Why don’t people in China drink the coffee they produce?
By Alessandro Carosi - I was travelling in China for a couple of weeks; I’d never been to this part of Asia before, but I was keen to learn a bit more about it and, whilst I was there, to explore its coffee scene. It’s still in its infancy, but interest in the drink is growing rapidly.

Tea culture is still very strong and tea remains the most widely consumed drink. In smaller towns or those less well-known internationally, finding a specialty coffee shop is a challenge, but in cities like Shanghai, there are coffee shops on every corner, including many high-end establishments where coffee is treated with great care. Coffee isn’t a drink to be grabbed and gone with, but something to be looked forward to with anticipation and joy, as if waiting for the woman you love on a first date. If not done properly, making coffee can take up to 20 minutes: the beans are selected, the best ones are chosen, and everything is prepared with care and attention to detail; every coffee granule must be the same size, and once it’s ready, it’s tasted; if it isn’t good, the whole process is started all over again. It was a pleasant surprise.

One thing struck me as very odd, though: none of the coffee shops I visited – not even the one owned by the 2024 World Roasting Champion – uses Chinese coffee. It’s been over ten years now since the plantations in the Yunnan region have been producing beans of a certain quality; it’s becoming easier and easier to find them in London, but nowhere in China. Why is that? I asked around a bit and the answer was always the same: the Chinese don’t like the coffee they produce. But it sounds a bit like a lie to me. In London and Paris, I’ve bought several very good anaerobic coffees, even though I’ve had enough of fermented coffees that all taste the same. And that’s exactly what I found in specialty Chinese coffee shops: Ethiopian or Colombian coffees with experimental processing methods that have practically the same flavours … anextraordinaryandordinarylife…