Coffee as They Drink It in Latin America

In Colombia, coffee is made with agua de panela.

From Mexico to Argentina, Latin America is a region full of great coffee and creative people. No matter where we are, we have our unique way to do even the most common activities. Our coffee is famous, so we take it seriously. Very seriously. And by ‘seriously,’ we mean that coffee is the perfect excuse to have fun and share the best moments with the people we love the most.

There is no “Latin American” method to brew coffee. Our cultural diversity makes it impossible to pick simply one. That’s the reason why, today, we’re going to explore some of the most popular ways of enjoying our favorite drink all across the continent. If you’re a fan of the flavors of Latin American coffee, live the whole experience by trying these recipes!

Costa Rica: Café chorreado

Careful planting, harvesting, and processing characterize Costa Rica’s coffee culture. In the final part of the process, Ticos brew coffee with a chorreador, a wooden tool that holds a filter made of cotton. Café chorreado is part of a tradition that goes back to many generations. Everyone learned it from their grandparents and continued brewing coffee like this today.

According to Costa Ricans, café chorreado has deep flavors and aromas.  To brew a chorreado, we need to preheat the chorreador and measure how much coffee and water we’re going to use. We then put the coffee in the cotton filter and start dampening it with hot water. We continue to pour the water slowly, with patience, and we never let it fill the filter all the way to the top. When it’s done, we don’t let the filter dripping, but put it away and clean it thoroughly. And there we have it! Our very own café chorreado.

Argentina: café cortado and lágrima

In the city of Buenos Aires, you’ll never walk for three blocks without finding a new café. For Argentinians, stopping to drink a cup of coffee in the middle of the day, whether it’s to enjoy it alone or with friends, is part of their coffee culture and traditions.

The most famous ways to brew coffee are café cortado and lágrima. To prepare a cortado, you need to use a proportion of ¾ of coffee for ¼ of milk, and add a fine layer of foam on the surface. It’s the most popular way to have coffee in Buenos Aires.

When it comes to the lágrima, we talk about a black coffee to which you only add a “tear” or a drop of milk. Just enough to change the color of the drink.

Cuba: sweet and strong

Cuban coffee is famous for its strong flavor and full body. To brew it, you’ll need to pour cold and clear water into the coffee maker. It’s important that the coffee is prepared with extremely clean water. Afterwards, introduce the coffee inside the filter and start heating it up.

Cuban coffee is very sweet. Sugar is one of the most important ingredients in the mix. As coffee starts to boil, add a small dose of sugar to the pot and start stirring. Once it has boiled, pour more sugar inside and stir until you get the thick and dense consistency that’s so traditional of Cuban coffee! An extra layer of foam on the surface of your drink at the end will do the final trick.

Colombia: Tinto

In Colombia, coffee means family. Their traditional ways of brewing coffee pass down from generation to generation and have stayed in the hearts of Colombian people for many years. Not everyone like Colombian tintos, though. Many coffee experts believe this brewing method is wrong and doesn’t bring the best out of the famously excellent Colombian coffee beans. We still encourage you to try it and decide on your own!

In order to brew a tinto, follow these instructions: Lit the fire and start boiling the water. Right before it’s boiled, add four tablespoons of ground coffee. In a separate pot, make agua de panela by adding unrefined sugarcane to boiling water. After three or four minutes, remove the coffee from the boil and add the sweet agua de panela. Focus on the flavors of the panela mixed with coffee and tell us how you like it! At That Coffee Roasters, we love to explore the different coffee nuances of every region. We know we’re not simply talking about a drink, but about a cultural experience that has been engraved in our traditions and families for centuries.

Cuban coffee is known for its sweet and strong flavors.

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That Coffee Roasters

Phone Number: (305) 821-8811

2697 W. 76 Street, Hialeah, Florida 33016

Facebook: That Coffee Roasters

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Where Is Your Coffee From? How Different Origins Can Change Your Cup

Coffee's origin has an impact on the way we roast it.

Today, we live in a multicultural world that has filled our lives with contrasts and new experiences. Back in the day, people mostly knew only about their traditions and ways of life, having little to no contact with other cultures. However, between the 20th and 21st century, that changed quite rapidly. The third wave of coffee marked a period in which coffee drinkers became influenced by these changes and started to take an interest in their coffee's details and specifications. How was it harvested? Which methods were used for processing it? And one very special and important question: where do those coffee beans come from?

Just like any other plants, coffee trees not only come in different species, but they’re also heavily influenced by climate conditions of the region in which they grow. Actually, you can’t grow coffee plants anywhere you like. They require weather that’s neither too cold nor too hot for them to grow healthy, as well as soils that are rich in nutrients. The better the climate is, the better the resulting coffee bean will be. And of course, the better it will taste.

For example, coffee cherries harvested in colder climate conditions and higher altitudes will ripen slower and develop more sugars. This means that once the beans are roasted, they’ll have a sweet flavor and they’ll feel denser and firmer. You can find these types of beans in the mountainous regions of Colombia, Costa Rica, and Ethiopia. On the other hand, Brazilian, Jamaican and Hawaiian coffee is generally grown at lower altitudes (around 900 meters above sea level). Roughly speaking, any altitude above 4.000 ft. A.S.L. is considered high. This is how your coffee can change depending on which height it was farmed:

Below 2,500 feet (762 meters) will be soft, mild, simple, and bland.
Around 3,000 feet (914 meters) will be sweet and smooth.
Around 4,000 feet (~1,200 meters) may have citrus, vanilla, chocolate, or nutty notes.
Above 5,000 feet (~1,500 meters) might be spicy, floral, or fruity.

Understanding how origins can change your cup o’ joe is even more complex than just looking at climate conditions. Acidity, flavors, and earthiness are all characteristics that change depending on a specific country’s coffee culture and traditions. Well-balanced coffees, with chocolate and hazelnut notes, are very popular all across America. East African coffee production tends to be juicy and fruity. Kenyan coffee, for example, is very tea-like and acidic.

Within every country, a universe of microclimates exists, altering coffee structure depending on different regions. Indonesia is known for its spicy coffee beans, as well as their earthy ones. And Brazil is so big and has so many different harvest seasons that it’d take a while to know all nuances and characteristics from all of its production.

And as we’ve said before, what truly brings out coffee's flavors is actually the coffee roasting process. Before that, coffee beans don’t have any taste in them. A good roaster will know how to understand all complexities behind every bean and will use a specific technique for every one of them. At That Coffee Roasters, years of experience have made us experts in that field! Try different coffees coming from different regions all over the world and start to expand your universe and coffee culture like never before!

Different climate conditions and soils will change your coffee's properties! 

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That Coffee Roasters

Phone Number: (305) 821-8811

2697 W. 76 Street, Hialeah, Florida 33016

Facebook: That Coffee Roasters

Instagram: thatcoffeeroasters