TIME WAS if you wanted the world's most expensive cup of coffee, you had to go to your steaming pile of Paradoxorus dung on the Indonesian Island of Sumatra. These small jungle mammals eat the red coffee cherries and through the miracle of digestion, produce a nicely fermented bean some time later. It was discovered (we'd love to know how) that these specially treated coffee beans produced a superior cup of joe, and a high end coffee industry was born. (More details here).
Well. Shandy Pockets recently visited the Siam Hotel in Bangkok, a swanky urban resort where we spied Elephant Dung Coffee being advertised in their deli at £25/$40 a throw. We weren't quite intrigued enough to actually buy a cup, but we DID inquire as to its origins. Seems the beans are grown, ingested and secreted by a troupe of elephants in Northern Thailand, and not just ANY beans, eaten willy-nilly off the trees. No, the beans are the finest, hand-picked Arabica beans, grown on a small estate and then mixed with fruit and rice for the elephants to feast on.
Although the theory to the Paradoxorus coffee is similar, thanks to its massive gut, the elephant is more like a slow cooker than the mammal microwave, and so the result is said to be much smoother. It's served in a funky, steampunk-looking contraption if that makes the price tag any more palatable? (See photos of the process)
EDIT: As noted in the comments section, a portion of the profits are ploughed back into elephant conservation, and the prices quoted do get you six servings. So do give it a try if you get the chance...
Well. Shandy Pockets recently visited the Siam Hotel in Bangkok, a swanky urban resort where we spied Elephant Dung Coffee being advertised in their deli at £25/$40 a throw. We weren't quite intrigued enough to actually buy a cup, but we DID inquire as to its origins. Seems the beans are grown, ingested and secreted by a troupe of elephants in Northern Thailand, and not just ANY beans, eaten willy-nilly off the trees. No, the beans are the finest, hand-picked Arabica beans, grown on a small estate and then mixed with fruit and rice for the elephants to feast on.
Although the theory to the Paradoxorus coffee is similar, thanks to its massive gut, the elephant is more like a slow cooker than the mammal microwave, and so the result is said to be much smoother. It's served in a funky, steampunk-looking contraption if that makes the price tag any more palatable? (See photos of the process)
EDIT: As noted in the comments section, a portion of the profits are ploughed back into elephant conservation, and the prices quoted do get you six servings. So do give it a try if you get the chance...
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