NEWSLETTER N.2  FEBRUARY 2012

At the origins...

I arrive at the airport of San Juan in Porto Rico at 14:00 pm where I meet with Rebecca Atienza, fourth generation of the family who owns the Hacienda San Pedro. We organise our trip for the next day to the final destination which is the city of Jajuya (in the central region of the island), a place totally immersed in nature: green is the principle colour of the area.
The following morning we leave at 8:00 am precisely and after about 2 hours we reach the Hacienda San Pedro; I am immediately struck, nearly blinded, by the luminosity of the colours around us, and overwhelmed by the
intense smells, my legs tremble... I am overjoyed to stay for 5 days at the same finca that provided us with the product that won us a victory in 2010.
At 5:00 am, - life at the farm starts early when the sun is not yet too strong -, we climb the mountain and stop at the area destined entirely to the cultivation of the Bourbon variety. The Bourbon is a natural mutation of the more known Typica, and it is named after Bourbon Island (now Reunion Island) where it was first grown. This variety produces 20% more per tree compared with the Typica, but fewer trees are grown. Its fruit is particularly dense and the cherry ripens rather quickly, the leaves are larger than the Typica but its beans are slightly smaller (0,95 cm long, 0,70cm large and 0,36 thick). This coffee maintains a good constancy during the roasting process.

We start harvesting: our group consists of Roberto and Rebecca Atienza,  Paola Masciullo and myself as well as a group of local harvesters, all ready to pick just the mature cherries as we have noticed from previous tastings of  cherries with different levels of maturity that those with maximum ripeness give the best result in the cup. This means that the harvest will be extremely slow and poor as well. But, we have a mission and we are willing to go to extremes just to complete it. Our daily harvest is finished at around 11:00 am, when we bring back to the valley just 6 sacks, but filled with a super selection.
I am extremely happy, because, I can assure you, a day with Roberta Atienza is like having a training course for a week. Every minute is filled with useful information and each word underlines his passion for this product: during the harvest we discussed a great many things, that have clarified as many aspects for me.
At 5:30 am on the second day we are again at the top of the mountain; it is not an absurdity, I feel I am admiring the beauty of the world from its highest point of view, although I know it is not so, but that is absolutely what I feel. A smile is fixed on my face, I can't even take it off, I continue to repeat to myself that what I live is not a dream but a wonderful reality: the origins of my work! Total harvest for the day: 4 sacks.

5:30 of the fifth and final day of my trip. We check if any ripe cherries are still on the trees, but it looks like we have been quite good during the last few days: for the next harvest we have to wait a couple of days. We decide to make a tour all around the farm, where Roberto and Rebecca explain the different varieties of arabica they grow. An extremely interesting lesson.

In the afternoon comes the time we have to say goodbye and pack our suitcases. At San Juan, the capital of Porto Rico, some students of Porto Rico university (the oldest university of the country) are waiting for me to give a lesson about coffee, about the Italian style of coffee drinking and the work of a barman. This too was a wonderful experience!
 

Literature and coffè.

It was towards the end of the 17th century that the first coffee houses appeared, enjoying an immediate success after the drink had gained popularity, and great health benefits were attributed it.
Thereafter, its spread developed along with the Illuminist ideology, when the time of the tavern and the wine drinking culture with its delirium and madness was over, and the coffee culture started, made of reflection, meditation and clear ideas. The cafeteria becomes a place of meeting and discussion, where intellectuals of the time organised the so-called “work groups”, intent on the real problems of the time, from public utilities to debates about ideas, which were then spread mainly through magazines, available in all the cafeterias in Europe, eliminating any distance of time and space between people in different cities.

In Italy the first political-cultural magazine :”Il Caffè” (1764-1766) was founded by Pietro Verri: it was the starting point of a new journalistic formula, but it also confirmed the appearance of intellectuals intent on cultivating a proper social and political mandate in the name of universal values of reason and culture. Just why this magazine was called “Il Caffè” is clearly explained by Pietro Verri in the opening article of the Milanese periodical: “Here, first of all, one drinks a coffee worthy of its name; real coffee from the East, and whoever tries it at least for half an hour becomes a reasonable person. Here at the cafeteria are reasonable and unreasonable men, one discusses and talks, one jokes and is serious; as for myself, who naturally talks rather little, I like registering all the discussions I hear; and as I have already put in order a number of them, I present these to the press with the title “Il Caffè” precisely because they came about in a cafeteria.”

The elegance of taste..

It is for more than 100 years now that Prestat Chocolates turns each tasting into a pleasant, surprising and seductive experience. Its chocolate and truffles have always conquered everyone from royal families to theatre and film celebrities, as well as families and children from all over the world.

Everything started in London in 1902, when Antoine Dufour decided to export from France (Chambery) the “truffes au chocolat”, first created by his family in 1895. He introduced them in the then fashionable Refreshment Rooms (places where one could relax): thanks to its creativity and perfection Prestat enjoyed an immediate success.

The secret of its popularity is that the chocolates are always made by hand by professional and talented chocolate manufacturers, ensuring an extraordinary  flavour; excellence and beauty are enclosed in surprising boxes, designed by the famous artist and illustrator Kitty Arden. They are a true feast for the eye, almost wanting to anticipate their delicious contents.

Prestat Truffles have been the preferred chocolates by Roald Dahl, author of “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory”, immortalised in the film: “Willy Wonka and the chocolate factory”. In many of his works he mentions the wonderful quality of Prestat and the rejuvenating properties of its chocolate and truffles.
In his autobiography “Memories of Gypsy Corner” he wrote: “I also adore so-called truffles …. as Prestat makes them.”

Today, Prestat is the favourite chocolate of the English royal family: for over 35 years Prestat has obtained the Royal Warrant (sign of honour conferred by the Royal family upon a shop or a business, that has provided or still provides services for the English crown, giving it prestige). It received another Warrant from Her Majesty the Queen Mother in 1999, the year of its 100th anniversary. In addition, Prestat has delighted all the guests at the Royal Wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton, who chose a new selection of 5 truffles covered in the finest milk, dark and white chocolate, enclosed in a wonderfully patriotic box, especially designed for the occasion.

Classic dish from the popular Tuscan tradition with its roots going back a long time: it is told that ever since the Middle Ages the feudatory used to accompany its dishes with unleavened bread. What remained of it was then given to the servants to eat, who boiled it in water adding anything to it they could find in the fields, mostly vegetables and herbs (carrots, black cabbage, celery, wild thyme etc.); the quantity produced lasted for days, so they kept reboiling the soup which got tastier each time.

Over time, preparation refined until it developed into a proper recipe: in the Florentine countryside, the peasant women prepared huge quantities especially on Friday when dinner was more sober (especially during Lent when meat, bacon fat and lard and, in some regions, even milk products and egg yolk were forbidden; what remained were bread, vegetables and herbs), and the soup would be reboiled during subsequent days. 
A Florentine saying goes: “a Florentine eats beans, licks his plate and ladle to clean it and then licks his fingers....”