Initially there wasn’t going to be a UK Brewers Cup.  With the World Brewers Cup being relatively new, countries had the option to nominate someone to compete, and the SCAE UK asked me.  I’ll be completely honest – I did want to compete in the Worlds because I really like this competition.  However, it seemed a little unfair and I thought that it would be a fun competition to put on.  I made a deal that I would go and represent if I failed to organise the UK competition myself.  Because I had wanted to compete I planned to enter into the competition – competitions have always proven to be great learning experiences and I thought this one would be especially fun.

With WBC and all that goes into it, this was perhaps a foolish proposition but I was lucky enough to be able to drag Andrew Tolley from Taylor Street Baristas and Gwilym Davies into the mix to help organise.  As this was outside of the remit of the SCAE we also had to find funding and sponsorship and I have to say thank you to Paul and all at Marco for water boilers, Ed and Steve at Mahlkoenig UK for grinders, Paul at Coffee Hit for prizes and Peter from James Gourmet for roasting the round 1 coffee.

I was delighted with the response – we filled all 20 places very quickly (more seemed a little ambitious as we planned to hold both round 1 and round 2 on the same day, at Prufrock Cafe on a Saturday.)  There was a great cross section of shops and roasters in the running, and we just needed a few judges.

Those judges ended up giving a heroic effort.  They’d judge around 25 cups of coffee over a 9 hour period.  I was impressed.  Thank you to Grant Rattray from Cup of Excellence, Lynsey from United Coffee and Joanna Lawson from Twin Trading.  (Unlike the other two, Grant isn’t a Q-Grader, but he has some substantial cupping credentials….)

The day was fun – a lot more people showed up to hang out, drink coffee and support than we hoped.  The vibe in the place was lovely, and great coffee felt oddly accessible compared to so many other coffee competitions.

I made a little video – I tried to capture everyone during the day but in between organising, competing and just running around like an idiot I maybe didn’t do the best job.  It should show everyone and the brew method they used.  We’ll try and get some recipes up on the tumblr soon.  I am annoyed I didn’t get good footage of Andrew running things, doing the scoring, organising judges and competitors and generally being awesome – thank you again for your help! He should have been in the video, so my apologies there.

So, I ended up winning.  I have to say that I would have felt awkward enough about this, even without the mixture of cheers and groans that met the announcement.  Nonetheless I am very pleased this event happened – I hope all competitors had fun.  I shall do my best in Maastricht later in the month.

A big thank you to Jess for roasting some delicious coffee, it shouldn’t have tasted that good the day after roasting!  For those who want the details I brewed a Kangunu AA lot, from Nyeri, at a ratio of 60g/l.  The method was basically a filtered french press.  (I like simple brewing).  4 minute steep time.

John Gordon made everyone at SQM incredibly proud. He took completely the right approach to competition – using it as a vehicle to learn, and I think because of that attitude has come away with a huge amount from it. His coffee was delicious (credit to Jess), and it was cool for everyone in the company to be involved in some way. I’m glad I overcame the nerves to watch him in the finals – he was great. Also – his signature drink is so tasty, shockingly so for something containing grape juice, hops, lime and espresso. Balanced, complex goodness and one of the few signature drinks that I could drink several of out of choice.

Making finals these days is a great achievement, a huge achievement. Making semifinals has become a challenge – the average standard of performances these days being much, much higher. Chatting to Matt Perger backstage he made the comment that every single barista was dialling in during their practice hour with a set of scales. (Essential for the weird atmospheric conditions). Speaking to a number of judges the average espresso was significantly better than ever before too. (Not that I am saying that they are linked…..) ¹

The competition itself was also pretty incredible. Not since Japan in 2007 has there been a stage like that, and never before has there been an audience that much fun, that noisy and that supportive. Those who got to perform on that stage got an experience that was truly unique. I am not disparaging Vienna next year, but I think this one is going to be tough to top, the way that Tokyo was tough to top. ²

For the finals I really enjoyed doing the commentary with Peter Giuliano on the live stream. Took a while for me to get into, but I hope it was at least a little entertaining for the folks watching online (and there were a lot more of you than I thought!). Feedback on that obviously welcome, and I think it is likely to be something that becomes increasingly common. Thoughts on that welcome, as I am obviously completely biased.

Having the WBC in a producing country was definitely a good thing. The farm tour that the baristas went on seemed extremely well received and the vibe behind the competition was great too. I’m absolutely gutted for Lina from Colombia, clearly so strong in the first round and then a tough semifinals performance that knocked her out. In fact (going back to how big an achievement making semis and finals are) if you look at who didn’t make it through you get as clear an idea of how tough it is, as if you were to just look at who did make it.

We have, without a doubt, a great champion this year. He’s lovely, genuine, passionate, talented and will make a superb ambassador for coffee. I hope producing countries in Central and South America take full advantage of a champion who understands coffee culture in a producing country, and who speaks both Spanish and English.

His performance was clearly exceptional – he was the one to watch from day one. Despite missing the first day, when I asked around a lot of people were pretty excited by what he was doing. If you haven’t seen it then you should watch it online.

On twitter afterwards I saw a number of people describe this performance as a game changer. In many ways I think that is a fair description, but perhaps I see it differently to other people.

Alejandro’s routine was a near perfect demonstration of the possible connection between a barista and origin. (It should be noted that Pete’s stellar performance was incredibly well executed along those lines too). In some ways the theoretical barrier that stopped producing countries winning has been lifted, but at the same time I think some of their advantage has gone as well. The winning performance next year cannot be along the same lines as the one this year. There must be change, there must be evolution. The card has been played to perfection, and now competitors much take a different direction. Pete picked, pulped, roasted and brewed his coffee. Hard to top. Alejandro’s signature drink contained everything the coffee tree producers, and as he performed both the producer and roaster watched from the crowd. I loved it all! I think Alejandro’s win is the start of something exciting.

I think that for the first time everyone is back to a level playing field – regardless of whether your home country produces coffee or not. I hope this means that next year we see more risk taking, more innovation and bigger ideas than ever before.

So. Best WBC ever. Seriously. An exciting year for a new champion, and I hope a lot of people went away reinvigorated about competition. ³ Congratulations to Alejandro, Federico and all at Viva Espresso (Federico is somehow even more passionate about coffee than when I first met him 5 years ago – which is saying something!), and to all who competed. (edit) Also huge congrats to Steve Leighton of HasBean for consistently roasting awesome coffee – I tasted Alejandro’s espresso backstage and it was seriously delicious. Congratulations to the WCE and Cafe de Colombia on an incredible event. I’m missing loads of stuff out, but I figure this post is long enough.

Thoughts and comments on this very welcome and there’s a flickr gallery of iphone shots here.

1. Actually, I might be saying that they are linked.
2. No matter how much chocolate is involved
3. I still plan on taking next year off and having nothing whatsoever to do with any competitor!

At this altitude water will boil at 91.2°C/196.2°F – below the 93.5°C/200°F that the Aurelias will be set to. What follows is mostly personal opinion¹, coupled with a possible experiment that might answer some questions.

When we’re brewing espresso the system is under pressure (9 bars mostly), rather than the much lower atmospheric pressure. One of the unique aspects of brewing under pressure is that water is able to dissolve a lot more CO2 than it usually can at atmospheric pressure. When the coffee liquid leaves the basket we see that it is unable to retain that CO2 which forms bubbles that get trapped by various surfactants as a foam: crema.

People will often remark that at altitude the coffee acts like it hasn’t had a chance to rest/degas. The espresso tends to have very large bubbles, and lacks strength – often disappearing very quickly. This is, of course, similar to brewing very fresh coffee (up to 48-96hrs post roast) at sea level.

What doesn’t make sense to me is that surely CO2 would be more likely to be drawn from the coffee bean when stored at low pressure than at higher pressure?

My guess (and it is a guess) is that the pressure change from the bottom of the basket to atmosphere is much larger than normal when brewing at altitude. I would guess that the saturation point for CO2 in water at 2625m is significantly lower than the saturation point at sea level. The liquid loses more gas, and we see this as bigger bubbles. With foams in liquid the strength is dependent on bubble size (the smaller the stronger – think good milk foam), so these larger bubbles of crema will disappear faster.

What does this mean for competitors? Here is my advice:

Bring scales. I know a lot of people don’t like it (though I don’t really understand why), but your espresso volume is going to be radically different for an identical flow rate at sea level. Know your brew recipe before you come, and before you start freaking out about how things taste, check whether you are brewing on spec. Espresso is a recipe that is based on weights and flow rates. Going by eye is tough. I’ve tried, when I was there in 2007, and it took a while before things made sense!

Another question remains – should espresso be aged longer for brewing at altitude?

This is a good question, and one I think we need to do a few experiments on. Ageing espresso will certainly reduce the amount of CO2 left in the coffee beans, but surely at the expense of some loss of pleasing aromas and the potential development of negative flavours. I’d like to run a two way experiment, but it needs participants who have access to coffee machines at different altitudes.

Take two bags of espresso from the same roasts/blending batch. Store one at sea level, store the other at high altitude. Ideally in similar temperatures. After 10 days bring both back down to sea level and observe variations in volume for a fixed weight of coffee, liquid and brew time. Based on my amateur theorising above – there should be no detectable differences, or – if anything – the coffee stored at altitude might have less crema/volume when brewed.

Then take two bags of identical espresso and store both for 10 days at sea level. Then brew one at sea level and one at altitude. Record variations in volume for fixed weight of coffee, liquid and brew time.

This way we’ll know whether the issue is ageing of brewing. I would predict that when brewed identically the high altitude espresso should be just as delicious as the low altitude one – but I am very happy to be proven wrong.

One aspect to consider is when the brewing liquid might reach boiling point. If someone is pulling very fast shots, where the brew water doesn’t lose much heat to the coffee – then I’d expect to see some issues towards the end of the shot as the exit liquid from the basket will be very close to boiling, if not boiling at high altitude. Properly brewed espressos shouldn’t (in theory) see the same problem. Anyone have video of a naked portafilter at high altitude?

Comments, thoughts, accurate science and brutal critiques of the above welcome!  Thanks to Brent Fortune for setting my brain off!

1. Warning: Amateur Science Alert!

I am not sure if there are plans to run it in the UK this year, if there are I will post the details.  (And probably enter too!)  If you want a quick video introduction to the competition then check out this video ¹:

I’m sure it will generate some criticism for its format, but before people hate on it too much – can we at least try it first to see how it works? ² Skepticism is fine (and to be encouraged to a point), but this is still being put together by the hard work of volunteers so if you have a better competition and are willing to give up your time then I am sure they’d be very pleased to hear from you.

I’m positive we’ll be seeing more details (rules, regs, scoresheets etc etc) coming out in the next few weeks, including information about the other competition which is the Roasting Competition!  Interesting stuff indeed!

UPDATE: Thanks to Oscar – the rules, regs and downloadables are to be found here.

UKBC Starts!

Talking of competition – the UK regionals kick off next week in the South East, which is being held on Monday and Tuesday in London.  (Details here).  Hopefully people will be coming down to hang out and support some entrants who’ve done the wise thing and made the effort to compete!  There are heats around the UK so come on out to support your friends/favourite baristas!  (I’m not judging this year, so won’t be at any of the other heats sadly.)

1. Yes, I do seem to be in the video, but no – I had nothing to do with it
2. This is not because I think the format is bad – more the reaction people often have to competition formats in general.

The problem is I never got around to sorting out a winner. Time to sort that out!

Below are links to various entries, and underneath is a poll for you to vote for your favourite. The SQM subscription prize still stands, though the others may not (quite rightly – who would support a competition as badly run as this!). I will probably cobble a few others bits and pieces together for the winner for extra amusement value.

We’ll close voting on the 31st December 2010, so hopefully people have a little free time to watch silly videos with milk and coffee. I don’t mind how people pick a favourite – most entertaining, best pour, silliness, soundtrack – I don’t mind. Just pick whichever one you think is the most absurd!

The entries:

Josh Hockin
Epic Espresso
Niko S
Jon Lewis
Team Ireland (Colin Harmon/David Walsh)
Alex Redgate
Em Hart
Hunt Slade/Safehouse
Hans Pronk
Troy O’Rourke
Sander Schat
Jesse Bladyka
Friso
Ola Persson
Lee Mazur
Stephen “EspressoBomb”

Links are posted in the order that they were submitted. If you have some spare time and enjoy silly things please watch and vote!

If I somehow missed any – let me know asap and I will add them!

While we were travelling together earlier in the month Colin, Gwilym and I chatted about uploading our scoresheets. I said that I’d upload mine if he uploaded his – and I think Gwilym is up for it too.

I wanted to upload the ones from Tokyo, but I honestly can’t find them. If anyone reading has a copy then please let me know/post a link in the comments! What I did find were my sheets from Berne. They are available to download as a zip of 7 jpg images.

I should add some commentary to these particular sheets:

This was one of the greatest learning experiences of my career. I walked offstage a mixture of happy, proud and also despondent at the knowledge that I didn’t really understand espresso and I really didn’t feel in control of it. I felt that I hadn’t served the shots I wanted to, but didn’t know enough to fix the problems I had had.

My signature drink was (quite rightly) savaged. It might have been innovative in its presentation but it wasn’t delicious and too much was (and had to be) prepared ahead of time.

All of the low scores I got, I deserved – no question.

I should also add that the rules were quite different then, as you can see from the scoresheets.

So why upload the sheets? I think it is interesting, I think (hope anyway) that it makes competition more accessible. I also see no reason why the judges should not be open to the same public scrutiny as the baristas. I’ll go out on a limb here and say that it would probably improve the scoresheets (on average) of judges if they knew that they would be a matter of public record. I’ve only judged around 100 competitors but I’d certainly have no objection to them uploading what I wrote/how I scored.

I also invite anyone else who has access to their scoresheets to upload them online – doesn’t matter which competition, how far they got, or where they placed. If you do please post a link in the comments. I know I wish I could have seen more scoresheets before I competed the first time.

Once again – all respect to Colin for going first, and hopefully setting a precedent that others will follow.

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:

John was, simply put, amazing.  Not just for a performance that left him a cruel half point outside of the semis, but even more for being an amazing ambassador for coffee in the UK and for being the epitome of how a barista should act onstage and offstage.  I am utterly honoured to call him a colleague and friend.  As a competing barista you are incredibly reliant on your support team and if I ever went back to it then I’d definitely want Jess in my corner as she does an incredible job.

His blend of two different coffees from two different roasters (the combined wonderfulness of Anette and Steve) was a lot of fun, and I think (as does Steve) that it says good things about the community and relationships within the UK coffee industry.

Plus that signature drink was ludicrously tasty…….

It’s hard writing about John, as well as many other competitors.  I’m lucky to call many of the finalists, semi-finalists and competitors friends and was being onstage as MC on the final day was a privilege.  Getting to taste everyone’s espresso was just so much fun that I shouldn’t go on about how delicious they all were because you’ll all want to kill me.  Seriously – too much tasty espresso goodness.

Getting to sneak some of Colin Harmon’s signature drink (which, by the way, did everything he promised and was both tasty and fascinating) was an added bonus.  Colin and Steve are a great example of what is possible when open minded and passionate baristas work with skilled and passionate roasters.  It is a shame Colin thinks he won’t be competing next year.  (I’m probably going to try to convince him otherwise!)

I don’t think anyone is in doubt that Mike Phillips is a deserving champion, and will be a great figurehead for coffee in the coming years.  Once you know Mike a little it is easy to forget just how focused, skilled and accomplished he is because he’s so charming and friendly.  And that can be a little distracting.

Oh, and the only part of the sig drink I tasted – the washed coffee, skimmed of crema then chilled and served with sparkling water:  ludicrously good.  Seriously, damned near criminal.

I am aware that it is easy to write nothing but sweetness and light after these events. Worry not – I’ve saved a little scorn, all to be focused on the event organisers of the show.  It seems odd that they seemed to show such annoyance and hostility towards the event that was a sufficient draw to double the size of their exhibition.  If anyone can explain it, I’m all ears….

Penny University was all kinds of crazy.  I owe massive thanks to Tim, Tobias and Alex for working incredibly hard on a bar that is demanding even on the quietest days – let alone when 30+ coffee industry folk appear at once and you’ve only got 6 seats!  You know you’re lucky to have amazing colleagues when people seek you out at the show just to tell you how great they are, and Tim puts so much time and effort into creating and running Penny University – for which I am very, very grateful.

It was great for me to make coffee for so many people the day after, while at the same time I felt horrible that the waiting time was so long and that there were people I didn’t get the opportunity to serve.  I hope everyone who came had fun though – be it that day, or any other day!

The show itself – or should I say the experience of being at a trade show in London – was a bit overwhelming.  So many people to say hello to that you barely got to say two sentences after that before being whipped in a different direction to great another person you hadn’t seen in way too long.  I didn’t really get a chance to hang out at any of the booths, which was a shame because I am sure I missed out on some interesting stuff.

Now it’s all over.  A mixture of sadness and relief.  It seems like people had a pretty good time in London (it is a weird feeling when you feel vaguely responsable for how good a time people have when visiting your city.)  I think the days I enjoyed most were the ones just after the event when a few people were still in town so we could hang out, drink some interesting whisky, eat oversized and delicious sausage rolls and be a bit silly.

Reading back over this I realise it is a pretty woeful wrap up, but I don’t think my brain can process this into anything sensible that could properly capture all the interesting stuff, all the hard work, all the preparation and execution that went on at an event like this.  (Plus saying “Congratulations everyone!” seems like a total cop out.  Ah well!  Plus I’ve used too many superlatives, but it is hard to describe many wonderful things in not many words.)

I’d love to know people’s impressions of London and the coffee scene here, if you visited and you read this.  It is easy to be too close to it and not see the forest for the trees.

For more WBC-type reading:

Colin Harmon’s Blog
Steve Leighton’s Blog
David Walsh’s Blog
Barista Magazine
Sprudge
Coffee Collective
Caffenation Blog
Bean Here, Bean There
Coffee Crusade
Star Barista

Hopefully Twitchy at some point.   (That should keep you all busy!)

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, which is already chock full o’content.

People are arriving into town, as I type this team Japan are at the roastery plying us with delicious things.  Other barista champions are visiting or arriving later today and I hope people get a chance to enjoy both London’s coffee scene – as well as the city itself.

Having done these before I’m coming to terms with the frustrating idea that I just won’t have time to properly chat to everyone I want, that there will be a lot of half finished conversations but I am excited to see lots of people again who I haven’t seen for a while.

I’ll try and update flickr, twitter and here too!

UPDATE:  Another WBC Blog.

The footage was shot inbetween me making coffee and trying to run things so isn’t very cohesive.  I thought I’d add a noisy, messy soundtrack and just leave it quite silly.  Thanks again to all who get involved!

UBF 6 – Let’s take it outside Santa from James Hoffmann.

It is no surprise that I am a big fan of barista competitions, but having recently gone through the UK judges workshop there are a couple of things I would like to post about and get some discussion going on.  First off an issue that both Anette and I find very frustrating:

The Scale of Words

For those unfamiliar with the words they are used to quantify the 0-6 scale used:

0 – Unacceptable
1 – Acceptable
2 – Average
3 – Good
4 – Very Good
5 – Excellent
6 – Extraordinary

Let’s start with 0 & 1.  I can see why they chose “Unacceptable” for 0 – if a judge is giving you no points whatsoever you must have done something pretty wrong.  However, I think using “Acceptable” creates an issue in the mind of the judge.  The drink might be very bad, but could certainly be worse.  Judges will often revert to the words – is this drink acceptable?  It may not be, but surely a single point out of six is punishment enough?

I guess it comes down to the difference in how numbers are perceived by judges and by competitors.  A score of 3 and below does not feel good.  Despite the words, a 3 feels mediocre.  However, a judge will often hold back from giving a 3 asking themselves if “good” is really the word to describe the drink.

Steps of 0.5 are allowed between 1 and 6, but these don’t come with words.  What is halfway between “good” and “very good”?  It is a question that needs to be answered as you see a lot of 3.5s awarded.  ”Really quite good” perhaps?

Using “Average” to describe 2 is also a bit depressing.  I would have thought average would have been in the middle – so a 3?  Are we saying that we expect the average competing barista to only score 2 in the 6 point boxes?

Choosing the language is obviously very difficult.  It would be hard to replace “Acceptable” with a word that wasn’t more damning.  I would argue that as a barista I would be happier with a numerical score, and then written feedback alongside it indicating both the problem and a possible solution.  (i.e. scoring 2.5 for tactile balance on an espresso, with a note saying “the shot was lacking in body, likely due to fast brew/underextraction.  Perhaps a slower brew would improve the body”)

I know a lot of people like and use the words, believing them to be an important frame of reference.  I’d be very interesting to hear people’s suggestions for alternative words in the comments.  Would people like to get rid of the words?  Do they think they are fine as they are?

The Scoresheets

It seems churlish to complain about something and not at least offer some sort of solution.  The layout of the scoresheets hasn’t really changed in 7 or 8 years.  Rules have come and gone but the layout has been pretty rigid.  I took the Sensory Scoresheet and moved a few things around, changed a couple of words but it is designed to be used with the current rules.

You can view it here.

The changes are based on how I use a scoresheet, so perhaps it says something about my judging!

First off – intros have changed a lot.  Competitors often deliver a lot of information in the first 90 seconds, including details about the coffee(s) they are using.  I wanted a dedicated space where I could take notes.  Previously I had used the espresso section, but it quickly becomes crowded, especially if you want to write detailed feedback on the taste of the drink.

Secondly – the boxes switched sides.  I wanted more space and a stronger emphasis on notes.  Leaving a wide open space to the right makes it even more explicit that judges should be filling this up completely with lots of useful notes.  Returning a scoresheet without detailed notes should be grounds for disqualifying a judge.  Only one barista gets a prize, the others get the scoresheets and feedback from the event – so it had better be damned good!

Thirdly – circles.  This is something a lot of judges do already – draw a little circle to better communicate what was wrong with the visuals of the espresso/cappuccino.  Interestingly the UK judges have come up with a slightly more complex system for noting down the visuals of drinks to better communicate scores – especially to other judges debriefing a competitors on sheets they didn’t write.  I like the idea – though I feel like it would make a nice ancillary piece of info, rather than replacing words, and helpful advice.   An area to watch nonetheless.

Fourth – a little rewording.  In an effort to squeeze more notation space onto the sheets I trimmed a few words.  In other cases I added words that the rules say to look for but hadn’t been included on the sheets.  Thoughts and comments on this very welcome.

Ultimately I wanted more space to write notes, because I think that will improve the use of the sheets returned to the competitors.  Would love to hear some feedback – from baristas, judges or anyone else?