Coffee is much more than a quick drink in Ethiopia.
In Ethiopia, the country where it is widely believed coffee was discovered around 800AD, serving and drinking coffee is an important cultural ritual - it is not only a key social occasion but also a spiritual event, and a mark of friendship and respect when visitors are invited to join.
Traditionally, the coffee ceremony takes place three times a day. It is an elaborate process, taking at least two hours for the host (always a young woman) to process raw, unwashed coffee beans into brewed cups of coffee.
First, the room has to be prepared with fresh grasses on the floor and burning incense, before water is boiled in a black clay coffee pot known as a jebena. The green coffee beans are carefully washed out of their husks in a heated pan over a tiny charcoal stove. They are roasted in the same pan, then coarsely crushed using a pestle and mortar, added to the jebena and brought to a boil. The brewed coffee, called bunna, is cooled and boiled a few times before being poured through a filter into cups. Three cups of coffee are brewed through the pot for each person attending the ceremony. Each cup is said to transform the spirit, and the third serving is considered to be a blessing to those who drink it
