The Sound of the Machete

There is a certain sound that metal-on-plant makes. As the force of a swinging machete hits tree branches, plant stalks, … More

There’s Something Special about Potenciana Coffee

Arabica coffee (the smooth mild stuff) grows best in volcanic soil at least 1400 meters (~4500 feet) above sea level. … More

No direct trade coffee farm is complete without the coffee shelf. The requisite installation includes bags of beans from all … More

Growing coffee always requires a strategy, often one informed by understanding what’s happening the coffee world over. In Costa Rica … More

Coffee is in many ways comparable to wine (see Wine is to Coffee), but it separates itself as the more … More

About a month into my trip I was skyping with one of my best friends and he asked me, … More

If your coffee comes with a tag of organic or fair trade or single origin, do you believe it? If … More

I spent 9 days living in a Ngöbe indigenous reserve in the Bocas del Toro province on Panama’s Northern Caribbean … More

Familiar– (adj) of or pertaining to family. Una empresa familiar. A family business. Coffee, at any stage in the chain, … More

Living a city that never sleeps in a highly developed nation in a fully globalized world, sometimes it’s hard to … More

When Coffee Speaks, it says, “hola Nueva York!” I’ll be in back in home sweet NYC for a week in … More

“It’s too bad that the economic compensation isn’t that fair, but that doesn’t negate, doesn’t impact the pride that I … More

The goal of the final book When Coffee Speaks is to share the stories that coffee growers (and other … More

Cedral is a small mountain community in southern Costa Rica with a school, two tiny stores, a church, a Boy … More

Coffee cherries being loaded from the receiver into the beneficio truck. Costa Rica and Nicaragua: two countries with histories and … More