The national drink of Uruguay

Ybera Maté (pronounced mah-teh) is a traditional South American infused drink, particularly in Uruguay and Argentina and to a lesser extent in other countries. The beverage is most popular in Uruguay, where people are seen walking on the street carrying the maté (drinking gourd) and termo (thermos) in their arms and where you can find hot water stations to refill the termo while on the road. To prevent accidental scaldings with the hot water Uruguay has enacted a national law which prohibits drinking yerba maté while driving.

Ybera maté is served with a metal straw from a hollow calabash gourd. In Spanish speaking countries the straw is called a bombilla and it was traditionally made of silver. Modern, commercially available straws are typically made of nickel silver, stainless steel, or hollow-stemmed cane. The bombilla also acts as a sieve because the submerged end is flared, with small holes or slots that allow the brewed liquid in, but block the chunky matter that makes up much of the mixture. The hollow gourd is known as a maté and and is often decorated with accents of silver at the rim and/or on the base. At the beginning of the 18th century the yerba mate gourd became a luxury item and silversmiths made the whole vessel out of silver with fanciful ornamentation.

We estimate that 1 out of every 3 people walking on the street have a termo tucked under their left arm and a maté held in their right hand. Travelers bring their maté vessels onto the bus and they carry them into stores and into the bank or hair salons. Everyplace you go you see yerba maté being consumed. In the grocery stores there is a complete aisle of ybera products to choose from, with one small shelf devoted to tea and another, even smaller, shelf to coffee. So far we have resisted the urge to buy our own yerba and matés for Curare but LE is sorely tempted to buy a stainless steel bombilla (she thinks it would be just the thing for filtering ice cubes in her drink or for getting rid of the orange pulp in fresh squeezed juice).

Yerba (Ilex paraguariensis) is a species of holly and is the source of the maté beverage. Though the plant is called yerba in Spanish (herb in English), it is a tree and not an herbaceous plant. It is native to subtropical South America in northeastern Argentina, Bolivia, southern Brazil, Uruguay and Paraguay. The yerba plant is a shrub when young and a tree when adult, growing up to 15 meters tall. It's leaves are evergreen, 7–11 cm long and 3–5.5 cm wide, with a serrated margin. As with other brewed herbs, the plants leaves are dried, chopped, and ground into a powdery mixture which contains caffeine and tannin but is less astringent than tea.

The method of preparing the yerba maté infusion varies considerably from region to region but speaking to several Uruguayans (in my still horrible Spanish) this is what I have found out.

1. The gourd is first filled one-half to three-quarters of the way with the yerba.
2. When the gourd is filled, the person grasps it with their full hand, covering and roughly sealing the opening with their palm. Then the maté is turned upside-down and shaken, which causes the finest particles of the yerba to settle toward the person's palm.
3. Once the yerba has settled, the maté is carefully brought to a near-sideways angle, with the opening tilted just slightly upward of the base. The maté is then shaken very gently with a side-to-side motion.
4. After arranging the yerba along one side of the gourd, the maté is carefully tilted back onto its base. The angled mound of yerba should remain, with its powdery peak still flat and mostly level with the top of the gourd.
5. Now the maté is ready to receive the straw. The straw is inserted at an angle so that it comes to rest near or against the opposite wall of the gourd. Many people choose to pour warm water into the mate before adding the straw, while others insert the straw into dry yerba. It seems everyone I spoke with had an opinion about which method is the best.
6. After the straw is inserted the yerba may be brewed. Hot water (typically at 70–80 °C [160–180 °F], never boiling) is added until it reaches almost to the top of the gourd. When the yerba is fully saturated it is ready for drinking. The drinkers may refill the maté (gourd) many times before it becomes lavado (washed out) and loses its flavor (most people told me that they added water about 10 times).

It seems like a lot of work for what is essentially a type of tea but I suppose that is why it has achieved a cultural status. Enjoy!