Coffee gift

The coffee ceremony is a traditional daily social interaction.

Ethiopia is the place where coffee was first found and is the hometown of coffee. As one of the top ten coffee producers in the world, half of the coffee produced in Ethiopia is drunk by its own people. For Ethiopians, "Buna dabo naw", "coffee is bread".

The mention of the word "ceremony" makes people feel solemn and solemn. That's true.

However, if you think that the Ethiopian "coffee gift" is as rare as the meticulous meal you are determined to prepare for your friends, you are wrong.

The coffee ceremony is part of the daily life of the Ethiopian people, at least once a day, and three times a day in the morning, noon and evening in traditional families. People get together and talk over coffee, which is a kind of social ritual.

Coffee ceremonies are usually cooked by the hostess of a family. When children are exposed to the coffee ceremony from an early age, girls are inculcated with the necessary knowledge to carry out the coffee ceremony.

Children's participation in the coffee ceremony probably begins by bringing coffee to the guests.

The first cup of coffee is served by the child to the oldest guest. This process is also one of the traditional ways for Ethiopia to continue the relationship between generations.

The process of the coffee ceremony

The Ethiopian coffee ceremony begins with neat placement of utensils.

On the grassy floor, the necessary coffee utensils are laid out neatly. The hostess wore a traditional dress, a white, ankle-length cotton dress decorated with embroidery patterns made up of colored threads.

Usually, the hostess burns spices to fill the air with fragrance. Under the gaze of all the guests, the ceremony began.

The coffee ceremony prepares raw coffee beans, which are washed with water to remove impurities, then placed in a pan with a long handle and heated over a small fire, that is, coffee roasting. The long handle allows the person in charge of the pot not to worry about the handle being too hot, so he can better focus on the coffee. During the baking process, the hostess will shake the pan rhythmically to make the baking more uniform. With the extension of the baking time, the color of the coffee beans slowly darkens, and the beans begin to glow, accompanied by a crackling sound.

At this time, remove the coffee beans from the fire, and the hostess will shake the pan to fill the room with the aroma of freshly roasted coffee, or the hostess will pass in front of all the guests with the roasted coffee beans, so that the guests can feel the strong aroma of the coffee.

After the roasted coffee beans are cooled and ground by hand, the beans are put into traditional wooden bowls and mashed with wooden sticks, which act as mortars and pestles and have the traditional name "mukecha bowl" / moo-keh-cha/ (wooden bowl) "zenezena stick".

Grind the coffee powder and put it in a pottery pot. The pottery pot has a handle, a spherical fat belly, a flat bottom, a slender bottleneck, and a stopper at the mouth of the bottle. Called "jebena".

Add water to the pottery pot and boil it on the fire until it boils. Brewed coffee is called "bunna" / boo-na/.

There is a tray on the long grass, in which there are several small porcelain cups without handles, locally known as "cini" / "see-nee/".

The coffee brewed in the pottery pot is poured into a small porcelain cup. Holding the pottery pot in hand, from the height of 1 foot, the water flow evenly divides the coffee into small cups. The skillful movement comes from years of observation and practice.

After the brewed coffee is divided, add water to the clay pot and then boil it.

Coffee is brewed three times, and usually the coffee powder needed for the second or third brewing is left in advance when it is ground.

Each of the three coffees has its own name. The first bubble is called Abol, the second bubble is called Tona and the third bubble is called Baraka. It is said that this is the name of the first three sheep to discover the wonderful use of coffee. The three brewing times also have their own meanings, and the third, baraka, is said to mean "to be blessed".

The process of dividing coffee from a pottery pot to a cup requires constant practice to operate skillfully and elegantly, but it doesn't hurt to drop coffee occasionally in the middle, and it's even part of tradition, symbolizing abundance.

Coffee itself is black coffee, the flavor depends on the origin of coffee, generally provide guests with sugar, depending on customs, some places may be served with salt or drink with butter.

Throughout the coffee ceremony, people talk while drinking coffee and enjoy delicious food. Don't be stingy and generously give all the compliments you can to the elegant hostess.