Winner, IACP Food Writing Awards 2022
‘Plates, Vol.4: Seeds‘ | Published 2021
Set across several villages in the Karo district in North Sumatra, Indonesia, ‘Orange Was the New Black’, the cover story for Plates, Vol.4: Seeds explores the underreported story of the resilient coffee seed that survived two natural disasters and the people intertwined with it.
From farmers to government officials, I spoke to people on the ground, biked past their fields and sat down for coffee with various individuals to observe the turning tide of “third wave coffee”. Despite the “shortage” of coffee in the West at the height of the global COVID-19 pandemic, the stories told by the people handling Sumatran coffee was different to the mainstream narrative.
Two standalone profile features on hidden figures in the field, a coffee farmer and a coffee trader, emerged from this excursion as a result of observing the disparity of voices at the decision-making table.
