CELPIP Reading Part 3 Practice Test: Arabica and Robusta

Paragraph A

Virtually all coffee traces to just two species, whose cultivation demands and flavour profiles diverge sharply. Arabica accounts for roughly two-thirds of global consumption and yields the smoother, more delicate cup, yet it is a temperamental plant requiring high elevation, moderate temperatures and constant vigilance against insects and disease. Robusta, true to its name, is considerably more resilient: it tolerates low, hot terrain, carries nearly double the caffeine content, and produces a harsher, more bitter beverage. It is that coarser product which eventually finds its way into instant coffee.

Paragraph B

The most familiar origin story centres on Kaldi, an Ethiopian goatherd whose animals reportedly grew agitated after grazing on certain red berries. The tale is almost certainly apocryphal, since it did not appear in print until 1671, long after the beverage was demonstrably in circulation among the devout of Yemen. The species itself appears to have originated in the highland forests of Ethiopia, where wild populations still display far greater genetic diversity than anywhere else on earth. In the Yemeni port of Mocha, meanwhile, Sufi mystics brewed the drink to sustain themselves through prolonged nocturnal devotions, making the earliest documented consumption a religious rather than a sociable pursuit.

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From Yemen the custom spread northward, and by roughly 1555 coffee houses were thriving in Istanbul. Quiet establishments they were not: patrons gathered to argue, to trade and to gather gossip. Venetian merchants, already engaged in commerce with Ottoman ports, are generally credited with introducing the beverage to Europe, and their city opened the continent's first coffeehouse in the mid-seventeenth century. England took up the fashion within a few years, and in London such premises earned the nickname penny universities, since the price of a single cup bought a seat in the conversation. Paris and Vienna followed before the century closed, Vienna not long after the Ottoman siege.

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Commercial cultivation is confined to a broad tropical band flanking the equator, and within that band growers confront a series of consequential choices. Trees allowed to ripen slowly beneath a forest canopy yield a diminished harvest, whereas trees planted in open sunlight mature faster and generally demand additional fertilizer. Once picked, the berries are either washed, a process that strips away the fruit before the beans are dried, or spread whole in the sun to dry unprocessed. Even the discarded skins are put to use, since in Ethiopia and Yemen they are dried and steeped into a light, fruity infusion called qishr.

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Not given in any of the above paragraphs.