Visit to Trapiche Don Simón

We had the privilege of visiting our neighbor Elisa Mata's beautiful family farm on Wednesday afternoon. We learned about the cultivation and processing of coffee, citrus fruits, and cane sugar. Doña Elisa is an amazing, powerful woman who loves what she does and is highly skilled and knowledgable.

She maintains the family tradition of producing cane sugar products for home use, and we got to learn about all of the steps of growing and processing the cane. We were also delighted to taste cajeta (a candy that is loosely similar to fudge), fresh-pressed sugar cane juice that the students extracted themselves using a manual sugar mill or trapiche as they are called in Costa Rica, an impossibly delicious guineo-variety banana that has an entirely different flavor from the Chiquita version, and the fresh-cut cane itself which is delightfully crunchy and juicy.

The students asked thoughtful questions and Doña Elisa shared openly about her and her family's experience. Her land is jaw-droppingly beautiful and we even saw a rainbow! We all left feeling so glad to have had the opportunity to vist Trapiche Don Simón. ¡Thank you, Doña Elisa!