Product Overview:

"With wit and humour, Pendergrast has served up a rich blend of anecdote, character study, market analysis, and social history.... Everything you ought to know about coffee is here, even how to make it." - New York Times.

Uncommon Grounds is the definitive history of coffee - from its discovery on an Ethiopian mountainside to the age of Starbucks and the coffee crisis of the twenty-first century. A sweeping epic, Uncommon Grounds uses coffee production, trade, and consumption as a window through which to view broad historical themes: the clash and blending of cultures, slavery, the rise of brand marketing, glaobal inequities, fair trade, revolutions, health scares, environmental issues, and the rediscovery of quality.
Replete with a cast of eccentric characters - all of them suffused with a passion for the golden bean - Uncommon Grounds is nothing less than a coffee-flavoured history of the world, the classic work on coffee culture, fully updated for our times.

"Pendergrast's account satisfies because of its thoroughness... Pendergrast unearths coffee-based trade wars, health reports, and cafe cultures, bringing to light amusing treasures along the way." - Mother Jones

"Pendergrast's broad vision, meticulous research, and colloquial delivery combine aromatically."