I was lucky enough to be invited to an organic coffee plantation called, Café González by mi amiga Andrea. Café González is an organic farm coming from 50 years of tradition. Her parents run the farm in the Ande mountains outside of Bogota. They are in their 80’s and stronger then ever!

They don’t grow coffee the normal way in direct sunlight. They take another approach where they grow coffee under a canopy of leaves from other trees. This gives the coffee beans a particular taste. I learned a lot on how the coffee plants grow and are handled. I was told on the branch of the coffee plant, the green beans are the immature beans, the red beans are mature, and the flowers are starting new beans a little later on in the plant life.

I was shown how they discard the bad beans as they sort through the beans. The best beans are the one’s that are whole and round. These beans will be separated from the beans with two half’s. The beans are in a greenhouse to help keep the moisture out. The married couple are happy to work on the farm and are always keeping busy.

The father takes pride in his roasting abilities. He roasts the beans himself over an open fire. It takes hours to roast the beans. He showed me the ceramic bowl he used to roast the beans. Mixing the beans while roasting is an important role. Once the beans start popping that the sign it’s getting close to being finished.

The following day I helped prepare by cutting up 8 different types of fruit to enjoy before lunch was ready. She put me to work but I was more then happy to help. Dinner was amazing with different types of meat, rice, and some delicious homemade hot sauce. After the delicious dinner she was instructing me on how to make dessert. Dessert was a rice dish boiled with cream, milk, and coconut. The dish came out amazing! With help of course.