flyingthud

For those of you who don’t read Tim Styles Blog, you should start. In just under 4 hours I’ll start my prep in the semi finals of the Irish Barista Competition. Everything is polished as of last night and all that remains is to pick up some water, a little ironing and some careful packing into Jen’s Ford Ka. (I am in the process of learning to drive)

Yesterday I won Ireland’s first Latte Art Competition. This took me by complete surprise as I knew people entering whose skill level surpasses me, Bela and Fan to name two. It seems my tech and taste gave me the extra point that beat Bela. Bela did a double rosetta for his macchiato, a triple for the cpp/latte and some sort of fancy etch I didn’t get to see for his signature. I on the other hand, in a spirit of fear and poor planning, opted for a rosetta on the mac, one on the capp/latte and then a tulip on the sig. The more I think about this the worse I feel, and I was rightly warned by the judges of the need to be a hell of a lot more creative for Worlds in Copenhagen.  

The competition was really well organised yesterday, with probably the best stage set up yet seen in an Irish Competition. Marzocco FB70s were the machine of choice thanks to my former employer Bewleys and it was a great chance for me to re familiarise myself with one after training off the synesso. Working off the white counter tops was a shock reminder too of how dirt builds up as again I’d be training on a black counter.

I will post tonight on whether I got through to the finals tomorrow or not.  Thanks for the kind words, those of you who left them, for those of you who didn’t… Well that says it all doesn’t it.