Oh, crap.

I made a special trip across town yesterday to Mediterranean Island, an International grocery that carries goods that reach far beyond its name’s boasted region. I was positive that I would find fava beans there and I did. I also came across sparingly marked bags of Ethiopian coffee beans that were obviously packaged in house. The beans were a pale, grayish-green and I wondered for a moment if they were the ones I’d heard about that were pooped out of monkeys. Without a second thought, I tossed a package in my basket. 

When I got home, I did the kind of research that probably should have preceded my purchase, and discovered that whatever this recollection I’d had about spent coffee beans was, it was barely clinging to reality. The pooped out berries in question are of Asian origin, not African. They are not processed by monkeys, but by civets. They are not $5 a pound, but around $160. I’m not saying I wanted what I bought to be them; all of this was just the coinciding of an adventurous purchase and a random memory that I wanted to get to the bottom of.      

So, this morning, I decided to give my feces-free beans a try. I put them in the grinder, pressed the button, and nearly deafened myself with the sound that came out of it. I could have ground gravel more easily. At this point it dawned on me that a very important adjective was missing from the package’s label. They were raw. This should have been obvious to me by their lack of brownness, but really I just thought they were prepared differently. Really. 

This was definitely a bit of an airhead moment for me, but, in my defense, part of what I enjoy about experimenting with foods from different countries and cultures is the suspension of expectations. Had I thought it completely through at the store, I probably wouldn’t have bought these coffee beans. And I wouldn’t have learned today how to roast them myself. On the grill no less!