wild coffee
- noun
- US
:
café silvestre
- In areas where wild coffee grows, you can find vibrant purple flowers among the lush foliage.
Examples
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Chances are, you have never tasted wild coffee.
Blog text (15) -
Many people enjoy the unique flavor of wild coffee when hiking in the rainforest.
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The herbalist recommended trying wild coffee for its distinct taste and natural health benefits.
Synonyms
A rough wild American plant with large leaves that meet around the stem and purple or dull red flowers
A rough wild plant from eastern North America with large leaves and purple or dull red flowers
A coarse American wild herb with large leaves that wrap the stem and purple or dull red flowers
A rough wild plant from America with large leaves and purple or red flowers
Surface Forms
Morphology
wild + coffee
The noun phrase is a straightforward adjective + noun composition: 'wild' (growing naturally, untamed) + 'coffee' yields the sense of coffee that grows in the wild or a wild species related to coffee. This compositional pattern is common and cross-linguistically regular, so a B1 learner who knows the two constituents would readily infer the intended meaning.
Etymology
Wild coffee got its name from the plant's look: its small red berries and leaves can remind people of the real coffee plant, and it grows wild in forests rather than on farms. That's why the name describes a wild plant that looks like coffee.
