The coffee plant (or rather tree!) botanically known as Coffea arabica, can earn you kudos from coffee snobs if you can manage to grow it successfully in your sitting room as an indoor plant.
Why should you try it
It is a very ornamental novelty plant with dark, shiny leaves and fragrant white flowers. If all goes well, it can soon become a large plant, but it can luckily be pruned into a manageable level which commercial coffee growers often do.
If you want to try your hand at this pretty plant simply for bragging purposes, (you will only get a harvest of beans after a number of years), plant it in a good sized pot in slightly acidic soil, which drains very well.
Water well and spritz it regularly in hot weather, as it loves high humidity. Keep it in good light but not in hot spots, as it likes cool growing conditions.
If you are still unsure about the right growing conditions, just remember that the coffee tree naturally grows in the shade of other trees in tropical East Africa.
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