Tracing the origins of coffee back to Sufi Islam: Journalist Abdul-Rehman Malik traces the “forgotten history” of the coffee bean for a BBC documentary. Originating in Ethiopia, finding its spiritual home in the Yemen, evading zealots and Sultans from Mecca to Constantinople, defying prejudice from Vienna to London — coffee made its mark wherever it went, facilitating radical new forms of social exchange. Malik discovers that coffee was popularised by Sufi mystics in the Yemen who used the drink as a way of energising themselves during their nocturnal devotions. On his journey, he finds that coffee was drunk in the sacred Mosque of Mecca itself — until the religious authorities issued a fatwa against it in the 16th Century. The drink that fuels us in early mornings and late nights also had a history of being persecuted by authorities in this part of the world. With no pub-culture, coffee-houses were the very first spaces where people of all social classes could come together to discuss news and gossip. Now coffee has taken over the world and we’re obsessed with it (runtime 29:45).