In the lush northern hills of Thailand, there is a new, yet extravagantly expensive, coffee being brewed using elephants and the dung they excrete.
In this jungle retreat, there is a herd of 20 elephants that is fed the pure cherries from the Arabica variety are mixed with fruit, rice, nuts, and seeds. The cherries are harvested a day later by women of the village, from the dung. After a thorough washing, the beans are extracted and sent to a roaster in
The Black Ivory coffee is hailed as having a sweet, earthy, mellow flavor and being smooth on the palate.
When an elephant eats the beans a chemical reaction in the elephants stomach breaks down the protein in the coffee. The proteins in coffee give it its bitterness, so breaking it down leads to a gourmet coffee that is smooth.
The elephants giant stomach plays another important role in the creation of the coffee’s flavor. Think of the elephant as the animal kingdom’s equivalent of a slow cooker. “It takes between 15-30 hours to digest the beans, which stew together with bananas, sugar cane and other ingredients in the elephant’s vegetarian diet to infuse unique earthy and fruity flavours”, said Blake Dinkin, the 42-year-old Canadian, who has a background in civet coffee.
Dinkin says: “My theory is that a natural fermentation process takes place in the elephant’s gut. That fermentation imparts flavours you wouldn’t get from other
coffees.”
Black Ivory’s maiden batch of 150 pounds has sold out. Dinkin hopes to crank out six times that amount in 2013. For now, only the wealthy or well-travelled have access to Black Ivory Coffee. It was
launched last month at a few luxury hotels in remote corners of the world – first in northern Thailand, then the Maldives and now Abu Dhabi – with the price tag of more than 30 dollars a cup.
SnStarr Productions 