麻豆果冻传媒

_{Tech alumnus Miguel Mendieta monitors the temperature of the coffee beans in his small batch roaster.} 

Hispanic Heritage Month may conclude on Oct. 15, but 麻豆果冻传媒 graduate Miguel Mendieta helps his Middle Tennessee community celebrate it every day.

A 2015 human ecology graduate with a concentration in nutrition, Mendieta uses his training to bring his love of Central American coffee and traditional Mexican food to people in the Nashville area 鈥� and the foundation of that love is family.

鈥淓verything we do is because we truly have a love for it. My family is from Mexico, my wife Amalia鈥檚 family is from Guatemala, but we both come from families who love food, who grow it from the ground up, and we have a passion for sharing it with others,鈥� Mendieta said.

With his brother-in-law, Juan Matias, Mendieta started a coffee business, Roasts & Brews, in which they import coffee directly from the Matias family farm started by Matias鈥檚 grandfather in Huehuetanango and from farms in other remote Guatemalan villages. The business has grown from providing coffee services at local farmers鈥� markets to online ordering.

In February 2022, the family also started a food truck business, Don Miguelito鈥檚, after noticing an absence of traditional Mexican fare at area festivals and events. The menu consists of traditional meats like asada and carnitas in street tacos, burritos, flautas, taquitos and other dishes prepared the way they would be in Mendieta鈥檚 home state of Guerrero.  


_{Miguel Mendieta scoops up a handful of Guatemalan coffee beans that have yet to be roasted.} 

鈥淭here鈥檚 so much diversity in the Hispanic culture, from music to art and architecture, and of course, food and beverages. There are so many people of Hispanic descent living in the United States now, it鈥檚 important for us to share that cultural diversity with others because it helps us all establish a greater understanding of each other. That sharing is also a way to honor our heritage and remember the people who came before us,鈥� Mendieta said.

In fact, he continued, so much cultural understanding can happen over a simple cup of coffee.

鈥淎lthough coffee originated in Ethiopia, it鈥檚 been grown for centuries in South and Central America, but because coffee has become so globally colonized, it鈥檚 easy to lose sight of that history,鈥� Mendieta said.

According to Mendieta, in the U.S., we have become conditioned to use coffee as a means of simply consuming caffeine to fuel our hustle culture. The evidence is clear in the popularity of national coffee franchises and even the slogan, 鈥淎merica runs on Dunkin.'"

But in Hispanic cultures, coffee is less of a caffeine fix and more of a drink served for socializing with others at any time of day, often offered with a slice of bread or pastry to friends or family members who stop by morning or evening, Mendieta said.

Perhaps people from those cultures take their time consuming it, he said, because it also takes patience to grow it.

It takes three to four years from the initial planting for coffee to mature into a consumable product, Mendieta explained, and thereafter, it鈥檚 harvested only once a year. Because it often grows in such remote and mountainous areas, it鈥檚 almost always impossible to use technology like tractors to harvest the crops. Farmers who grow coffee usually pick it by hand and use donkeys or horses to transport the berries. From there, it must be washed, dried and processed, with the beans taken to a mill for any remaining skin from the berries to be removed.

鈥淐offee seems to bring joy to everyone, but it鈥檚 hard work to be a coffee farmer. The farmers are doing the hardest work, but they鈥檙e often the ones getting left out and not earning a fair profit,鈥� Mendieta said. 

Because the farmers harvest their crops only once a year, they typically rely on middlemen to distribute their coffee to manufacturers and franchises, which gives the middlemen the greatest profit margin (and is partly why a cup of coffee at a franchise is so expensive).


_{The finished product 鈥� a bag and cup of Roasts & Brews coffee.}

鈥淲e鈥檝e established direct relationships with the family farms where we source our coffee and deal directly with the importer who helps us purchase the coffee for our business. We cut out the middlemen for the portion of coffee we purchase, so we can give the farmers a better, fairer price,鈥� Mendieta said.

The difference is a farmer bringing home about $2 per pound for coffee beans sold to a middleman and $5 per pound sold to Mendieta鈥檚 business. 

Part of what helped bring to life his family鈥檚 visions for both Roasts & Brews and Don Miguelito鈥檚 is the practical knowledge Mendieta gained from Tech nutrition classes like quantity food production and food management.

鈥淎s a student, I didn鈥檛 realize just how much I would be using that information in the future, but there鈥檚 lots of science and lots of measurement involved in both businesses, especially the coffee. There鈥檚 lots of conversion from metric to standard measurements and roasting times and temperatures that must be considered,鈥� he said.

鈥淭hat academic knowledge is important, but the people skills are probably most important. It all comes down to the soft skills the professors tried to teach us, about communication and relating to people. I use those skills all the time, whether I鈥檓 relating to a client, customer or employee,鈥� Mendieta said.

Just as much learning, however, comes from experience.

鈥淭here is still so much to learn. Just last week, we attended a webinar about how coffee has come to be what it is,鈥� Mendieta said.

Not only are there different varieties of coffee beans, but the flavor profile of each is determined by the nutrients in the soil of the specific location where it grows.

鈥淲e can differentiate the flavors between the varieties we get from the family farms in Guatemala. They each have their own distinct flavor profile,鈥� Mendieta said.

That purity of flavor is another advantage Roasts & Brews provides over larger coffee manufacturers by working directly with the farmers to produce small batch roasts. For more information or to order, go to the website at .

 

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