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The traditional gourd or "Maté" is used for drinking yerba maté and is grown from various types of plants and trees. Namely from the squash family. In Argentina and other heavily consuming yerba maté counties the gourd has taken on the role of a traditional drinking vassal. The gourd or "Maté" is the oldest known devise for consuming yerba maté.    

The Bombilla (bom-bee-ah) is a traditional straw with a spring or whole like filter on the opposing end of the drinking tip. The Bombilla is used traditionally to drink yerba maté tea with a plant gourd.

The purpose of this device is to allow the individual to drink yerba maté tea in the traditional South American style.

Making yerba maté in a French press is fast and one of the most popular ways to brew yerba maté in the United States. You make yerba maté just like the way you would other teas or coffee's in your French press.

To Start:

There are 2 major techniques of curing yerba maté in the world.

The first and most commonly commercially processed method is fire dried:

This map of South America details the general geographic regions of yerba maté cultivation. Included is wild yerba maté and domestic cultivation of yerba maté Ilex paraguariensis  in South America. The yerba maté plant grows best in subtropical environments of Northern Argentina, Paraguay, Uruguay and parts of Southern Brazil. Each region has developed different "methods" or styles of growing, curing and marketing yerba maté.

Yerba maté grows in South America wild and is widely cultivated throughout central South America.

Wild Yerba Maté: The wild yerba maté plant is a species of holly in the aquifoliaceae family native to subtropical South America namely Northern Argentina, Southern Paraguay, Western Uruguay and Southern Brazil.

Bio-Dynamic farming yerba maté: At this time we do not know of any bio-dynamic farms growing yerba maté.

Cultivating conventional yerba maté:  Most of the global production of yerba maté is grown by using fossil fuel based fertilizers. 

More coming soon...