My Mate World

Every once in a while, my partner and I decide to kick our morning coffee and share a gourd of yerba mate as we get ready in the morning. I ordered a few different kinds from the My Mate World website, (Highly recommend if you want to find some quality mate) this one was the resounding favorite. It’s got a little bit of a smoky aspect to it compared to other brands we tried, like Amanda and Oasis. It’s an intense tea, compared to the gentle Chinese greens and even the deepest steamed fukamushi sencha. The astringency and tannins are mouth puckering, which is understandable for the amount of leaf that is traditionally used. I usually fill my little gourd about 1/4 – 1/3 full, pour some cool water to wake up the leaves for a minute, then tip the gourd to the side and fill it with hot water, around 80C/175F. Then we take teeny tiny sips off our gilded bombilla until the ratio of tea to water becomes undrinkably thick, in which we start the hot water process again. The passing of the gourd to one another is a very enjoyable dance, sometimes we even add some lemon to the gourd :)