Coffee Ceremony

The most recognizable part of Eritrean culture is the 'coffee ceremony'. This coffee is brewed by first roasting the 'green' coffee beans over the hot coals. Once the beans are roasted each participant wafts a generous amount towards them. This is followed by the grinding of the beans.

The coffee grounds are then put into a 'jebena' (a 'jebena' is made of clay and has a spherical base with a neck, which has pouring spout; typically a handle connects the neck with the spherical base) and boiled with water. When the coffee boils up through the neck it is poured in and out of another container to cool it, and then is put back into the jebena until it happens again. This is done three times.

At this point the coffee is ready to pour, and to do so a filter is fixed in the spout of the jebena. Pouring the coffee is done for all participants by moving the tilted jebena over each cup until it is full and then moving on to the next (some of the coffee will inevitably miss the cup but this is done to prevent the coffee grounds from getting into the coffee). Typically this cycle is repeated three times for the whole ceremony. One extra cup is poured each time.