Manifest Bean: Go West, Young Coffee

Have you ever sat down at a coffee shop, ordered yourself a latte, and found yourself thinking, "Who thought this thing up? Why does this delicious mixture of pressure-extracted coffee and steamed milk exist?" or perhaps a slightly more existential, "How did someone living in America come to drink something made from the ground, roasted seed of the fruit of a tree that originated from Ethiopia?" Okay, you've probably never asked that question, but if you are asking it now you're in luck: mysteries like this baffle and delight me to no end.

"The door is open... but it can be closed... but it's not? THIS IS AMAZING?" -Me everyday
"Problems, problems..." by Ion Chibzii is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0

Let's start with the origin stories. There's a few. I've mentioned the myth about the Ethiopian goatherd in my first post ever (oh what a young foolish man I was...), but that story didn't appear in print until 1671, a rather suspicious 800 years after it supposedly took place. Other origins attribute either the avian observations of a Sufi mystic or the desert wanderings of exiled disciple of a Sheik (his discovery of coffee not only revoked his exiled status but got him honored as a saint, because, well, you know, coffee!), but as before, it's unclear how exactly coffee was "discovered."

The best guess is that the the tribesman of Ethiopia consumed coffee fruit for its stimulating properties, and at some point a visiter from Yemen tried it and thought it was rather swell. What we do know is that the first written evidence of coffee, as we know it, was in the 15th century in the Sufi monasteries in Yemen, used to keep them alert during prayers. This precious beverage was given the name qahwah, which had originally meant wine.

Except when you drink too much of this wine you just start pretending that you're getting a lot of work done.
Photo by Scott Feldstein is licensed under CC BY 2.0

In its early years, coffee lived a mostly religious life,  doing it's prayers and being a good boy. It was mostly found in areas of Sufi influence, with coffeehouses first popping up around a religious university in Cairo, but coffee quickly spread across the Ottoman empire. The bad news for coffee was that as soon as it stepped out into the world, it's reputation started to sour (or perhaps I should say bitter? sorry). In 1511 coffee was banned by conservative Imams for fear of it being too stimulating, possibly encouraging wandering thoughts, or worse, outright rebellion. Lucky for us the people's love of coffee was so great that the ban only managed to last fifteen years.

In Europe coffee was less liked, with no small part of that caused by its association with Islam. Viewed as the Devil's beverage, the drink of infidels, and all manner of other insults you may apply to potable liquids, coffee was shunned if not outright banned in most of Europe.

"Such mudslop! Truly this is the bitter invention Satan."
Wink by Chris Blakely is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

That is until Pope Clement VIII was pressured by some of advisers to officially declare coffee the drink of sin in 1600, or so the rumor goes. The advisers may not have thought the plan throw and it backfired a little; Clement decided he had to try the drink first to make his decision, and after a taste he supposedly said, "This devil's drink is so delicious...we should cheat the devil by baptizing it!" Fanciful at best, but I do personally like thinking my coffee has received official Papal approval.

It wasn't long after that coffee spread throughout Europe, with coffee shops becoming the new place for thinkers to gather to exchange ideas. Coffeehouses earned the nickname "penny universities" because for the price of a cup of coffee you could join in on conversations about almost anything with the educated elite. The effect was similar to when the internet first kicked off, although probably with less 12-year olds practicing their curses and all the other unsavory bits.

Who could debase anything wearing wigs like those?
The white powder prevented any and all wrongdoings, I'm sure.

"Wait, they can do what to us?"
-The Low Class, on Coffee

In fact, egalitarian ideas, shifts of power, and, slightly less fortunately, rebellion, seemed to follow coffee where ever it went. One might venture to say that coffee may have been the substance the gave people the power to fight for the rights that they deserved. Or, one could observe that the rise of coffeehouses gave people something safe to drink that wasn't alcoholic, and perhaps all the people needed to do was sober up a little and realize they were being toyed with.

Keep an eye out for the next history post, where I'll go over coffee's travel from Europe to the rest of the world.

Bigger Than Caffeine: Coffee and Rwanda

Coffee may be your morning routine. It might be the fuel that gets you going, or it may be your culinary indulgence. But what does coffee mean for the people growing it?

The first thoughts that come to mind when someone mentions Rwanda aren’t pleasant. Being the home of one of the largest genocides of this generation, it’s hard to imagine thinking of much else. But this is changing, and it’s possible that in a few decades the first thing you will think of when you think Rwanda will be coffee. Damned good coffee at that.

Made by some pretty awesome people.

Coffee has been hanging around Rwanda for a long time: small farms were forced to grow it in the Belgian colonial era of the 1930s, planting the arabica species of the coffee plant (keep that in mind). In the early 90’s coffee was the majority of exports, but the chaos decimated the coffee infrastructure, and with significantly less people to work the farms and almost no way to process the beans, the coffee industry dwindled.

Looking at the country now, it’s hard to imagine Rwanda not having world-class coffee: coffee has been a major crop for decades, the country is still filled with the heirloom arabica trees when many other countries replaced theirs with the tough-as-nails-quantity-over-quality robusta trees and the climate is about as perfect as one could hope for growing coffee.

Pictured: Coffee heaven. If you look really hard and maybe cross your eyes you’ll see angelic coffee beans playing harps.
Photo by Amakuru is licensed under CC-BY-SA-2.0

The transition from barely functioning, C-grade coffee production (read: Folger’s) to top class, “let’s sell this at $22 a pound at Starbucks and call it ‘black apron,’ whatever that means,” didn’t happen overnight. Or by accident.

“Oops, I accidentally made great coffee. It just kinda happened” -No One Ever

When President Paul Kagame stepped into office, he realized that coffee could revive the destitute economy and released control of the production back to the farmers. Then, working with US Agency for International Development, an organization named PEARL taught Rwandans better farming practices as well as how to cup coffee and control quality of their product, filling the gaps left from the genocide. 

After learning more about what they were producing, the Rwandan farmers were able to see what they were growing as a craft, not something they were forced to grow, and began to care about what they made. Stepping into the craft coffee industry also meant farmers were able to more than double their incomes. This has helped some famers immensely, but many are still trying to find ways of getting their coffee to processing stations and then to the market, meaning sometimes they have an amazing product, but no way to sell it.

The fireman carrying should be saved for firemen, and maybe adventurous honeymooners.
Photo by Hanoi Mark is licensed under CC-BY-NC 2.0

The question now is, have you tasted any of the delicious coffee from Rwanda? And if not, would you like to? You can find Rwandan coffee at many well-respected roasters across the country, but if you’re in Portland you can buy a pound of Rwandan at Arabica, with beans we source from the local Rwanda Bean Company. If you’re lucky you can stop by our Commercial St. location on July 15th for our Rwanda Benefit, you'll be able to try some of our Rwandan coffee and learn about the importance of coffee in Rwanda from the man who sources it for us.

Learn more about the event here, or see how you can help the farmers continue their craft here. And the next time you see some Rwandan coffee in a shop somewhere, remember the words of Zac Nsenga, former Rwandan ambassador to the United States: “The more you consume coffee from Rwanda, the more you give Rwanda hope. It’s the quality and the story behind it that makes it special.”

(P.S. If you’re interested in learning more about Rwanda’s history and coffee’s place in that, please read this wonderful piece in the New York Times by Laura Fraser and this interview on NPR by Michaeleen Doucleff. This blog wouldn't be possible without either of these pieces.)