By: Hiacynth Ablanez
Curious about the process of how to make a coffee? Well, this brew bar café in Benguet is offering you an experience of making your own coffee from the farm up to your cup!
Coffee has been one of the favorite drinks of most people – from Gen Z to Millennials to Gen X to Boomers. It can be a great companion whatever you’re doing; studying, working or even just relaxing. That is why a lot of café businesses have started to rise to offer different flavors and styles of coffee, but this specific café offers us something different.
Farm to Cup is an al fresco café in Benguet, La Trinidad that offers an experience of making a coffee from their farm up to the cup allowing the customers to see the whole process of coffee production; from brewing a coffee bean until it becomes a flavored coffee.
Farm to Cup Benguet is owned and run by Eli Toledo Natividad, 46 a Filipino coffee expert and a former instructor at the University of the Philippines- Baguio. Before this famous brew bar happened, Natividad used to work in a café that closed during the pandemic. But this doesn’t stop him from his love and loyalty to coffee. He offered a partnership with Philippine Nazarene College (PNC) to use its 4.5-hectare and make it a brew bar and coffee planting place.
Natividad explained in an interview with PhilSTAR L!fe that it was just an ambition in the start but now they are able to do it. Natividad also mentioned that they are a coffee education hub that provides program and mentorship in partnership with Technical Education And Skills Development Authority (TESDA) Central Office and Baguio, Benguet and most of their students have pursued in developing their own coffee shops after they graduate.
Witnessing the whole coffee production process is indeed a fun experience but Farm to Cup Benguet doesn’t just offer fun but also pushes their advocacy. They encouraged youth to help in coffee planting and organized a fundraising campaign like “#Youth4DEnviroment: Helping the youth through educational sponsorship.”
Aside from pushing their advocacy, Natividad also encouraged consumers to support locals to help the farmers in the Philippines, “We have a lot of struggling coffee farmers [who] need help. There’s a huge gap in our demand for coffee and the supplies that we are producing and we have to do something about it. Instead of buying coffee from Vietnam, Indonesia and other countries, we should really focus on growing [and] producing more coffee in the Philipppines,” he shared.
Photo by Farm to Cup Benguet
The al fresco café is also offering pastries to partner with your caffeinated or non-caffeinated drink every Monday to Saturday from 8:00 A.M to 8:00 P.M. The café has been serving these best drinks and pastries since March 2021.
Supporting wonderful local café and projects like Farm to Cup can be one of the best things you’ll do. As you don’t just let yourself experience the coffee production process but also take part in an advocacy campaign.
Calling out all of the coffee lovers out there! Would you like to experience this Do-It-Yourself coffee? Which stage of the coffee production process are you most excited about? Share to us your thoughts in the comment section below!