A Harmony Of Flavors Published My Experience, History Traditions of Coffee Growing in Guatemala

Feb. 6, 2013 - PRLog -- Chris Rawstern, Culinary Advisor for A Harmony of Flavors, published on Yahoo! Voices the article “My Experience with the History and Traditions of Coffee Growing in Guatemala”.

This article is part of A Harmony of Flavors mission to publish pertinent articles to help bring people’s attention to important issues or problems and hopefully offer some form of education for them to make the best decisions. This Article describes that Guatemala is a coffee country and coffee is a large part of the farming that occurs there. Observing all the work that went into making coffee ready for exportation in its green, unroasted state was an amazing learning process. Coffee trees are small, and cannot thrive in too direct sunlight. To help the small trees, other taller trees are interspersed, to provide shade, such as banana, with their wide leaves, and other larger hardwoods. Migrant workers would travel to the various coffee plantations at harvest and pick the ripe, red berries. The coffee berries were then washed and tumbled repeatedly, until all the fruit was stripped away and only the seed was left.  At this point the seeds were very soft and a rather pale white color.

Rawstern is an author, teacher, gourmet cook as well as a photographer and graphic artist.  She has taken or created all images appearing on these sites. Her articles have been syndicated nationally.

Her background is Slovakian on her mother's side and Yugoslavian on her father's. Her grandparents came from Europe to the United States to make a better life for themselves and their families. Her ethnic cooking influences began at the cradle. She began her cooking career in Guatemala, in 1970 when she moved there as a 20-year-old newlywed, and set out to learn to cook in a foreign land. This process was complicated by the fact that she could not speak or read the language.

Rawstern loves food, new recipes, and to teach people how to cook from scratch. Her passion is to teach people how to create A Harmony of Flavors when they cook, find joy in baking and help pass along her love of and joy in foods, both simple and exotic, plain or fancy, as she continues her journey in both ethnic cooking and domestic. Her favorite saying in her class is “Life is short – eat dessert first”.

About the Author

My name is Chris Rawstern and I have been on a cooking and baking journey for 42 years. I love food. I love to cook, and teach people how to cook, from scratch.  I love baking.  I love to create new recipes and try them.  I hope to inspire you to follow me!

I would love to hear from you, to help me continue my journey to explore diverse culinary experiences and hopefully to start you on a journey of collecting favored recipes of your own.  Visit me at my Web site (http://www.aharmonyofflavors.com/) my Blog or Marketplace (http://www.a-harmony-of-flavors-marketplace.com/).  Email me at chris@aharmonyofflavors.com.