Speaking of the holidays, if you are looking for an edible Christmas gift, we heartily recommend two gifts that we have received and truly enjoyed.

Mystic Monk Coffee

Mystic Monk Coffee is roasted by the Carmelite Monks, a Roman Catholic monastery in the silence and solitude of the Rocky Mountains of northern Wyoming. The monks live a hidden life of prayer and contemplation in the pursuit of God. The monastery is inundated with young men who seek to leave everything to pray for the world, in a tradition at least a thousand years old. It is the monks’ great joy and privilege to share the fruit of their life with you in every cup of Mystic Monk Coffee.

My sis bought Brian the Mystic Monk Coffee for his birthday and he LOVED it! Personally, I am not a coffee drinker but the smell of their hazelnut coffee makes you seriously consider converting! They also sell k-cups and fair trade organic coffee.

Gethsemani Farms

Since 1848, when 44 Trappist monks from the Abbey of Melleray in western France made themselves a new home in the hills of central Kentucky, Gethsemani has been a hardworking community. Supporting themselves at first by farming, the monks now depend on their mail-order sales of homemade fruitcake, cheese and bourbon fudge.

To a Trappist, work is a form of prayer. In fact, the cycle of public prayers the monks chant seven times daily is known as the Work of God, or Opus Dei in Latin. Trappists also pray privately at intervals throughout the day, encountering God through the ancient monastic discipline known as lectio divina, or sacred reading.

We have only tasted their cheese so far, but it was superb. Make sure to try the “smoked” one. Yum!

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