The Coffee Cherry

 The coffee cherry is called a cherry primarily because it is about the same size, shape and colour as an actual cherry. Beneath the bright red skin is the pulp, a sweet, sticky yellow substance, which becomes slim towards the center of the fruit, where it surrounds the coffee beans, which are actually the seeds. There are normally two beans per cherry, facing each other's flat side, like peanut halves. On the surface of the beans is a very thin, special membrane called the silver skin. Each bean is encased in a tough, cream-coloured, protective bean-shaped shell, or jacket.
 Beans destined to be seed beans for growing new coffee plants must remain in their parchment (leaf) if they are to sprout.

 Normal coffee-trees sometimes produce a few smaller-than -average cherries in which only one bean forms. This single bean, called variously a peaberry, perla or caracol, will not have a flat side;rather it will be small and almost completely round. Sorted out and collected  together, peaberries sell at a slightly higher price than do normal coffee beans from same trees.
  Many say that the peaberry flavour is better, although it may just be that, because of the special sorting, few, if any, defective beans are able to slip through.