Seed to Cup






What an incredible day it was… Possibly going to be the winner for the best day of the trip! We had the amazing opportunity to go up to the coffee field with Gabriel, one of the coffee farmers, and learn about the overall process of how coffee is made, beginning with harvesting and ending with tasting freshly made coffee. I felt completely content today in the coffee fields with the amazing scenery sounding us, it was pretty surreal. Gabriel talked about the process of growing the coffee seedlings for a year down in the houses and then transporting them to the fields in June. It then takes the coffee plants 4-5 years before they produce a full harvest. Every 15-20 years they prune the plants to the stump to generate new growth. All of this was really interesting to me and I really enjoyed focusing on learning about coffee production. We went back to Gabriel’s house for lunch and then continued discussing coffee over a classic Guatemalan meal. After lunch we actually got to depulp the 90lbs of coffee we picked as a group. Reallyyyy cool! Gabriel said they always depulp the coffee as soon as possible to prevent fermentation from occurring while the beans are still inside the fruit. After they remove the pulp, they let the beans sit in a big bowl for 24 hours before they dry the beans on the roof!     


After this Gabriel and his wife roasted some of the beans that were already green coffee on the stove. Then we actually got to hand grind them before getting to pour hot water over the coffee grounds and drink some freshly made coffee! What a day. I have learned so much today about coffee that I never knew... It definitely makes me want to support small time coffee farmers because of how much hard work they put into making a single cup of coffee.  
I'm sold. Guatemala is beautiful and the coffee is truly delicious. 

My best,

Audrey Kroeger

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