Last Sunday was my last day working for Bewley’s Coffee Co. I have worked for the company for close to three years now, during which, I have gained invaluable experience and made some great friends. They are easily the pioneers of specialty coffee in Ireland, and I have no doubt they will continue to bring exciting innovations to the market here. I wish them the very best in the future and hope to maintain strong ties with all the fantastic people working there.
I’ve spent my last few days helping prepare our National Champion Andrius Valiauga for Tokyo. He’s now well under way, with only a few final tweaks of the blend needed and he’s now experimenting with the extraction ratios to tease the most out of it. Its been very interesting seeing Andrius change throughout this competition. Before he entered he was quite skeptical, and seemed quite content with his skills on the bar. However, once we began developing the blend and taking apart his distribution, and leveling method, using the naked to highlight any issues, he’s really begun to appreciate the extra levels to the craft. Its something James has said before, that entering competition is a sure fire way to improve your skills as a barista, and I think its really true. I hope to keep in touch with Andrius as he practices and look forward to seeing him compete in Tokyo.
I on the other hand, am now preparing for my final exam on Wednesday morning, after which I’ll consume large quantities or alcohol, and will probably fall asleep at around 7 pm. As some of you probably already know, I will then be getting ready for my trip down the west coast of North America with James and Anette. This is something I’m really looking forward to as not only do I get a chance to catch up with old friends from Vancouver, but I get to visit a whole rack of new places and faces in towns like Portland, San Francisco and our final stop of LA. It’ll be great to have such good company on the trip too.
Between James and myself, I’m sure we can give ample amount coverage of the trip.
Check my latest flickr pages if you wanna see some of Andrius’ handywork done in the training lab in Bewleys over the weekend.
Night all
In the future I hope to open a cafe and roastery. I would hope to serve nothing but great drinks and to roast and sell wonderfully unique coffees. But if things keep going the way they are, I think its fair to expect others to have the same aspirations.
So imagine its a few years down the line, and whatever city I’m living in has around 5 high quality roasters who in my opinion do just as good a job as me in sourcing and roasting tasty stuff. So I guess I’m wondering now, where the coffee aware consumer will go.
Will they stick to their local roaster? Or will they wanna try out whatever each roaster is carrying from season to season. But what if, as is currently the case in the UK, the number of high quality green importers is very low and our 5 skilled roasters aren’t big enough to buy direct. Our consumer is only exposed to around 15 different coffees roasted by the 5, and while this ain’t the worst scenario, I can’t help but wonder will it ever become as diverse as products such as wine.
Yeah the roasters could always form a buying group, either with each other or with friendly roasters abroad, and in doing so source coffees exclusive to them, but that probably wouldn’t account for all their purchases, though I suppose theres no reason why not. I suppose I’m wondering whether each corner of the industry will develop at the same rate as we totter along with all this. Will more and more quality farms keep coming to light, bringing more truly special coffees to the clients of our cosy end of the industry? This then might prompt more green importers, or perhaps more ideally, the facilitation of small roasters dealing directly. In my head though, I worry what could happen sooner is that a city might have five small roasters all carrying largely the same offerings. Is there a possible tipping point?
Apologies if this isn’t clear, but I wanted to write it down. I’d appreciate someone with more insight to leave any thoughts they might have.
On tuesday next I start my finals. So don’t be angry if you don’t hear a lot from me in those following three weeks. If however, you do hear a lot from me, you can pretty much assume that the exams aren’t going well and that I’ve decided to stop making an effort. At which point you can either join me in not caring anymore after 6 years of study, or you can slap me on the wrist (preferably via e mail) and tell me grow up and finish the exams.
Either way, I think you should all take a peak at my good, and sorely missed friend Deaton the Bigot Pigot’s blog. Its one of the most honest blogs out there at the moment, and although around 2 weeks behind where he’s actually at, provides an interesting insight and snapshot of some of the quality coffee corners the far side of the atlantic.
Also, I thought I’d post this little interview I did with a certain coffee celebrity at the recent Danish Barista Champs. As the competition was held at a Women’s Vision conference, there was ‘other’ events being held.
and heres a tulip I did this morning, still not as good as the one Sammy did in that video I posted before, but getting better I think. Its always that last heart that causes trouble.
I’m very irritable at the moment. Namely because I’m missing this.
Also, the Dalla Corte machine I’ve had at home for the last few weeks is about to leave. I’m surprised at how much I enjoyed having it, especially as Ive always seen myself as a filter guy instead. Maybe it was just being able to play around with shots and latte art whenever I wanted, but it was just cool having it. The machine works very well, the two boilers ensuring great steam pressure.
It heats up very quickly, its easy to clean, although I was shocked at just how quicklty it kept getting dirty. Literally after 5/6 shots I was noticing that dirty taste, and would have to clean it again. From that I made work on saturday particularly about cleaning with the baristas. At one point I had the guys srub out their pfs and said we’d come back in an hour and see how clean they’d be. Unfortunately, one of our new baristas Gareth came on duty during that hour, and immediately cleaned out the pfs, making my experiment a bit pointless. I know that for the rest of the day, they wouldn’t get too dirty, and decided I’d demonstrate it another time when less attentive staff were on.
So back to the Dalla Corte. It has a silly temperature control button that is not nearly as precise as I’d like and if my sources are correct, masks the potential temp stability capable of the machine. At first the design is a bit off putting, but after a while I got used to it. Shots were very consistent, once everything was dialed in. I didn’t really experiment around as much as I’d have liked, but this is exam season so I have an honest excuse. It strikes me now, that I’m forever using college as a reason for not doing things, and that in 4 weeks time, I’ll no longer have that excuse.
It will be very interesting to see who wins the usbc, as the competition is so tough this year. With 5 past winners, its gonna be very difficult to call a winner before the announcement. So while I spend my days wishing I was over there catching up with Klaus and Deaton, I’ll cherish my last few days with the Dalla Corte, before I hand it back to the very kind, and very wonderful Damian, head engineer at Bewleys who lent it to me in the first place. Thanks again mate.
Finally, heres something I made for Dad this morning; you get to see me looking very groggy and worryingly resembling a troll, oh and people on the radio talking about the upcoming Irish elections, enjoy.
