Today, I learned how to make coffee. At one point, Ecuador was the top global exporter of coffee—Hermania and Alvino, true Ecuadorians, grow, harvest, and roast their own beans. Hermania was very amused and delighted with the idea that I wanted to document each step of the coffee-making process. Since the whole procedure is so work-intensive, she makes about enough for two months each time she roasts and grinds the beans.
The coffee fruit grow on shiny-leafed trees and are harvested by hand--the ripe fruit are red.
Alvino’s brother owns a machine that processes the fruit to separate the outer skin from the white, mucous-covered seeds. After processing, the naked beans are dried in the sun.
Hermania roasts the dried beans over a fire in a ceramic dish (a family friend, Myra, watches). She stirs the beans constantly to roast them evenly, and whenever the wind changes direction, which is often, she needs to reposition herself to avoid the smoke.
After about twenty minutes, the smoke starts to smell sweet and rich. When the beans are entirely roasted, they are set out in a large tray to cool a bit.
My 10-year-old host brother David and I take turns on the hand-crank to grind the beans. One of us turns the crank, while the other feeds the beans in very slowly. We spend about an hour with one-third of the batch (one roasting dish worth) and leave the rest for Alvino and another man who helps on the farm.
Hermania makes the coffee with a sieve and a piece of cloth. Sometimes we have it with milk, sometimes with water, but always with a very generous helping of sugar.
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