Making Kahawa

Spoiler Alert!  This story gives away what I am going to be bringing back for my grandmothers, so if  you are one of my grandmothers and you want it to be a surprise, stop reading now.  If you are not one of my grandmothers, feel free to read, but don’t tell them what they are getting.

Besides tourism, Tanzania is also known for it’s coffee (or kahawa in Swahili) industry.  Here at Peace Matunda, cultural tours are offered, and part of the tour is making coffee.  As in roasting and grinding by hand. Not putting some grounds in a percolator.  Since both of my grandmothers like coffee, I thought it would be cool to make them some while I was here so I can take them back some coffee that was ground with love.

Here is a picture of the beans and the flower from the coffee tree.  

Kahawa Beans and Flower

 But when you buy it at the market, the outer shell has been taken off and it has been dried.  After waiting for the beans to dry, you have to grind them to get the flaky outer shell off the beans.  And to separate the flakes from the beans, you flip them up and around and let the wind whisk away the flakes and leave the beans.  I was completely unable to do this, but Bella is a pro.

Bella Flipping Beans

 

 

We were finally ready to start the roasting.  We put the beans in a small pot over a fire and stirred and stirred so they didn’t burn.  We were allowed to stir for shorts periods of time, but we were always told to give the spoon back to let the experts do it.  I was never pole pole enough.   

Me Stirring Kahawa Beans

Once they turn a nice dark brown color, it was time to dump them in the grinder thingy and start pounding.  Pounding the roasted beans by hand could become a tedious process, and it was definitely an arm workout.  And we had 10 kilograms of coffee to roast and pound.  Even though it was tough, we split it up over a period of several days (and really, it was more like several weeks), and made a rule to not drink any bokery or banana beer until the roasting and pounding of the day was done.  Here is me getting serious about the pounding:

Serious Pounding