Coffee beans drying. Photo: william.neuheisel, Flickr

Erin Meister trains baristas for North Carolina-based Counter Culture Coffee and sporadically maintains the blog Meet the Press Pot from her home in New York City. This is part of a series of tips for the caffeine-addicted.

Hey, wait a sec! Are you really about to dump out the rest of the too-big coffee you ordered this morning, drank a third of, forgot about and let get lukewarm? Come on, pal -- you think this stuff grows on trees?

Well, actually, it kind of does -- except they're more like bushes. And the beans that we enjoy roasted, ground and percolated in the morning are actually seeds, not beans: They're more like a cherry pit than any legume you put in your famous Super Bowl Sunday chili. And much like every other fresh fruit or vegetable we enjoy, the beauty and deliciousness of a coffee is fleeting, seasonal and really labor intensive.

Read more about coffee's journey from seed to cup after the jump.

We've mentioned the new Netscape here on Slashfood before. In case you haven't heard, what used to be an alternative web browser to Internet Explorer, netscape.com, got an extreme makeover in mid-June and has become a social bookmarking site, similar to del.icio.us, digg (technology) or flickr (photos), but for news. In case you're not familiar with social bookmarking, it is the concept of users collecting bookmarks of their favorite websites, and sharing them with the community. Users can collect, categorize, and "tag" bookmarks, which makes it easier for other users to find similar bookmarks. On sites like digg and newsvine, users can "vote" on each others' stories.

Over on Netscape, it's mostly about news, but users can also submit stories in a number of "channels," or categories - from Art & Design to Careers & Jobs to Health & Fitness to Popular Videos. It goes without saying that Slashfood's favorite channel is Food & Travel, but we'll get into more detail about that shortly.

The networks must have tired of having reality show contestants battle for rewards of bagged Doritos and beer when stranded on deserted islands because they're taking the challenge of survival even further. The eight contestants on the weight loss show Man's First Diet (working title) will live with bushmen in the Kalahari desert and follow their hunter-gatherer lifestyle. The men will hunt with the tribesmen while the women will "have to live according to the San Bushmen's strict social rules, looking on the ground for tubers and learning how to process and pound them to make them edible."

One of the goals of the show is to regain the knowledge of "the essential evolutionary link between food and effort." In other words, the contestants will hopefully realize that they should appreciate the food that they have at home, rather than inhaling packages of chips in front of the television. Whether the experiment, which will be monitored closely by experts evaluating their physical and mental health, will be a successful one remains to be seen, though it does seem likely that the participants will have difficulty transferring their new skills to life at home.

It is unknown how long the contestants will be out in Africa, but the show is planned to air over four 1-hour time slots on BBC3 in England.

 

Just about anywhere can produce wine it would seem. Now East African state Tanzania joins such odd countries as Thailand and Brazil in harvesting grapes and producing wine.

Founded in 2002 Cetawico is located near the village of Hombòlo, on a plateau 1100-1200 above sea level in the Dodoma region some 700kms from the equator. The company was started in 2002. They produce three wines from cooperatively grown grapes - chenin blanc, rosé and red blend from Chenin Blanc, Teroldego, Marzemino, Aglianico and Syrah grapes.

They were on show at a recent trade fair in Italy and were so well received that they plan to double production as soon as they can.

Planning on doing some traveling this summer? Looking for a list of the dining hot spots that you should stop by for a memorable meal? Start with the go list from Food and Wine magazine, which picks out 376 restaurants chosen by "plugged in correspondents" from 50 cities around the world. They have the goods on restaurants like Michael Mina in San Francisco, Rockpool in Sydney, Ferran Adria's Fast Good in Madrid and Felix in Hong Kong, including a picks at both the high and lower ends of the price range.

Now, it's not possible that a list like this, even such a large one, would have all the great eats of any given city, but you aren't likely to have a bad meal by picking any of their choices. If you're traveling somewhere a little off the beaten path that isn't on the "go list," or are looking for something specific, it might be best to turn to another source of restaurant information. And the best resource, in my opinion, when traveling and looking for good eats is still Chowhound. Take some time to browse through their archives and look for recommendations, or pose a question on their message board if you're looking for something specific - like the best mexican food in Boise, ID.

Christine Drummond is a New Zealand business woman with a heart. Her dream: to send food aid to the poor in Kenya. The thing is, she runs a dog food business. The Kenyan government has replied that the offer is in "bad taste."

The founder of Mighty Mix dog biscuits insists, however, that while the same ingredients are used in both the dog food and the nutritional supplement (Raw Dry Nourish), they are not the same. The powder is a natural, high-powered nutrient-rich food combining flax seeds, green-lipped mussels and something called deer velvet (which doesn't sound at all appetizing).  She is also sending 42 tons of maize in addition to the 6000 emergency packs. The food should feed 140 orphans for two months.

TV New Zealand has a video clip on the story.

An article in the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel brought Steven Wallace and his Omahene Cocoa Bean Company to my attention. I've mentioned before my deep interest in single origin chocolates.  Wallace runs a chocolate bar manufacturing company in Ghana from his home here in the States. He's an ex-lawyer who developed the company to maintain his connection with Ghana, a country he fell in love with during a school semester there. Now he has around 300 employees in Tema, Ghana. He began production in 1994 and his was the first chocolate bar exported from Ghana. While some of the world's best cocoa is grown in Ghana, the beans are often processed elsewhere. The company is also good news for those who are concerned about potential mistreatment of workers in the chocolate business. Wallace's employees receive free uniforms, meals, medical care, subsidized housing and profit sharing. Omahene products include chocolate bars, hot chocolate mixes and iced frappe mixes.

The premier online listing site for wine related events - LocalWineEvents.com has received more than just an image make-over.  

Now the 'world's largest online calendar for wine, beer, spirits and food events' has more exclusive content and enhanced services. There is a weekly wine quiz, an area for those searching for wine and food educators and a ticket-holders only area. There is also an invaluable 'add to calender' function. Excellent stuff. Over 50,000 events have been posted on the site since its inception in 2000.

I have corresponded with Eric V Orange, the site's creator, over the last few years and, despite my insistence, the category listings covering the UK are still cruddy. I was hoping that this update would replace the hotpotch of city/area categories with better regional based names but this has not occurred. Sorting this out would increase the usage of the site in the UK; at the moment it just looks like a half-hearted add-on.