Stephanie Camden, a passionate American Q-Grader and newly hired green-coffee buyer for Seattle-based Ultima Global Roastery, has spent her life obsessed with coffee but has never traveled outside the continental United States. She is sent to Mexico to evaluate three coffee fincas and recommend which farms Ultima should work with. Her logistics manager and friend River Townsend warns her that the assignment is important because Stephanie is still on probation at Ultima.
When Stephanie arrives in Mexico City to connect to the southern coffee regions, the tour guide she was expecting, Flora, is mysteriously unavailable. Instead, she is met by Matteo Valencia, the handsome, charming owner of Valencia A+ Tours. Matteo comes from a large Mexican family but was raised partly in Los Angeles, giving him a unique foot in both worlds.
What begins badly, with Stephanie literally attacking Matteo with her fanny pack because she thinks he's stealing her luggage, gradually becomes an unlikely connection. Their personalities initially clash. Stephanie is a coffee purist who drinks it black and takes her profession extremely seriously. Matteo prefers elaborate, sweet coffee drinks—like traditional café de olla—and treats life with considerably more flexibility. As Matteo takes Stephanie through the Mexican countryside (traveling through the lush coffee regions of Veracruz and Chiapas), she begins to discover both the country and the man behind the tour-guide persona. He introduces her to Mexican culture, his warm family dynamics, food, and coffee, bridging her American perspective with his rich Mexican heritage, while she teaches him to appreciate coffee at a deeper level.
But Matteo has a secret. His childhood best friend, Dominic Perez, owns Finca Arboleda, a struggling coffee farm. Matteo has financially supported Dominic for years and wants Stephanie to taste his coffee because it could save Dominic from bankruptcy. Matteo therefore manipulates Stephanie's itinerary to bring her to Dominic's finca.
The deception becomes increasingly difficult for Matteo to justify as he genuinely falls for Stephanie. At the same time, Stephanie falls for him. When she discovers that Matteo has a financial connection to Dominic's finca and deliberately manipulated her trip, she feels betrayed. Their relationship collapses just as she is supposed to evaluate the final finca, Finca Esplanade. She misses the appointment, putting her career at risk.
Back in Mexico City, Matteo makes one final attempt to convince Stephanie to recommend Dominic's coffee. He finally admits that he has fallen for her. Stephanie returns to Seattle and presents her case to Ultima Global. Rather than simply following the original assignment, Stephanie trusts her own professional instincts and recommends Finca Arboleda. The executives agree, lift her probation, and ultimately allow her to establish a Mexican and Mesoamerican division.
Six months later, Stephanie has moved to Mexico and is running Ultima's operations there. She returns to Finca Arboleda, where Matteo is now operating tours for the hugely successful farm. Their reunion leads to the final coffee puns, flirtation, and kiss.