We grew coffee in our backyard. And we liked it.

Happy National Coffee Day!

A few years ago, our dear friends, Gene and Pam sent Eric two little 3 inch coffee plants for his birthday. They thought it would be fun for us to grow our own backyard coffee.

So we added the little plants to our kind-of-chaotic-we-just-like-how-they-look backyard garden. We watered them along with everyone else who lives out there and the little coffee plants grew.

And thrived.

And we began to notice.

"Have you seen the coffee plants lately? They're getting so big!"

We repotted them and kept them close together so they wouldn't be lonely.

And last year, they produced little white flowers. WUT? "We've got COFFEE BLOSSOMS, people!"

Look at us! Growing coffee!

And then....

The little red cherries appeared. WHAT DO WE DO NOW? (<--Can you read the panic in that question?)

We sent photos to our friends. "Remember those coffee plants you gave us a few years ago? Look at what's happening to them!"

Apparently it was time to harvest. Who knew?

So, Eric set about the task of choosing the ripest red coffee cherries.

We had planned a weekend trip with our friends (the ones who originally gave us the plants) and decided it would be fun to bring some of the magic beans. Gene happens to be quite the coffee snob aficionado and has his own roasting device.

Coffee talk.

He took the beans home and after a few days sent us this:

Success!

We did some of our own harvesting, shucking, drying and roasting (If by roasting, you mean stirring the beans around in a small skillet until they're brown) when we got home.

I personally hated the idea of pulling off those beautiful, bright RED (!) coffee beans from our plants, but that's not important right now.

So we somehow managed to scrape together two small (freakishly small!) cups of our own Backyard Brew.

Also, those 2 cute little plants are so much taller than me now. I know. Shut up!

There were two things we decided after this experience with the Backyard Coffee:

1. As much as we enjoyed the process, we will, from now on, leave the coffee making to The Pros.
2. We have added a descriptive name to our Backyard Coffee. We're calling it, Mission Viejo Brown.

National Coffee Day - It's "taka taka" time! (A Coffee Giveaway, too.)

Don't ask me how I know these things. I just do. 

This is one of those geeky things that has gotten stuck in my brain and screams to be celebrated.

Like Hobbit Day, which we always celebrate elaborately. Or like Pi Day, which also happens to be Albert Einstein's birthday. Or even Star Wars Day ("May the 4th be with you!" - get it?), but that's not important right now.

It's probably a homeschool thing. We're Uber-geeks, aren't we? I know. Shut up.

But today is slightly different. Today, September 29th, is National Coffee Day. (Let's have a moment of reverential silence, please.)

And being Cuban-coffee-loving-uber-geeks, we celebrate this particular holiday with great devotion. In fact, we pretty much celebrate coffee, not just yearly, but much more on a daily-possibly-even-hourly basis.

Of course, we love our first-cup-in-the-morning black coffee, or café con leche, or sweet espresso, or even a wake-me-up-please latte.

But around 2:00 pm, there's that slump. You know what I'm talking about.That boy-am-I-tired-how-will-I-get-through-the-rest-of-my-day feeling. And the answer to that (at least around here) is....

It's “taka taka” time!

Taka taka is the sound of the spoon in the cup stirring the espresso and sugar into Killer Espuma®.

For us Cubans, it's the highlight of our mornings and afternoons and evenings and around here, we dance and sing when it's taka taka time ...

My daughter, Amy Kikita is the reigning Queen of the Taka Taka. She's the one who makes the best cafecito in our household. In fact, she takes coffee making to another entire level.

Let me illustrate:

So, today, in honor of National Coffee Day, I'd like to do a coffee related giveaway. 

What better brand of coffee for a Hispanic Heritage Month National Coffee Day Coffee Giveaway, than our very own Cuban go-to brand? Bustelo, of course.

And no, the Bustelo people are not sponsoring this giveaway. (I wish!) This is my very own personal I-love-MBFCF-readers-because-you-are-all-so-fabulous giveaway. You're welcome.)

I'm giving away a 10 oz. can of this beautiful Bustelo Supreme Espresso by Bustelo:

  

and ...

a 1.75 oz. jar of Café Bustelo Instant Coffee: 
 

and ...

A this set of six beautiful (Fiesta colors, people!) espresso cups:

My son, Adam, gave me this very same set and I love these tacitas so much I want to marry them. (Sorry, Eric.)

So.....let's have some Coffee Talk.

I'll be giving away all THREE items to one lucky winner.

To be entered in this fabulous National Coffee Day Giveaway, please answer one or all of the following questions:

• Do you have a mid-afternoon coffee, latte, cappucino, decaf or regular?
• Do you make it yourself, or does someone else make it for you?
• Do you “taka taka”?  ;-)

I will pick a winner randomly from your comments on Friday, September 30th at 7 pm.

So, come on....let's talk “taka taka.