The History of Cafe Kili

A recent article by Elizabeth Lieb recounts the rich history of Cafe Kili and its founders.

"Recently opened Café Kili of Temple Terrace is a dream come true for Rose. A professional nurse by trade, she relocated with her family to the Bay area 10 years ago from her native Kenya. Since arriving in the United States, she’s worked at various jobs, raised three sons, and is an active member in her church, West Gate Baptist. In spite of a busy life during these years as wife, mother and financial contributor to the family, she continued to nurture a personal dream of selling fresh roasted coffee.

Growing up as the daughter of a coffee farmer had many benefits. The family business, located in the Central Province of Kenya, was sufficiently prosperous that Rose and her siblings were able to attend school and pursue professional careers. Contributing to a family business left Rose with entrepreneur attitudes and a willingness to take risks. With all this experience in her favor, she lacked one skill she felt essential to delivering quality coffee – the craft of roasting coffee beans. With the support of her husband, Patrick, she took small steps over the last two years towards fulfilling her ambition..."

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About Our Coffee

Drinking coffee is an act to be enjoyed, whether alone or with friends. A good cup of coffee is smooth, rich and flavorful, not bitter or burnt tasting. Our family's love of good coffee coupled with expert knowledge of roasting led to our decision to introduce Tampa to the wonders of small batch coffee roasting.

Roasting coffee in small batches has many benefits for the coffee lover:

• Roasting in small batches allows Cafe Kili to pay close attention to how the beans are treated before, during, and after roasting.
• Cafe Kili is able to personally select coffee sources and view the beans themselves before roasting, ensuring that the green coffee beans are of superior quality.
• Small batch roasting enables Cafe Kili to select the roast that best draws out the flavor of the green beans.
• Roasting only a few pounds of beans at the same time ensures that the coffee is roasted evenly to desired specifications
• As Cafe Kili roasts coffee on an as needed basis, there is no stockpiling of roasted coffee, ensuring that the beans used and sold are the freshest.
  
• Best of all, Cafe Kili's small batch coffee roasting results in a delicious cup of coffee.