The most famous coffee origin story comes from Ethiopia, around 1,200 years ago. A goat herder named Kaldi supposedly noticed that his goats became bouncy and refused to sleep after nibbling the red berries from a certain bush. He tried them himself, felt a buzz, and shared his discovery with the local monastery.
The monks were doubtful and tossed the berries into a fire - which roasted them and released the rich smell we now know as coffee. They scooped the beans out, ground them up, and brewed the world’s first cup. Whether the story is true or not, Ethiopia is genuinely where the coffee plant first grew wild.
From Ethiopia, coffee spread to Yemen, then to the Middle East, then to Europe in the 1500s. Today coffee is grown in more than 70 countries across the “coffee belt” around the equator. People drink an estimated 2 billion cups every day worldwide. Goats can take partial credit for all of it.
