Wayan pulls into the Satria Coffee Farm and we expect very little. There are many roadside stands where we could get luwak coffee, so we kind of figured this was just like any other. Boy, were we surprised!
First, you walk down a trail that has an amazing garden on either side. I wouldn't have noticed any of the plants had Wayan not stopped to educate us, but we passed mangosteen, peppercorn, pineapple, coconut trees, jackfruit, vanilla, chilies, papaya, cinnamon, snakefruit, palms, etc. and, of course, coffee trees.
The trail leads you up to cages where you get to see the luwaks (also known as civets). They are a little larger than house cats, and they have long, sharp nails and wide pupils. They're calm during the day but apparently very aggressive at night. On top of the cage you see a case with what looks like Baby Ruths inside.
The next stop on the trail is a table with different spices cultivated from the garden. We touch and sniff.
Stop number three has a bunch of friendly workers waiting for you, and an old woman roasting some coffee beans. One of the workers would be our guide for the rest of our stay at Satria. She educates us on the difference between male and female coffee beans, and then explains the process of roasting and crushing the beans before getting into the process of extracting and cleaning the poop beans.
The old woman lets us stir (we=free labor).
Our new coffee guide (didn't get her name) walks us over to long tables overlooking the jungle. She tells us to sit and wait for a minute while she comes back with samples for us. She returns with tea and coffee samples, explains the benefits of each of them and places them on this placemat so we remember which type was which:
This was a FREE SAMPLING. In fact, the entire time we were at the farm we weren't pressured to buy a thing.
The only sample missing was the luwak coffee ("kopi luwak" in Basa Indonesian), which can be purchased for 50,000RP/cup. The coffee is known as "the most expensive coffee in the world," which is the reason a sample can't be given for free. We gladly order one to have alongside our samples, judging the flavor versus the regular Bali coffee .
Spoiler: it's not great. It doesn't actually taste like shit, but it's not delicious. It tastes like a very strong and bitter espresso. We were surprised to find there is little caffeine in luwak coffee because the cats extract it during fermentation. Instead, the luwak coffee has more protein. Why drink strong-tasting coffee without the benefit of the kick?
Anyway, we hang out for a bit. There's a jar with organic apple tobacco on the table, complete with rolling papers and matches inside. You're encouraged to try their tobacco for free, too. There's another jar with sugared peanuts we're encouraged to try. Then there's a jar labeled "Cat Poo". We didn't have anything from this jar.
After relaxing for a bit we head to the gift shop. It's reasonably priced, though the cat-poo-chino mixes are expensive. Overall I highly recommend that if you are in Ubud you go to the Satria Coffee farm. The experience was amazing. They're nice, they're organic and they even remind you that Jack Nicholson drinks luwak coffee in The Bucket List.
(Check them out: http://www.satriaagrowisata.baliklik.com)
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