This article is adapted from the September 18, 2021, edition of Gastro Obscura’s Favorite Things newsletter. You can sign up here. Coffee is everywhere. It’s in espressos and cappuccinos; it’s in pods and packets of Nescafé. It’s in small-town gas stations and big-city cafés. It’s on every continent. Some 90 percent of people on Earth start the day with caffeine, usually tea or coffee. All that coffee can be traced back to one place: patches of forest in Ethiopia. These forests where coffee grows wild—gathered by humans, but also enjoyed…
