YerbanLegend.com

Yerba mate is rapidly gaining acceptance and popularity around the United States, but buying a cup of yerba mate can be a real challenge. In South America, finding yerba mate is no big deal. You can buy it in many forms at markets, most restaurants, gas stations, from street vendors and at mate bars. In the United States it is getting easier, but it still takes real persistence.

Within a short 1,500 step walk from my home there are six coffee houses. Two of the establishments are the ubiquitous Starbucks – one on either side of the street. Yet, not one of these thriving businesses has yerba mate on their menu board. 

The big chain coffee houses apparently have no interest in selling yerba mate. Perhaps they are concerned that if their customers discovered all that yerba mate has to offer, they would be tempted to give up coffee. Or maybe, when you are as big as Starbucks, innovation gives way to tradition. Can’t you just hear: “That’s the way we’ve always done it!” and “if it ain’t broke; don’t fix it!” I suspect that the hot beverage “leaders” will react only when an increased demand is developed by newer companies.

Many smaller, boutique coffee and tea houses are already starting to recognize the increasing interest in yerba mate and are putting it on their menus. A conscientious proprietor of a local coffee or tea house, with a true interest in his clientele, is in a better position to search for a source and offer it as a specialty item. The Starbucks of the world are just too big to care.

In recent travels around California, I bought a mate latte at the Whole Foods Market in Sebastopol; they made it from a concentrate. On the central coast I purchased a hot mate at Linnaea’s Cafe in San Luis Obispo; they put loose yerba into a little tea sack, tied a knot on the open end and pointed me to a hot water station. At the Morro Bay Coffee Co. (in Morro Bay of course), they let me select a mate tea bag from several flavors and poured the hot water for me. At Mojo Coffee in Goleta, the coffee barista measured out a small quantity of loose yerba, poured it into the metal filter basket of the portafilter on an espresso machine and blasted it with hot water.

It should come as no surprise that I still have not found one place in the United States that sells yerba mate the way it is prepared in South America. South Americans fill their gourd with loose yerba, pour in hot water from a kettle or thermos and sip it through a bombilla. The locals usually carry their own yerba and utensils.

I hasten to add that I have not found a coffee or tea house that sells mate prepared in a French press either. I often prepare it this way at home and I can easily understand that this method does not lend itself to commercial usage.

But, not far from my home in Long Beach, I found what might be the best choice we have for now. At the Viento y Agua Coffee House, owner Bela Mogyorody, or one of his staff, will measure loose yerba into a paper filter, put it in the basket of a commercial coffee pot and brew it just like coffee. His coffee house is just a few miles from the California State University campus in Long Beach and students come in to study, log onto his free wi-fi hot spot and of course – sip a cup of mate. There is an art gallery right next door and they provide the traditional coffee house entertainment in the evenings.

Bela now has a regular clientele who order nothing but yerba mate. When the weather warms up, he even offers it cold – as a terere. He brews it in the morning and keeps a pitcher in the refrigerator throughout the day. One of the best recommendations for the yerba mate at Viento y Agua is that all of the employees drink it regularly.

It’s taking time, but the Norte Americanos are catching on. Maybe someday we’ll even share that special camaraderie of our South American neighbors who pass the gourd around to their closest friends and share sips from a common bombilla. It could happen.

What is your favorite mate source? Where is it located? How do they prepare it? Is their staff drinking it too? Or, just selling it? Is the U.S. ready for a chain of mate bars? Tell us about it.

Send me the name, address, etc. of your favorite source of a cup of mate in the U.S. and I will add it to my “By The Cup” Directory.