Author Archives: James Hoffmann

My name is James Hoffmann, and I am a founder of Square Mile Coffee Roasters and was the World Barista Champion in 2007. I continue to write, give talks and consult on many aspects of coffee.

A simple explanation

I am extremely grateful to everyone who responded in the comments of the last post about taste and temperature.  I learned a great deal and now have some more avenues to explore. Partway down the comments I was guilty of wanting a simple explanation –  a short neat summary that I could tell my customers

Things I don’t understand #3214

I am not particularly ashamed of the phrase “I don’t know” but there comes a point in the day when you’ve said it five or six times and you feel you really ought to do something about it. The cause of my embarrassed ignorance:  the change in flavour when coffee cools.

WBC 2010 Ramblings

Ah, the post-WBC, er… post.  I’ve always failed at anything vaguely approaching a decent wrap-up of these events and I doubt I’m likely to start now. It is tricky to find a place to start, so broad is the experience and so numerous the people and conversations.  I should probably start with the important stuff:

WBC Blogging

Despite the backlog of other posts I can never find the time to visit, I suspect blogging for the next week will probably be devoted to the WBC. Having said that I don’t know that I will have time to create the kind of coverage you will see on the unofficial WBC blog over here,

WBC London Coffee Map

Just a very quick post to let you know that if you are coming to London for the WBC and want suggestions of somewhere to go then I’d recommend checking out the WBC/Coffee Kids London Coffee Map. Not only will you get delicious coffee, but the participating shops are also raising money for Coffee Kids,

One final plea

This is one last humble request on a topic I know I’ve ranted on about before. It would be really good, when talking about how we are brewing espresso amongst professionals, to start by talking about the weight of the espresso.  We need to stop using volume.  It is useless. Utterly useless.  Saying 1.5oz is

It’s like 8 hours of barista competition

Perhaps the best description of working at Penny University!  (In a good way) I say this having only worked there a handful of days, which have left me inspired by the people who’ve come for coffee and full of admiration and appreciation for Tim and Tobias who are doing this full time – and doing