the precincts of the kitchen.

The kitchen furniture.
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The furniture for a kitchen should not be cumbersome, and should be so made and dressed as to be easily cleaned. There should be plenty of cupboards, and each for the sake of order, should be devoted to a special purpose. Cupboards with sliding doors are much superior to closets. They should be placed upon casters so as to be easily moved, as they, are thus not only more convenient, but admit of more thorough cleanliness.

Cupboards used for the storage of food should be well ventilated; otherwise, they furnish choice conditions for the development of mold and germs. Movable cupboards may be ventilated by means of openings in the top, and doors covered with very fine wire gauze which will admit the air but keep out flies and dust.

For ordinary kitchen uses, small tables of suitable height on easy-rolling casters, and with zinc tops, are the most convenient and most easily kept clean. It is quite as well that they be made without drawers, which are too apt to become receptacles for a heterogeneous mass of rubbish. If desirable to have some handy place for keeping articles which are frequently required for use, an arrangement similar to that represented in the accompanying cut may be made at very small expense. It may be also an advantage to arrange small shelves about and above the range, on which may be kept various articles necessary for cooking purposes.

One of the most indispensable articles of furnishing for a well-appointed kitchen, is a sink; however, a sink must be properly constructed and well cared for, or it is likely to become a source of great danger to the health of the inmates of the household. The sink should if possible stand out from the wall, so as to allow free access to all sides of it for the sake of cleanliness. The pipes and fixtures should be selected and placed by a competent plumber.

Great pains should be taken to keep the pipes clean and well disinfected. Refuse of all kinds should be kept out. Thoughtless housekeepers and careless domestics often allow greasy water and bits of table waste to find their way into the pipes. Drain pipes usually have a bend, or trap, through which water containing no sediment flows freely; but the melted grease which often passes into the pipes mixed with hot water, becomes cooled and solid as it descends, adhering to the pipes, and gradually accumulating until the drain is blocked, or the water passes through very slowly. A grease-lined pipe is a hotbed for disease germs.

Barley is stated by historians to be the oldest of all cultivated grains. It seems to have been the principal bread plant among the ancient Hebrews, Greeks, and Romans. The Jews especially held the grain in high esteem, and sacred history usually uses it interchangeably with wheat, when speaking of the fruits of the Earth.

Among the early Greeks and Romans, barley was almost the only food of the common people and the soldiers. The flour was made into gruel, after the following recipe: “Dry, near the fire or in the oven, twenty pounds of barley flour, then parch it. Add three pounds of linseed meal, half a pound of coriander seeds, two ounces of salt, and the water necessary.” If an especially delectable dish was desired, a little millet was also added to give the paste more “cohesion and delicacy.” Barley was also used whole as a food, in which case it was first parched, which is still the manner of preparing it in some parts of Palestine and many districts of India, also in the Canary Islands, where it is known as gofio .

In the time of Charles I, barley meal took the place of wheat almost entirely as the food of the common people in England. In some parts of Europe, India, and other Eastern countries, it is still largely consumed as the ordinary farinaceous food of the peasantry and soldiers. The early settlers of New England also largely used it for bread making.

Barley is less nutritious than wheat, and to many people is less agreeable in flavor. It is likewise somewhat inferior in point of digestibility. Its starch cells being less soluble, they offer more resistance to the gastric juice.

There are several distinct species of barley, but that most commonly cultivated is designated as two-rowed, or two-eared barley. In general structure, the barley grain resembles wheat and oats.

Simply deprived of its outer husk, the grain is termed Scotch milled or pot barley . Subjected still further to the process by which the fibrous outer coat of the grain is removed, it constitutes what is known as pearl barley . Pearl barley ground into flour is known as patent barley . Barley flour, owing to the fact that it contains so small a proportion of gluten, needs to be mixed with wheaten flour for bread-making purposes. When added in small quantity to whole-wheat bread, it has a tendency to keep the loaf moist, and is thought by some to improve the flavor.

The most general use made of this cereal as a food, is in the form of pearl, or Scotch, barley. When well boiled, barley requires about two hours for digestion.

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