Coffee

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Coffee beans hail from the coffee plant. The bean itself is the pit inside the red or purple fruit (cherry). The plant itself is a tropical or subtropical bush or small tree with dark green leaves. Ground coffee beans can be used to brew coffee or as an ingredient in energy tea.

Eating a coffee bean, or drinking strong enough coffee, will result in the opposite of being drunk. While this is presumably a cure for too much alcohol, the latter may also be a cure for too much sobriety.

Coffee beans

This is a rare bush which seems to be growing happily outside its native environment. 
On it are small red pods which resemble... coffee beans?

Coffee beans can be found at the following places:

One coffee bean yields 5 pinches of ground coffee.

Coffee beans can, in conjunction with water, be used in a coffee machine to make coffee of various strengths.

Brewing coffee

A coffee machine may be purchased in the coffee stall that sometimes appears in the Djelibeybi bazaar. It is used by placing coffee beans and water in it, then pushing the button.

You push the button on your coffee machine.
The sound of muttering and swearing emanates from your coffee machine.
Your coffee machine starts to judder alarmingly.
The distinct sound of a handle being turned drifts out from your coffee machine.
Steam shoots out from your coffee machine.
Your coffee machine grows eerily quiet.  All that can be heard is a fading stream of invective from somewhere deep within its workings.
The glorious smell of coffee drifts from your machine.

Depending on the ratio of coffee beans to water, it can make three different strengths of coffee: Klatchian coffee, black coffee, or very weak black coffee.

The machine will hold up to a pint, but you can use as little as one coffee bean and one drop of water (which creates one drop of Klatchian coffee). The amount of coffee created appears to be equal to the amount of water used.

Note that if the wrong ingredients are used--for example, chocolate-covered coffee beans, or already-brewed coffee--then "bad slime" will be produced instead of coffee.

Another important note is that if you add something--milk, sugar, or water--to coffee that's still in the machine, the reaction won't take place and it won't work: you have to pour it into another vessel first.

Klatchian coffee

Klatchian coffee may be brewed by adding at least 50 beans to the coffee machine before filling the rest with water. To brew smaller amounts, the ratio needs to be under 40 drops of water per bean.

Real Klatchian coffee.  It is so strong that it can take you through sobriety to the other side.  Coffee lovers tend to get carefully drunk before tasting this stuff.

Klatchian coffee is quite strong, and will get the drinker knurd. Adding water can dilute it into black coffee, or into very weak black coffee.

Black coffee

Black coffee will be created if you add 15-50 beans to the machine before filling it with water. For smaller amounts, black coffee is created when the ratio is between 40 and 169 drops of water per bean.

That's black coffee.  It looks quite strong, although it's nothing in comparison to the Klatchian stuff.

Black coffee is fairly strong, and will get the drinker slightly knurd. Adding water can dilute it into very weak black coffee.

You can also add milk to turn it into white coffee...

Freshly brewed coffee mixed with fresh, creamy milk.

...sugar to turn it into sweet coffee...

This is black coffee, pure and simple.  Except, wait, not so simple.  Someone has put sugar in it and made it all sweet!

...or both to turn it into sweet white coffee:

Freshly brewed coffee has been mixed with milk and sugar to create a drink perfect for those who like the idea of coffee, but wish it was perhaps not quite so full-on.

Milk will fully "react" with black coffee when added in ratios between at least one part milk to twelve parts black coffee, all the way up to one part milk to three parts black coffee.

All of these variations have different appearances, and a variety of messages when drunk.

Variants with sugar will give you a sugar high as well.

Very weak black coffee

Very weak black coffee will be brewed if fewer than 15 beans are added to the machine before it is filled with water. For smaller amounts, very weak black coffee is created when the ratio is at least 170 drops of water per bean.

This is black coffee, of a sort.  Although it does smell faintly of coffee, it looks more reminiscent of dirty water than the deep, rich colour that one might expect from a proper brew.

Very weak black coffee will not get the drinker knurd.

Milk can be added to this variety, too, turning it into very weak white coffee:

This is white coffee, of a sort.  Actually it looks like more of a mix of water and milk, with just a very faint hint of coffee colour.  Apparently some people like that sort of thing.

Very weak white coffee may also be created by diluting white coffee or sweet white coffee with water.

There do not appear to be "sweet" variants of very weak black or white coffee: sweet coffee will turn into very weak black coffee when diluted with water, and sweet white coffee will turn into very weak white coffee when diluted.

Spiced coffee

If you add spices to the coffee machine before pushing the button, spiced coffee will be made. To make spiced coffee, the ratio of beans to water must be in the same range as that which makes "black coffee". Spiced coffee makes you knurd.

The following spices may be used when brewing coffee:

There may be others that work.  research If this has been marked on a page, it's because there was something that probably isn't known, that the person who edited the page thinks could be found out. Perhaps you could figure this thing out, and be famous evermore. 

It seems that you can add up to about one pinch/bud of a spice per bean--any more than that of any particular spice, and you'll create bad slime instead (with the exception that if you're only using one bean, you may use two pinches of a spice). Note, though, that you could create spiced coffee from--for example--forty drops of water, one bean, one pinch cardamom, one pinch cinnamon, one clove bud, and one pinch nutmeg.

You can add up to three spices and they'll be distinguishable in the final product. Otherwise, you get this:

This coffee has been brewed with a mix of spices, too many to identify individually.

Instead of this:

This coffee has been brewed with [spices].

If the ratio of spices to water is too low, you get this:

This coffee has apparently been brewed with some sort of spice (or spices), but not enough of it (or them) to make much difference.

This happens when there are at least six hundred drops of water per bud or pinch of spice.

The appearance and taste of the coffee will be different depending on what spices you used, and in what ratios. Spiced coffee may be mixed with other spiced coffee, which may affect the spice ratios.

When drunk, spiced coffee gives a variety of messages. Each sip will likely be different from the last! Here are a few examples:

  • "A gentle hint of cinnamon can be discerned behind the woody cloves and warming cardamom as you drink a drop of spiced coffee."
  • "Warming cloves and resinous cardamom blend with the mellow smoothness of roasted coffee beans as you drink a drop of spiced coffee, with a hint of woodiness coming through from the cinnamon in the background."
  • "The woody flavour of cloves tries to stand up to the warming flavour of cinnamon as you drink a drop of spiced coffee. Warmth wins the fight by a mile."
  • "The rich darkness of roasted coffee beans mingles with the woodiness of cinnamon as you drink a tablespoon of spiced coffee."
  • "You drink a drop of spiced coffee, savouring the nutty, sweet and warming balance of nutmeg, cinnamon and cardamom."
  • "The mellow smoothness of roasted coffee beans comes through clearly as you drink a drop of spiced coffee, but the plethora of spices used in the mix makes it hard to detect any other individual flavours."
  • "Faint hints of spice tease your tastebuds as you drink a drop of spiced coffee, but the flavour is too weak for you to be able to identify them behind the coffee itself."

See also