One interesting thing to know about coffee production: farming comes in two almost entirely separate flavours: specialty beans, usually grown transparently, sustainably (both ecologically and...
One interesting thing to know about coffee production: farming comes in two almost entirely separate flavours:
specialty beans, usually grown transparently, sustainably (both ecologically and financially), and with great thought put into terroir
commodity coffee, which is often completely unsustainable in every sense, abusive to workers, and mixed and matched without regard for taste or style
Specialty beans don't vary much, because they have a built-in buffer of profit and, y'know, sustainability.
Commodity beans are what financial trolls speculate on, what Folgers impacts with quarterly reports, and generally get roasted so hard you can't taste the bean anyway. Might as well use chicory.
So if you go to a nice coffee shop, or rely on an (actually ethical) craft coffee subscription, don't expect to see an impact. Your coffee comes from a supply that is entirely distinct from the commodity market.
If your craft coffee DOES change in price due to this, find a better craft coffee source! If they use commodity coffee, they likely don't know anything about the farms, farmers, or the bean's terroir. If they don't, they can't roast expertly. Or ethically, since commodity coffee uses almost as many slaves as Amazon. At craft coffee margins, they should do better! There are a lot of great ethical deliver-by-mail roasters in the USA; try one out instead.
Commodity coffee price would set a price floor for any specialty/premium coffee price. I would expect to see some price increases in specialty coffee if and after commodity prices stabilise higher...
Commodity coffee price would set a price floor for any specialty/premium coffee price.
I would expect to see some price increases in specialty coffee if and after commodity prices stabilise higher than usual.
Even if your supply chain costs have gone up to the point you're not making any money on your product anymore? If the input costs more than the output is that just for the sake of it?
Even if your supply chain costs have gone up to the point you're not making any money on your product anymore? If the input costs more than the output is that just for the sake of it?
Well, to be more specific, "it" is "make more money". If a company lowers prices? That's to make more money. Increases prices? It's to make more money. It's never "benevolence", or because of a...
Well, to be more specific, "it" is "make more money". If a company lowers prices? That's to make more money. Increases prices? It's to make more money. It's never "benevolence", or because of a supernatural force or something.
Except specialty coffee comes in such small batches it's essentially useless at Folgers scale. It could influence the price, but I suspect commodity coffee demand would collapse well before the...
Except specialty coffee comes in such small batches it's essentially useless at Folgers scale. It could influence the price, but I suspect commodity coffee demand would collapse well before the prices started to converge.
To be clear, though, if you're doing this, your coffee is already quite expensive by the time you buy it. Worth the premium imo, but not affordable for everyone. The line in the article really...
So if you go to a nice coffee shop, or rely on an (actually ethical) craft coffee subscription, don't expect to see an impact.
To be clear, though, if you're doing this, your coffee is already quite expensive by the time you buy it. Worth the premium imo, but not affordable for everyone.
The line in the article
Arabica, the high-end variety favored for specialty brews
really annoyed me, though. The vast majority of coffee people drink these days, specialty or not, is Arabica. And I say that as someone who enjoys Robusta on occasion! Framing it as an exclusively high-end variety like the article does is weird to me.
Good spot on the Arabica screw-up. The way they word it, you'd think that all Arabica is craft coffee! Fun fact: in the last few years, a few producers have actually tried to make craft Robusta....
Good spot on the Arabica screw-up. The way they word it, you'd think that all Arabica is craft coffee!
Fun fact: in the last few years, a few producers have actually tried to make craft Robusta. Hasn't really worked out. Though I have had a couple of espresso blends that use maybe 10% Robusta to great effect.
I remember James Hoffman had a specialty Robusta in one of the previous coffee tastings he ran, though unfortunately I didn't participate in that one so I can't speak to how it tasted. I enjoy a...
I remember James Hoffman had a specialty Robusta in one of the previous coffee tastings he ran, though unfortunately I didn't participate in that one so I can't speak to how it tasted. I enjoy a Vietnamese coffee, since the sweetened condensed milk really works well with the intensity of Robusta. But it's kinda a pain to buy Robusta just for that, so I often just use my normal espresso roast for it.
Knock-on effects, supply and demand. A rise in commodity coffee prices (narrowing the price gap between el-cheapo coffee and specialty) is likely to increase demand / consumption of specialty...
Knock-on effects, supply and demand.
A rise in commodity coffee prices (narrowing the price gap between el-cheapo coffee and specialty) is likely to increase demand / consumption of specialty coffee. If the price difference is such that it isn't all that much more to get good coffee, sales of such increase (demand increase) and the supply/demand ratio is disrupted.
Sellers can be presented with 'raise prices or run out' - most would raise prices. Could they order more? Sure. But that just kicks the can down to the growers, who are then presented with the same scenario.
As I say in the other thread: true sustainable, transparent, artisan coffee is not interchangeable with commodity coffee. The batch sizes are too small, for one. And honestly most of the sellers...
As I say in the other thread: true sustainable, transparent, artisan coffee is not interchangeable with commodity coffee. The batch sizes are too small, for one. And honestly most of the sellers would rather their coffee go to someone who actually puts it to good use! These places are simply managed in a completely different way than the sprawling monocultural plantations of the coffee world.
I'll share with you my personal experience - the coffee I buy for myself and my girlfriend (from a local Roaster who buys single-origin coffee from various individual farms and co-ops throughout...
I'll share with you my personal experience - the coffee I buy for myself and my girlfriend (from a local Roaster who buys single-origin coffee from various individual farms and co-ops throughout Central America, South America, and Africa, many of them certified Fair Trade).
I know the owner of the local Roaster - not so well it would be fair to call us friends, but well-spoken acquaintances. He buys most of his coffee by the 100lb range burlap bag (different standard weights from different countries - 100lbs, 60kg, 70kg... etc) and while some of the purchasing is set-price, others are auction based.
Prices have gone up over the past year, to a non-trivial extent. We had seen price increases before and he had chosen to eat small increases to not bump up what he was charging his local customers, but more recently he has had no choice. I've watched a 5lb bag of roasted coffee (Brasil-origin for me) go from $72, to $80, to $82, to $85, to $90, and most recently now to $95.
The 2lb bags of Ethiopia-origin I get for my girlfriend have gone up likewise around the same pace. Lots of factors are involved, climate change harming coffee crops being a big one.
The coffee that was my absolute favorite from Costa Rica (Costa Rica Black Honey - followed by the name of the specific region and co-op that produced it) just doesn't exist anymore. If you Google just 'Costa Rica Black Honey' you will get results, but from my research I'm reasonably sure they aren't the same as what I used to get, rather using a somewhat-similar process and trying to profit off the popular 'black honey' name. I've never, ever had coffee that tasted anywhere near as good and it just doesn't exist anymore. To be fair, part of the reason for that is likely the time and expense of the processing method, the original co-op he got those beans from was fermenting them in barrels with the cherry over time and you ended up with coffee beans that had basically been soaked in coffee-cherry alcohol for somewhere between 3 and 6 months.
He has been able to source other beans that use a similar process, but only sells them by the 12oz bag due to how little he can secure, and how utterly expensive it was to source.
Fascinating, thanks for sharing! I don't personally know anyone on the roasting side of the industry these days, but it's worrying to hear that. Strange that it hasn't impacted prices at my...
Fascinating, thanks for sharing! I don't personally know anyone on the roasting side of the industry these days, but it's worrying to hear that. Strange that it hasn't impacted prices at my favorite artisan roaster, who sounds near-identical to yours. Maybe they've just been lucky. I'll have to keep an eye out for margin-tightening from them if this keeps up.
Maybe strike up a conversation with them, ask what they have personally seen in terms of prices and availability of the beans they buy, and if they buy directly from specific growers or do they...
Maybe strike up a conversation with them, ask what they have personally seen in terms of prices and availability of the beans they buy, and if they buy directly from specific growers or do they source through middlemen services - likewise have they had to dance around changing who they buy from to avoid rising costs? No idea what their experience as been like, but maybe they'd be willing to talk shop.
I think the people thinking about increased demand for specialty coffee due to rising commodity coffee prices are thinking about the demand for the finished product after roasting (which are...
I think the people thinking about increased demand for specialty coffee due to rising commodity coffee prices are thinking about the demand for the finished product after roasting (which are interchangeable to consumers if you take taste/quality out of the equation) rather than the actual price and demand for the raw coffee (which is what I assume you and the article are both actually talking about, since speciality and commodity coffee are indeed very different on that front). Most people, I wager, put very little thought into what happens before the roastery.
Gonna be an awful lot of these supply fears in basically every single type of crop over the next few years and decades; we're at the point now where climate change is really beginning to kick in,...
Gonna be an awful lot of these supply fears in basically every single type of crop over the next few years and decades; we're at the point now where climate change is really beginning to kick in, and it's only getting worse and worse from here. Coffee is the least of our concerns, already we're seeing mass harvest failures in staple crops like rice and wheat all over the world.
Not OP, and I’m not sure what you’re looking for, but putting “crop failure 2024” into Google turned up some results. For example, in 2023, India had that rice crop failure which made the news....
Not OP, and I’m not sure what you’re looking for, but putting “crop failure 2024” into Google turned up some results.
For example, in 2023, India had that rice crop failure which made the news. Putting “climate change crop yield” was also helpful, but in contrast to OP’s suggestion, at least on study indicated that wheat yield would increase (however many other crops would decrease).
You’re not the person who asked, but I don’t know how to respond to that. It looks like there were more crop failures in India in 2024. The heavy monsoon rains which are drowning fields don’t come...
You’re not the person who asked, but I don’t know how to respond to that. It looks like there were more crop failures in India in 2024. The heavy monsoon rains which are drowning fields don’t come with a convenient loudspeaker announcement “the following severe weather event comes to you courtesy of cliiimate chaaaaange”.
Predictions indicated that monsoon rains would become more unpredictable and intense, then they did. Since we don’t have a control group Earth which took climate change seriously, the argument that crop failures just happen will continue applying up until the last human on earth stares at the last field of rotting potatoes.
I think you’ll need to see politicians and candidates directly tie it to economic well being. Not to get off topic here, but Trump’s ad “Kamala is for they/them, Trump is for you” worked not just...
I think you’ll need to see politicians and candidates directly tie it to economic well being. Not to get off topic here, but Trump’s ad “Kamala is for they/them, Trump is for you” worked not just because of trans issues, but because it tied perceptions of Dems catering to activists over focusing on the economy. In a similar (though reversed) vein, you would need to tie climate change to the economy and show how one can improve both.
And no society has been truly fighting for a government that takes climate change seriously. Far weaker societies have brought down and revolutionized far more powerful governments throughout...
And no society has been truly fighting for a government that takes climate change seriously.
Far weaker societies have brought down and revolutionized far more powerful governments throughout history. Uncountatble lives have been sacrificed for less serious issues. In modern societies, not a single drop of blood would have to be shed to change government policies, yet we keep investing our money on maximizing consumption. Everyone hates Amazon, but they keep increasing its overwhelming market share because of the better service, i.e. it allows them to consume more crap more conveniently.
Only somewhat related but a few years ago on a whim I went out and collected all the dandelions in the yard and roasted their roots for dandelion coffee. I was pleasantly surprised at how...
Only somewhat related but a few years ago on a whim I went out and collected all the dandelions in the yard and roasted their roots for dandelion coffee. I was pleasantly surprised at how coffee-like it tasted and how well it went with cream and sugar. Definitely not something you could do routinely from normal yard quantities of dandelions as the roots need several years' worth of growth to reach sufficient sizes for any reasonable quantity of grounds, and harvesting them is pretty slow. If you did have a big field overrun with dandelions and a lot more time than money, though, it's really pretty decent.
Chicory is also a classic coffee substitute (though I've never tried it myself so I can't speak to how good it tastes). They used to frequently cut coffee with it. It's also noteworthy that this...
Chicory is also a classic coffee substitute (though I've never tried it myself so I can't speak to how good it tastes). They used to frequently cut coffee with it.
It's also noteworthy that this article is only about Arabica. There's never been a better time to try out Vietnamese coffee (which traditionally uses Robusta, a bittered variety with a higher caffeine concentration)!
Yeah, Café du Monde's blend with chicory is something I've heard of! afaik the mixing with chicory was originally due to supply shortages during the US civil war, but then it became part of local...
Yeah, Café du Monde's blend with chicory is something I've heard of! afaik the mixing with chicory was originally due to supply shortages during the US civil war, but then it became part of local coffee culture and caught on with the Vietnamese immigrant community there as well.
Vietnamese coffee is going to get more expensive as well in the coming years. Durian has become a major cash crop and I have seen reports of Vietnamese coffee growers switching over to durian as...
Vietnamese coffee is going to get more expensive as well in the coming years. Durian has become a major cash crop and I have seen reports of Vietnamese coffee growers switching over to durian as the demand continues to grow for the King of Fruits, especially in China (I'll need to go dig up a source for that as its been awhile since I read a couple of articles related to this).
When I say "Vietnamese coffee", I'm referring to the method of preparing coffee with a phin and combining with sweetened condensed milk, which can be done with coffee of any origin. Vietnam grows...
When I say "Vietnamese coffee", I'm referring to the method of preparing coffee with a phin and combining with sweetened condensed milk, which can be done with coffee of any origin. Vietnam grows mostly Robusta, but Robusta is also grown in other countries. Robusta is also less popular worldwide, so even if the price rises the way this article describes happening with Arabica, it'll have much less of an effect.
That would make more sense, thanks for the clarification! I'm very basic with my coffee, usually just black so the first thing that jumped into my brain was coffee from Vietnam. I believe I've had...
That would make more sense, thanks for the clarification! I'm very basic with my coffee, usually just black so the first thing that jumped into my brain was coffee from Vietnam. I believe I've had that preparation type a couple of times at Vietnamese restaurants and enjoyed it thoroughly.
Anyone can give an archive link? Can't get behind the paywall for some reason. In any case, with climate change, I'm expecting it to get worse. Given how the rich countries love their coffee,...
Anyone can give an archive link? Can't get behind the paywall for some reason.
In any case, with climate change, I'm expecting it to get worse. Given how the rich countries love their coffee, myself included, maybe some funding to the poorer countries will get there after all to prevent desertification... Of coffee bean farms.
I'm curious how people will react to this specific instance of scarcity. There is a real possibility that without some intervention or technical breakthrough, industrial coffee production becomes...
I'm curious how people will react to this specific instance of scarcity. There is a real possibility that without some intervention or technical breakthrough, industrial coffee production becomes unfeasible. And if that is the first casualty of climate change, what effect does it have going forward.
We joke about "Don't talk to me before my coffee.", but morning brews are a soft ritual so ingrained in humanity that for most people its beyond sacred. And coffee represents so much gross waste and evil, while still being a chemical, psychological, social, cultural and production dependency for a good chunk of the global population.
A big part of colonialism was to maintain and facilitate the mass production and flow of luxury goods that the western world had become reliant on. And our global supply chain is decendent from colonizers needing to supply other colonizers. Almost all the benefits and wealth generated from that enterprise is still largely enjoyed by the people who facilitated it and the cost consideration kept institutional change at bay for centuries now. No amount of fair trade and ethical sourcing will change the reality that there has been no real reconciliation for that history. But more importantly, it indicates the society we developed is reliant on excess and exploitation to a self destructive degree. It's such a fact of life that the non-consumption of coffee isn't even consideration yet.
I remember an old study (will try to find it) detailing that the greenest, most ethically sourced coffee can "only" produce around 3kg of carbon emission per 1kg bag. And this is dependent on revolutionary techniques like regenerative planting, healthy crop cycling and not using air freight for every bag.
That accounts for a negligible percentage of global production. Average production is 15kg of CO2 to get 1kg of bulk coffee to a port. And the study was about green coffee and doesn't account for land transport, roasting, grinding, packaging, distribution and actually brewing with all the supporting milk, sugar and other supporting chains.
I'm not judging. I take my morning coffee black with a concerning amount of sugar every other day. I have two bags of specialty blends, along with Indian teas and some matcha, rooibos, chocolate and spices. I use Chinese made phones made by underpaid labor and crammed full of precious metals that was dubiously sourced from around the world, all while burning fuel for a biking distance commute. I don't consider any of it as wasteful consumption and I don't know how to feel about it.
A buddy of mine insists that the market and technology will fill in the gaps and maintain normalcy, but I don't think the market can solve issue created by the market. At least not without creating more problems. It just feels like maybe having a coffee industry to loose is part of the problem. My fear is that people focus on going back to the way things were instead of figuring out a better way to rebuild. Like having a daily brew that wasn't dependent on global distribution infrastructure.
If anything, the market is pretty good at regulating demand by price. So maybe an increased price will lower the demand, perhaps on the long run form new coffee habits for many people. 1-2 cups a...
If anything, the market is pretty good at regulating demand by price. So maybe an increased price will lower the demand, perhaps on the long run form new coffee habits for many people. 1-2 cups a day instead of the 6-10 cups many gouge throughout their work day. If the price becomes high enough and make coffee a true luxury item, that will happen sooner or later.
There have been a few attempts at producing mock coffee 1 and cocoa 2 (another crop which is unlikely to stay commercially viable this century). Tl;dr is that the flavours for both crops mostly...
There have been a few attempts at producing mock coffee 1 and cocoa 2 (another crop which is unlikely to stay commercially viable this century).
Tl;dr is that the flavours for both crops mostly come from a fermentation step (ie controlled spoilage); you aren’t eating cooked raw beans straight off the tree. Since it’s the microorganisms which make coffee beans taste like coffee, engineering similar strains to work on cheaper types of plants has yielded results.
That process is likely to become more popular in the coming decades. Imo ofc.
That’s what prices are for. As growing coffee becomes more expensive, prices go up, and this causes people to look for alternatives. We know coffee’s secret sauce is caffeine, and at this point...
That’s what prices are for. As growing coffee becomes more expensive, prices go up, and this causes people to look for alternatives. We know coffee’s secret sauce is caffeine, and at this point caffeine can be easily chemically synthesized, so if prices increases there’ll be alternatives.
I've been mentioning to my friends and family that coffee prices (and other staples) are going to rise for awhile now due to climate change. Even beyond climate change there are longer term...
I think this coming year is going to the year I build back up my preps (and make a Tildes post discussing general prepareness). Been meaning to start stocking up again for awhile but wanted to get in a better spot financially after being out of work for a year.
I'm going to jump on this and do the old echo routine. Climate change is having a huge impact. Our local farmers have had a horrid year in basics such as wheat and corn since the weather has been...
I'm going to jump on this and do the old echo routine.
Climate change is having a huge impact. Our local farmers have had a horrid year in basics such as wheat and corn since the weather has been so off. Apparently we have had the wettest 18 months since 1836.
I know the planet lives in cycles and we're not helping it, but we really need to adapt as a species else we are really going to struggle.
There has been a push to create more drought and flood tolerant strains of essential crops like rice and wheat, but there's strong opposition from "environmentalists" that hate anything GMO. It's...
There has been a push to create more drought and flood tolerant strains of essential crops like rice and wheat, but there's strong opposition from "environmentalists" that hate anything GMO. It's a damn shame because we have real working solutions created by experts that're blocked by uninformed activists.
I started this this month. Not just environment, but the coming administration's anticipated behaviors make me believe that things are gonna get ugly quickly. I'd love a tildes post hearing your...
I started this this month. Not just environment, but the coming administration's anticipated behaviors make me believe that things are gonna get ugly quickly. I'd love a tildes post hearing your thoughts on this.
I'm by no means an expert or have great insight into being prepared! That being said, I think having a post discussing it or people sharing ideas would be great. I've lurked on r/preppers for a...
I'm by no means an expert or have great insight into being prepared! That being said, I think having a post discussing it or people sharing ideas would be great. I've lurked on r/preppers for a long while and tried to follow the "common sense" preparedness approach of preparing for things likely to happen. Easy to get my wife on board with it when I have sensible preps that we eventually use or make sense why you want that. Having multiple weeks worth of food and water + basic supplies can a world of difference during a storm, and you lose power.
An example of having some of these "common sense" preps in place: after getting married, my wife and I hosted a Chinese New Year party, and had a low percentage chance of 1/2 inch of snow turn into multiple inches of snow during the afternoon into the evening. Having the preps on hand meant it wasn't an emergency when we had a group of our friends needing to stay with us over that weekend.
I've seen less pushback from people I've mentioned it to over the years as there's been economic difficulties. It also depends on how you frame it and what you're preparing for. Saying you're buying 10,000 .556 rounds to fight off a zombie uprising is going to get you the side eye. Saying you stocked up on staple foods and basic supplies to have just in case you lose power or there's (insert your region's likely natural disaster) should be viewed as common sense in my opinion.
There's always great ideas from other people for things they choose to prepare or steps they take that I haven't considered. Some people have more resources they can put into it, or they treat it as a hobby that they enjoy spending time on. Now that I have a young family, it has become something that I can do to ensure they're taken care of, and allow me to have resources in place to help provide for my wife's extended family in case of an emergency.
Ah, the zombie uprising...I miss the good old days. We just got a solar backup generator because we have a well for water and in an extended power outage, that is our weakest point. We also...
Ah, the zombie uprising...I miss the good old days.
We just got a solar backup generator because we have a well for water and in an extended power outage, that is our weakest point. We also recently had an unpredicted major storm, and while our power was back on in 10 hours, some of our neighbors were without for 5 days or more, during freezing temps.
Thanks for sharing your experience and strategy!
I'm a big fan of zombie fiction, the slow zombies being my preferred kind! I'd love to have solar panels installed at my new place or have a well! We've talked about one day moving to the backside...
I'm a big fan of zombie fiction, the slow zombies being my preferred kind!
I'd love to have solar panels installed at my new place or have a well! We've talked about one day moving to the backside of the island we live on and buying a plot of land to split with my wife's extended family. My biggest concern has been supply chain disruption, since so much of what we eat or rely on is brought on to the island from the mainland or imported from abroad.
I had talked prepping with my in laws a few years ago and brought up the need to stockpile food. It didn't really click with them. I remember bringing up what the grocery stores are out of food and my mother-in-law replied with something along the lines of "that would never happen, if the store near our house is out of food we'd go to another store to get food". That was the moment that it clicked that I would need to prepare with them in mind, as well as my wife and kids.
I would love if you had any resources as a “getting started point” or a “slowly building up” point. (I’ve thought of lurking reddit again, but have tried to avoid the site for the most part. I...
I would love if you had any resources as a “getting started point” or a “slowly building up” point. (I’ve thought of lurking reddit again, but have tried to avoid the site for the most part. I guess I will check out their “newbies” pinned thread, but if there’s anything specific you’ve found useful I’d love seeing a thread here talking about it.)
I don’t live in an area with anything too major, but we do have some natural disasters that do occur and could certainly impact the grocery stores or ability to get to them. We do live in an apartment complex, so there’s not much we could do in terms of backup power or heating systems, but food etc could maybe be useful.
I know you just said you'd rather stay off Reddit, but the r/preppers wiki is a fantastic resource: https://www.reddit.com/r/preppers/wiki/index and this allows you to avoid most of the...
I know you just said you'd rather stay off Reddit, but the r/preppers wiki is a fantastic resource: https://www.reddit.com/r/preppers/wiki/index and this allows you to avoid most of the discussions that happen on the Subreddit and get into more actionable steps/useful info for where you're at.
I'll admit that these next two links are taken from their Getting Started page, as I knew they had great resources there if you'd like to avoid going on Reddit:
Taking a quick look through that gave me some evening reading as I think it's been than long enough for me to want to brush up on some things and also consider tropical climate preparedness as well.
To give a bit of my own advice, you don't need to treat preparedness as anything out of the ordinary, especially for food. You can build "depth" in your pantry by something as simple as having 1 additional can of things you normally eat in reserve. If you did that for everything in your pantry, that means you have effectively doubled your food supply. I like to stress that this is for things you normally eat. When you see a sale of 12 cans of green beans, and you eat those, perfect time to grab some if the expiration date is a decent way out, then you can eat them in order of nearest expiration date.
If instead you saw a sale on 12 cans of cranberry sauce and no one in your house eats it, then you shouldn't pick it up. Sure it's food, and you'd eat what you can get during an emergency, but it would be money better spent on something that you normally eat since you can continue to include it in your diet and just rotate in extra cans as you buy them.
Buying the additional food items that don't spoil also lets you take advantage of sales and can help you save money in the long run.
Hope that helps and good luck with the preparations! If you ever wanted to bounce ideas off me, I'd be more than happy to chat about it. I'm by no means an expert, just someone interested in making sure my family can get through a rainy day or a bad storm without needing to be stressed about getting things from the store or provide stress on local emergency relief services when others may need it more.
The Mormons have a lot of resources focused on food security and disaster prep. I knew one in college who kept a 2 by 3 by 4 plastic tub with a sealed Tupperware type lid under her bed full of...
The Mormons have a lot of resources focused on food security and disaster prep.
I knew one in college who kept a 2 by 3 by 4 plastic tub with a sealed Tupperware type lid under her bed full of backup food supplies.
So this thread started me down the rabbit hole of alternative and more sustainable caffeine sources. I recognize that I've been a fully fledged coffee addict since age 8 (Quebecoise mom who...
So this thread started me down the rabbit hole of alternative and more sustainable caffeine sources.
I recognize that I've been a fully fledged coffee addict since age 8 (Quebecoise mom who thought nothing of giving her kids café au lait), and it's hard to imagine life without it. On cold, dark, snowy mornings, it's the only reason I get out of bed.
My spouse has taken up getting green beans from Sweet Maria's and roasting them himself. This is substantially cheaper than commercial coffee, and allows much more control over sustainable content. I'm not going to go into technical detail here - it's his hobby, and there are plenty of online resources.
I've never particularly enjoyed Camilla sinensis tea - it tastes like dishwater compared to a well-brewed cuppa joe. Tea has its own nasty legacy of colonialism and excessive carbon footprint, especially where it's a commodity that displaces food crops. However, in the Americas, at least, there are three reasonably sustainable plant teas which contain caffeine, and may have other health benefits: guayusa, yaupon, and yerba mate.
All three have caffeine, as well as varying amounts of theobromine (the stimulant compound in cacao), theanine, theophylline, and antioxidant polyphenols. Reportedly, the combination of pharmaceutically active compounds provides alertness without jitteriness.
I've got an order in for Harney and Sons' American Buzz tea, which seems awfully expensive. If I like it, I'll probably get the single herbs direct from growers if possible, and blend my own. It's conceivable that I could grow yaupon, but I'd have to check on whether it would be a non-native invasive where I am.
In case you're curious and have never tried it, I live in a country where the majority of the population consume yerba mate every day. It's an acquired taste since it's very bitter, but once...
In case you're curious and have never tried it, I live in a country where the majority of the population consume yerba mate every day. It's an acquired taste since it's very bitter, but once you're hooked it's a great substitute for coffee. It can also be very practical, in my country people carry around mate and a thermos full of hot water everywhere.
I've had yerba mate traditionally brewed. It's got quite a bit of bitter tannin, but that's part of why I enjoyed its reminiscence of coffee, and tannins are generally a healthy nutritional...
I've had yerba mate traditionally brewed. It's got quite a bit of bitter tannin, but that's part of why I enjoyed its reminiscence of coffee, and tannins are generally a healthy nutritional component. Is yerba mate leaf customarily smoked over a fire, or just roasted?
I wouldn't say it's either. It's a leaf, what we buy in the supermarket is a dried version. We put the dry leaf inside a special container (most typically a dried gourd called mate) and you pour...
I wouldn't say it's either. It's a leaf, what we buy in the supermarket is a dried version. We put the dry leaf inside a special container (most typically a dried gourd called mate) and you pour hot water and drink from a special straw called bombilla, which allows for the passage of water but not the leaves. There's is a whole art of making it perfectly, I could find out more if you want (I only drink mate when people share their own with me, sharing it is also part of the ritual).
One interesting thing to know about coffee production: farming comes in two almost entirely separate flavours:
Specialty beans don't vary much, because they have a built-in buffer of profit and, y'know, sustainability.
Commodity beans are what financial trolls speculate on, what Folgers impacts with quarterly reports, and generally get roasted so hard you can't taste the bean anyway. Might as well use chicory.
So if you go to a nice coffee shop, or rely on an (actually ethical) craft coffee subscription, don't expect to see an impact. Your coffee comes from a supply that is entirely distinct from the commodity market.
If your craft coffee DOES change in price due to this, find a better craft coffee source! If they use commodity coffee, they likely don't know anything about the farms, farmers, or the bean's terroir. If they don't, they can't roast expertly. Or ethically, since commodity coffee uses almost as many slaves as Amazon. At craft coffee margins, they should do better! There are a lot of great ethical deliver-by-mail roasters in the USA; try one out instead.
Commodity coffee price would set a price floor for any specialty/premium coffee price.
I would expect to see some price increases in specialty coffee if and after commodity prices stabilise higher than usual.
Good point, plus there's a trend of serious price gouging for the sake of it so I don't doubt price increases across the board.
Price increases are always “for the sake of it”.
Even if your supply chain costs have gone up to the point you're not making any money on your product anymore? If the input costs more than the output is that just for the sake of it?
Well, to be more specific, "it" is "make more money". If a company lowers prices? That's to make more money. Increases prices? It's to make more money. It's never "benevolence", or because of a supernatural force or something.
I can’t believe they’d increase the price just to make more money!
Except specialty coffee comes in such small batches it's essentially useless at Folgers scale. It could influence the price, but I suspect commodity coffee demand would collapse well before the prices started to converge.
To be clear, though, if you're doing this, your coffee is already quite expensive by the time you buy it. Worth the premium imo, but not affordable for everyone.
The line in the article
really annoyed me, though. The vast majority of coffee people drink these days, specialty or not, is Arabica. And I say that as someone who enjoys Robusta on occasion! Framing it as an exclusively high-end variety like the article does is weird to me.
Good spot on the Arabica screw-up. The way they word it, you'd think that all Arabica is craft coffee!
Fun fact: in the last few years, a few producers have actually tried to make craft Robusta. Hasn't really worked out. Though I have had a couple of espresso blends that use maybe 10% Robusta to great effect.
I remember James Hoffman had a specialty Robusta in one of the previous coffee tastings he ran, though unfortunately I didn't participate in that one so I can't speak to how it tasted. I enjoy a Vietnamese coffee, since the sweetened condensed milk really works well with the intensity of Robusta. But it's kinda a pain to buy Robusta just for that, so I often just use my normal espresso roast for it.
Knock-on effects, supply and demand.
A rise in commodity coffee prices (narrowing the price gap between el-cheapo coffee and specialty) is likely to increase demand / consumption of specialty coffee. If the price difference is such that it isn't all that much more to get good coffee, sales of such increase (demand increase) and the supply/demand ratio is disrupted.
Sellers can be presented with 'raise prices or run out' - most would raise prices. Could they order more? Sure. But that just kicks the can down to the growers, who are then presented with the same scenario.
As I say in the other thread: true sustainable, transparent, artisan coffee is not interchangeable with commodity coffee. The batch sizes are too small, for one. And honestly most of the sellers would rather their coffee go to someone who actually puts it to good use! These places are simply managed in a completely different way than the sprawling monocultural plantations of the coffee world.
I'll share with you my personal experience - the coffee I buy for myself and my girlfriend (from a local Roaster who buys single-origin coffee from various individual farms and co-ops throughout Central America, South America, and Africa, many of them certified Fair Trade).
I know the owner of the local Roaster - not so well it would be fair to call us friends, but well-spoken acquaintances. He buys most of his coffee by the 100lb range burlap bag (different standard weights from different countries - 100lbs, 60kg, 70kg... etc) and while some of the purchasing is set-price, others are auction based.
Prices have gone up over the past year, to a non-trivial extent. We had seen price increases before and he had chosen to eat small increases to not bump up what he was charging his local customers, but more recently he has had no choice. I've watched a 5lb bag of roasted coffee (Brasil-origin for me) go from $72, to $80, to $82, to $85, to $90, and most recently now to $95.
The 2lb bags of Ethiopia-origin I get for my girlfriend have gone up likewise around the same pace. Lots of factors are involved, climate change harming coffee crops being a big one.
The coffee that was my absolute favorite from Costa Rica (Costa Rica Black Honey - followed by the name of the specific region and co-op that produced it) just doesn't exist anymore. If you Google just 'Costa Rica Black Honey' you will get results, but from my research I'm reasonably sure they aren't the same as what I used to get, rather using a somewhat-similar process and trying to profit off the popular 'black honey' name. I've never, ever had coffee that tasted anywhere near as good and it just doesn't exist anymore. To be fair, part of the reason for that is likely the time and expense of the processing method, the original co-op he got those beans from was fermenting them in barrels with the cherry over time and you ended up with coffee beans that had basically been soaked in coffee-cherry alcohol for somewhere between 3 and 6 months.
He has been able to source other beans that use a similar process, but only sells them by the 12oz bag due to how little he can secure, and how utterly expensive it was to source.
Fascinating, thanks for sharing! I don't personally know anyone on the roasting side of the industry these days, but it's worrying to hear that. Strange that it hasn't impacted prices at my favorite artisan roaster, who sounds near-identical to yours. Maybe they've just been lucky. I'll have to keep an eye out for margin-tightening from them if this keeps up.
Maybe strike up a conversation with them, ask what they have personally seen in terms of prices and availability of the beans they buy, and if they buy directly from specific growers or do they source through middlemen services - likewise have they had to dance around changing who they buy from to avoid rising costs? No idea what their experience as been like, but maybe they'd be willing to talk shop.
I think the people thinking about increased demand for specialty coffee due to rising commodity coffee prices are thinking about the demand for the finished product after roasting (which are interchangeable to consumers if you take taste/quality out of the equation) rather than the actual price and demand for the raw coffee (which is what I assume you and the article are both actually talking about, since speciality and commodity coffee are indeed very different on that front). Most people, I wager, put very little thought into what happens before the roastery.
Gonna be an awful lot of these supply fears in basically every single type of crop over the next few years and decades; we're at the point now where climate change is really beginning to kick in, and it's only getting worse and worse from here. Coffee is the least of our concerns, already we're seeing mass harvest failures in staple crops like rice and wheat all over the world.
Do you have a favorite source reporting on this?
Not OP, and I’m not sure what you’re looking for, but putting “crop failure 2024” into Google turned up some results.
For example, in 2023, India had that rice crop failure which made the news. Putting “climate change crop yield” was also helpful, but in contrast to OP’s suggestion, at least on study indicated that wheat yield would increase (however many other crops would decrease).
I mean, there's always some crop failures somewhere in the world. The world is a big place.
You’re not the person who asked, but I don’t know how to respond to that. It looks like there were more crop failures in India in 2024. The heavy monsoon rains which are drowning fields don’t come with a convenient loudspeaker announcement “the following severe weather event comes to you courtesy of cliiimate chaaaaange”.
Predictions indicated that monsoon rains would become more unpredictable and intense, then they did. Since we don’t have a control group Earth which took climate change seriously, the argument that crop failures just happen will continue applying up until the last human on earth stares at the last field of rotting potatoes.
I wonder if this is what it'll take for us to see actual political progress. No government has been truly serious about fighting for our climate.
I think you’ll need to see politicians and candidates directly tie it to economic well being. Not to get off topic here, but Trump’s ad “Kamala is for they/them, Trump is for you” worked not just because of trans issues, but because it tied perceptions of Dems catering to activists over focusing on the economy. In a similar (though reversed) vein, you would need to tie climate change to the economy and show how one can improve both.
And no society has been truly fighting for a government that takes climate change seriously.
Far weaker societies have brought down and revolutionized far more powerful governments throughout history. Uncountatble lives have been sacrificed for less serious issues. In modern societies, not a single drop of blood would have to be shed to change government policies, yet we keep investing our money on maximizing consumption. Everyone hates Amazon, but they keep increasing its overwhelming market share because of the better service, i.e. it allows them to consume more crap more conveniently.
I'm so tired of people.
Only somewhat related but a few years ago on a whim I went out and collected all the dandelions in the yard and roasted their roots for dandelion coffee. I was pleasantly surprised at how coffee-like it tasted and how well it went with cream and sugar. Definitely not something you could do routinely from normal yard quantities of dandelions as the roots need several years' worth of growth to reach sufficient sizes for any reasonable quantity of grounds, and harvesting them is pretty slow. If you did have a big field overrun with dandelions and a lot more time than money, though, it's really pretty decent.
Chicory is also a classic coffee substitute (though I've never tried it myself so I can't speak to how good it tastes). They used to frequently cut coffee with it.
It's also noteworthy that this article is only about Arabica. There's never been a better time to try out Vietnamese coffee (which traditionally uses Robusta, a bittered variety with a higher caffeine concentration)!
Chicory coffee is common in New Orleans and Louisiana. It lends some acorn notes to the roast? It's a very particular flavour.
Yeah, Café du Monde's blend with chicory is something I've heard of! afaik the mixing with chicory was originally due to supply shortages during the US civil war, but then it became part of local coffee culture and caught on with the Vietnamese immigrant community there as well.
A friend of mine used to serve me camp coffee essence as so-called coffee. It has a lot of chicory in it. It was not good.
Vietnamese coffee is going to get more expensive as well in the coming years. Durian has become a major cash crop and I have seen reports of Vietnamese coffee growers switching over to durian as the demand continues to grow for the King of Fruits, especially in China (I'll need to go dig up a source for that as its been awhile since I read a couple of articles related to this).
When I say "Vietnamese coffee", I'm referring to the method of preparing coffee with a phin and combining with sweetened condensed milk, which can be done with coffee of any origin. Vietnam grows mostly Robusta, but Robusta is also grown in other countries. Robusta is also less popular worldwide, so even if the price rises the way this article describes happening with Arabica, it'll have much less of an effect.
That would make more sense, thanks for the clarification! I'm very basic with my coffee, usually just black so the first thing that jumped into my brain was coffee from Vietnam. I believe I've had that preparation type a couple of times at Vietnamese restaurants and enjoyed it thoroughly.
If making the switch, take note that Robusta beans have around twice as much caffeine as Arabica. Adjust your daily consumption accordingly.
Anyone can give an archive link? Can't get behind the paywall for some reason.
In any case, with climate change, I'm expecting it to get worse. Given how the rich countries love their coffee, myself included, maybe some funding to the poorer countries will get there after all to prevent desertification... Of coffee bean farms.
This is an archive link.
I'm curious how people will react to this specific instance of scarcity. There is a real possibility that without some intervention or technical breakthrough, industrial coffee production becomes unfeasible. And if that is the first casualty of climate change, what effect does it have going forward.
We joke about "Don't talk to me before my coffee.", but morning brews are a soft ritual so ingrained in humanity that for most people its beyond sacred. And coffee represents so much gross waste and evil, while still being a chemical, psychological, social, cultural and production dependency for a good chunk of the global population.
A big part of colonialism was to maintain and facilitate the mass production and flow of luxury goods that the western world had become reliant on. And our global supply chain is decendent from colonizers needing to supply other colonizers. Almost all the benefits and wealth generated from that enterprise is still largely enjoyed by the people who facilitated it and the cost consideration kept institutional change at bay for centuries now. No amount of fair trade and ethical sourcing will change the reality that there has been no real reconciliation for that history. But more importantly, it indicates the society we developed is reliant on excess and exploitation to a self destructive degree. It's such a fact of life that the non-consumption of coffee isn't even consideration yet.
I remember an old study (will try to find it) detailing that the greenest, most ethically sourced coffee can "only" produce around 3kg of carbon emission per 1kg bag. And this is dependent on revolutionary techniques like regenerative planting, healthy crop cycling and not using air freight for every bag.
That accounts for a negligible percentage of global production. Average production is 15kg of CO2 to get 1kg of bulk coffee to a port. And the study was about green coffee and doesn't account for land transport, roasting, grinding, packaging, distribution and actually brewing with all the supporting milk, sugar and other supporting chains.
I'm not judging. I take my morning coffee black with a concerning amount of sugar every other day. I have two bags of specialty blends, along with Indian teas and some matcha, rooibos, chocolate and spices. I use Chinese made phones made by underpaid labor and crammed full of precious metals that was dubiously sourced from around the world, all while burning fuel for a biking distance commute. I don't consider any of it as wasteful consumption and I don't know how to feel about it.
A buddy of mine insists that the market and technology will fill in the gaps and maintain normalcy, but I don't think the market can solve issue created by the market. At least not without creating more problems. It just feels like maybe having a coffee industry to loose is part of the problem. My fear is that people focus on going back to the way things were instead of figuring out a better way to rebuild. Like having a daily brew that wasn't dependent on global distribution infrastructure.
If anything, the market is pretty good at regulating demand by price. So maybe an increased price will lower the demand, perhaps on the long run form new coffee habits for many people. 1-2 cups a day instead of the 6-10 cups many gouge throughout their work day. If the price becomes high enough and make coffee a true luxury item, that will happen sooner or later.
There have been a few attempts at producing mock coffee 1 and cocoa 2 (another crop which is unlikely to stay commercially viable this century).
Tl;dr is that the flavours for both crops mostly come from a fermentation step (ie controlled spoilage); you aren’t eating cooked raw beans straight off the tree. Since it’s the microorganisms which make coffee beans taste like coffee, engineering similar strains to work on cheaper types of plants has yielded results.
That process is likely to become more popular in the coming decades. Imo ofc.
That’s what prices are for. As growing coffee becomes more expensive, prices go up, and this causes people to look for alternatives. We know coffee’s secret sauce is caffeine, and at this point caffeine can be easily chemically synthesized, so if prices increases there’ll be alternatives.
I've been mentioning to my friends and family that coffee prices (and other staples) are going to rise for awhile now due to climate change. Even beyond climate change there are longer term weather cycles that can and will impact the production of certain things. Combine that with the growing demang for coffee and prices will rise. I saw [the country I live in had a 25% increase in consumption of coffee nationally in just 2 years during COVID (2020-2022)](https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Total-coffee-consumption-in-Malaysia-from-2013-2022-Statista-2021_fig1_357427797#:~:text=A%20statistical%20analysis%20on%20coffee,and%202022(Statista%2C%202021.) and I would guess it is continuing to increase.
I think this coming year is going to the year I build back up my preps (and make a Tildes post discussing general prepareness). Been meaning to start stocking up again for awhile but wanted to get in a better spot financially after being out of work for a year.
I'm going to jump on this and do the old echo routine.
Climate change is having a huge impact. Our local farmers have had a horrid year in basics such as wheat and corn since the weather has been so off. Apparently we have had the wettest 18 months since 1836.
I know the planet lives in cycles and we're not helping it, but we really need to adapt as a species else we are really going to struggle.
There has been a push to create more drought and flood tolerant strains of essential crops like rice and wheat, but there's strong opposition from "environmentalists" that hate anything GMO. It's a damn shame because we have real working solutions created by experts that're blocked by uninformed activists.
I started this this month. Not just environment, but the coming administration's anticipated behaviors make me believe that things are gonna get ugly quickly. I'd love a tildes post hearing your thoughts on this.
I'm by no means an expert or have great insight into being prepared! That being said, I think having a post discussing it or people sharing ideas would be great. I've lurked on r/preppers for a long while and tried to follow the "common sense" preparedness approach of preparing for things likely to happen. Easy to get my wife on board with it when I have sensible preps that we eventually use or make sense why you want that. Having multiple weeks worth of food and water + basic supplies can a world of difference during a storm, and you lose power.
An example of having some of these "common sense" preps in place: after getting married, my wife and I hosted a Chinese New Year party, and had a low percentage chance of 1/2 inch of snow turn into multiple inches of snow during the afternoon into the evening. Having the preps on hand meant it wasn't an emergency when we had a group of our friends needing to stay with us over that weekend.
I've seen less pushback from people I've mentioned it to over the years as there's been economic difficulties. It also depends on how you frame it and what you're preparing for. Saying you're buying 10,000 .556 rounds to fight off a zombie uprising is going to get you the side eye. Saying you stocked up on staple foods and basic supplies to have just in case you lose power or there's (insert your region's likely natural disaster) should be viewed as common sense in my opinion.
There's always great ideas from other people for things they choose to prepare or steps they take that I haven't considered. Some people have more resources they can put into it, or they treat it as a hobby that they enjoy spending time on. Now that I have a young family, it has become something that I can do to ensure they're taken care of, and allow me to have resources in place to help provide for my wife's extended family in case of an emergency.
Ah, the zombie uprising...I miss the good old days.
We just got a solar backup generator because we have a well for water and in an extended power outage, that is our weakest point. We also recently had an unpredicted major storm, and while our power was back on in 10 hours, some of our neighbors were without for 5 days or more, during freezing temps.
Thanks for sharing your experience and strategy!
I'm a big fan of zombie fiction, the slow zombies being my preferred kind!
I'd love to have solar panels installed at my new place or have a well! We've talked about one day moving to the backside of the island we live on and buying a plot of land to split with my wife's extended family. My biggest concern has been supply chain disruption, since so much of what we eat or rely on is brought on to the island from the mainland or imported from abroad.
I had talked prepping with my in laws a few years ago and brought up the need to stockpile food. It didn't really click with them. I remember bringing up what the grocery stores are out of food and my mother-in-law replied with something along the lines of "that would never happen, if the store near our house is out of food we'd go to another store to get food". That was the moment that it clicked that I would need to prepare with them in mind, as well as my wife and kids.
I would love if you had any resources as a “getting started point” or a “slowly building up” point. (I’ve thought of lurking reddit again, but have tried to avoid the site for the most part. I guess I will check out their “newbies” pinned thread, but if there’s anything specific you’ve found useful I’d love seeing a thread here talking about it.)
I don’t live in an area with anything too major, but we do have some natural disasters that do occur and could certainly impact the grocery stores or ability to get to them. We do live in an apartment complex, so there’s not much we could do in terms of backup power or heating systems, but food etc could maybe be useful.
I know you just said you'd rather stay off Reddit, but the r/preppers wiki is a fantastic resource: https://www.reddit.com/r/preppers/wiki/index and this allows you to avoid most of the discussions that happen on the Subreddit and get into more actionable steps/useful info for where you're at.
I'll admit that these next two links are taken from their Getting Started page, as I knew they had great resources there if you'd like to avoid going on Reddit:
https://www.redcross.org/get-help/how-to-prepare-for-emergencies.html
https://www.ready.gov/
Taking a quick look through that gave me some evening reading as I think it's been than long enough for me to want to brush up on some things and also consider tropical climate preparedness as well.
To give a bit of my own advice, you don't need to treat preparedness as anything out of the ordinary, especially for food. You can build "depth" in your pantry by something as simple as having 1 additional can of things you normally eat in reserve. If you did that for everything in your pantry, that means you have effectively doubled your food supply. I like to stress that this is for things you normally eat. When you see a sale of 12 cans of green beans, and you eat those, perfect time to grab some if the expiration date is a decent way out, then you can eat them in order of nearest expiration date.
If instead you saw a sale on 12 cans of cranberry sauce and no one in your house eats it, then you shouldn't pick it up. Sure it's food, and you'd eat what you can get during an emergency, but it would be money better spent on something that you normally eat since you can continue to include it in your diet and just rotate in extra cans as you buy them.
Buying the additional food items that don't spoil also lets you take advantage of sales and can help you save money in the long run.
Hope that helps and good luck with the preparations! If you ever wanted to bounce ideas off me, I'd be more than happy to chat about it. I'm by no means an expert, just someone interested in making sure my family can get through a rainy day or a bad storm without needing to be stressed about getting things from the store or provide stress on local emergency relief services when others may need it more.
Edit: This link is also a great overview of getting into a "preparedness mindset": https://lcamtuf.coredump.cx/prep/index-old.shtml
The Mormons have a lot of resources focused on food security and disaster prep.
I knew one in college who kept a 2 by 3 by 4 plastic tub with a sealed Tupperware type lid under her bed full of backup food supplies.
So this thread started me down the rabbit hole of alternative and more sustainable caffeine sources.
I recognize that I've been a fully fledged coffee addict since age 8 (Quebecoise mom who thought nothing of giving her kids café au lait), and it's hard to imagine life without it. On cold, dark, snowy mornings, it's the only reason I get out of bed.
My spouse has taken up getting green beans from Sweet Maria's and roasting them himself. This is substantially cheaper than commercial coffee, and allows much more control over sustainable content. I'm not going to go into technical detail here - it's his hobby, and there are plenty of online resources.
I've never particularly enjoyed Camilla sinensis tea - it tastes like dishwater compared to a well-brewed cuppa joe. Tea has its own nasty legacy of colonialism and excessive carbon footprint, especially where it's a commodity that displaces food crops. However, in the Americas, at least, there are three reasonably sustainable plant teas which contain caffeine, and may have other health benefits: guayusa, yaupon, and yerba mate.
All three have caffeine, as well as varying amounts of theobromine (the stimulant compound in cacao), theanine, theophylline, and antioxidant polyphenols. Reportedly, the combination of pharmaceutically active compounds provides alertness without jitteriness.
I've got an order in for Harney and Sons' American Buzz tea, which seems awfully expensive. If I like it, I'll probably get the single herbs direct from growers if possible, and blend my own. It's conceivable that I could grow yaupon, but I'd have to check on whether it would be a non-native invasive where I am.
In case you're curious and have never tried it, I live in a country where the majority of the population consume yerba mate every day. It's an acquired taste since it's very bitter, but once you're hooked it's a great substitute for coffee. It can also be very practical, in my country people carry around mate and a thermos full of hot water everywhere.
I've had yerba mate traditionally brewed. It's got quite a bit of bitter tannin, but that's part of why I enjoyed its reminiscence of coffee, and tannins are generally a healthy nutritional component. Is yerba mate leaf customarily smoked over a fire, or just roasted?
I wouldn't say it's either. It's a leaf, what we buy in the supermarket is a dried version. We put the dry leaf inside a special container (most typically a dried gourd called mate) and you pour hot water and drink from a special straw called bombilla, which allows for the passage of water but not the leaves. There's is a whole art of making it perfectly, I could find out more if you want (I only drink mate when people share their own with me, sharing it is also part of the ritual).