Cafe (Coffee)

During our first week here, we got the opportunity to visit a local coffee grower and discover the wonders of this process. Coffee is a hot commodity around this area since this is a good altitude at which to grow it. Though I previously didn't share much interest in coffee since I don't drink it, I still find it to be a interesting process, and it was a great experience to see it from start to finish.



(coffee plant in it's early stages) Before coffee can even be harvested, the plant must grow for 2 to 3 years. Because of this, it's a plant that a lot is invested in because if the coffee plant doesn't make it the first time, there are another two or three years that are necessary to wait for another plant. Because of this, they are done in intervals.




The contraption used above was used in the past as a way to remove the casings from the coffee beans. Interestingly, it doesn't smash the beans, but does create a mulch type texture for the seed casing which the coffee growers use to create the bags in which to sell the coffee. That's recycling people!



Here we can see the coffee beans in the various stages of roasting (2x), harvesting, etc. The bottom left is the dark roast and the bottom right is the medium roast. After our tour, we all got a chance to taste the coffee from the farm. Though I am not a coffee drinker generally, I did enjoy this coffee with lots of cream and sugar. For those people that are coffee drinkers in our group, they are now officially addicted. lol