Oregon Public Broadcasting

It's not quite tea. And it's definitely not coffee.

Santiago Casanueva owns Top Leaf Mate Bar in Bend.

The traditional South American beverage called yerba mate is still relatively unknown in the U.S. But it's catching on with some natural food stores and cafes in the Northwest.

Mate probably won't put your local Starbucks out of business. But some entrepreneurs are hoping to tap into the local coffee culture.

The Top Leaf Mate Bar in downtown Bend, Oregon looks a lot like your average coffee shop. It sounds like a coffee shop too.

But there's no coffee on the menu here. The baristas are exclusively serving products made with yerba mate. That's a type of large shrub grown in places like Argentina and Paraguay.

The leaves are dried and steeped with either hot or cold water to make a beverage that's kind of like tea.

But Top Leaf customer Len Meserve is nursing a mug holding something that looks more like what you'd get at Starbucks.

Len Meserve: "A mocha mate."

Chris Lehman: "So, what does a mocha mate taste like?"

Len Meserve: "It's mate and chocolate and it's very good."

To the uninitiated, pure mate can taste bitter and grassy. That's why places like Top Leaf blend it with flavors.

Mate is traditionally served in a gourd, but the North American version often comes in a glass jar.

Some people like customer Alex Monshaw do drink it straight up. He says he made the switch from coffee to mate several months ago. He says he used to drink up to four cups of coffee a day. Not anymore.

"The cool thing about it is, it's not like if I miss a day of mate I'm pissed off all day, like coffee was, you know. When you miss your coffee, it's really unpleasant but mate isn't something I need to wake up, it's just something that makes me feel really good," Monshaw said.

Mate contains a small amount of caffeine. It also has other natural stimulants. Its fans say it gives you a boost in a less acidic way than coffee does.

Top Leaf owner Santiago Casanueva is practically evangelistic in his support of mate. But he says he knows it isn't going to displace coffee anytime soon.

"Coffee's had a strong run for 20 years. It's going to keep being here. I educate my customers in a way that allows them to realize they're making not only a choice that's giving them the same buzz, if not better, but they're getting all these nutritional benefits."

The health benefits of yerba mate are disputed.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration warned a Louisiana company for claiming its yerba-based dietary supplements reduce blood pressure. But Casanueva thinks a coffee-crazed society is ready to -- as he calls it -- get off the bean and onto the green.

He's trying to turn the mate bar concept into a franchised chain. Casanueva isn't the only central Oregon entrepreneur thinking big when it comes to mate.

Nate Winkler adds some spices to a mate blend at Oregon Yerba Mate in Redmond.

Just up the road in Redmond, Nate Winkler runs Oregon Yerba Mate. He imports it bulk from Argentina and blends it with herbs and spices in a customized blending machine that looks kind of like a cement mixer.

Winkler does run a small mate cafe, but he sees more potential in his budding wholesale business.

"Once it started to gain some momentum, we started looking at health food stores, selling it bulk so people could brew it at home. So that's kind of how we got into it and from there, it just started snowballing,"

Winkler says he now has about 70 accounts, mostly natural food stores including industry giant Whole Foods. But whether they brew it at home or drink it in a cafe, most North Americans probably won't experience mate in the traditional South American way.

It's almost a ritual there. You drink it out of a shared gourd through a metal straw called a bombilla.

At the Top Leaf Mate Bar in Bend, you can ask for your drink in a gourd. But you won't get an actual gourd. In a concession to the local health department, Top Leaf uses a substitute made from glass.