Roasted coffee beans. Any of the seeds from several species of shrubs of the genus Coffea are used to make coffee. The drink is made with beans which have been roasted and ground. The Coffea genus is originally native to Ethiopia and now cultivated throughout the tropics. Coffee drinking began in Arab regions in the 14th century but did not become common in Europe until 300 years later, when the first coffee houses were opened in Vienna, Paris and London.