Kona: Nurturing the Bean from Field to Cup

The Kona coffee bean can only be designated as such if it comes from the one place in the world where it is grown – Kona, Hawaii. As we discussed last week, the volcanic nutrients make Kona’s soil a unique and highly hospitable location in which to grow coffee. In addition to the soil nutrients, Kona’s successful cultivation also depends on a specific combination of sun and water. Kona’s climate offers sunny mornings, rainy afternoons and cool, comfortable evenings, which result in an ideal combination of weather factors to Kona coffee plants.

Kona is cultivated on the Big Island of Hawaii in the North and South Kona Districts, where it grows on the slopes of Mount Hualalau and Mauna Loa. Despite the generosity of Princess Bernice’s KSBE land grant in the late 19th Century, the acreage on which Kona can grow is limited to fewer than 3,000 acres by the size of the North and South Kona districts, making Kona coffee one of the most sought-after and expensive coffees in the world.



But how does the Kona plant produce the green beans that eventually are roasted to a rich brown color and ground to make your cup of Kona? To answer this question, I rely upon my relationships with Kona growers, who let me know annually the rate of growth of the crop. Typically, Kona coffee plants bloom in February and March, producing exquisite white flowers on the coffee trees and which the growers refer to as “Kona Snow.” In April, green berries appear on the branches, and by late August a red fruit, commonly called “cherry” due to its resemblance to that ripe berry, are ripe for picking. The Kona farmers then pick the cherries from the coffee branches by hand, plucking each tree of its cherries several times between August and January, whereupon the annual crop cycle begins anew. During the harvest, each coffee tree will yield about 20 pounds of cherries. “Kona Snow” never ceases to take my breath away, but what really impresses me is this: it takes seven pounds of cherries to make one pound of roasted coffee.


The farmers then take the picked cherries and run them through a coffee pulper, which separates the cherries’ beans (there are two beans per cherry) from the fruity pulp. After this separation, the beans are placed in a fermentation tank for approximately 12 hours. They are then removed, rinsed and spread to dry on a drying rack in the sun, which usually has a cover to protect the beans from becoming wet again in the event of rain. After the beans have dried completely (usually after one to two weeks), the beans are stored (they are now dried green beans) prior to roasting.