In the Grinder - Our Daily Coffee Weblog

March 2011 Archives

North Central RBC Recap

March 1, 2011

The North Central Regional Barista Competition was held in Chicago this year hosted byTorani at Navy Pier. 

The event was absolutely chalk full of stellar competitors.  Last year's US Barista Champion and World Barista Champion Mike Phillips of Intelligentsia came from the former Great Lakes Region; now restructered into the North Central Region. 

Andrew, Sally, and myself all traveled down to Chicago for the event.  This year's RBC was held in conjunction with Coffee Fest, so many people who normally would not attend an RBC got the opportunity to step away from the show floor and check out the competition.  Sally and Andrew manned the booth while I took my USBC judging certification test.  I passed, and I was able to judge these incredible baristas over the course of the weekend.  I learned a ton during the certification process, and I would highly recommend doing it if you are looking in more ways to get involved in the coffee community.  

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Outside of the competition, it was awesome to be in a city that does an excellent job of complementing fine dining with excellent coffee.  We visited The Bongo Room for breakfast and had perfectly prepared Intelligentsia coffee and went to the unbelievable Graham Elliot for dinner followed by exquisite shots of Metropolis coffee.  My hope is that more cities follow suit and give customers great coffee experiences at their restaurants.  

The finalists were announced Saturday evening: Ryan Knapp and Trevor Corlett of Mad Cap, Brett Felchner of Anodyne, Alli VanHyft of Grey House Coffee, and Scott Lucey and Cody Kinart of Alterra took the top 6 spots. 

After competiting again on Sunday, of the six finalists, the top three were decided.  Ryan Knapp took 1st place, followed by Scott Lucey taking 2nd, and Trevor Corlett taking 3rd.  (Sidenote, Trevor went over by 30 seconds during the competition which equals a 30 point deduction from his total score). 

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Also, congrats to Jonathan Jarrow for winning the first ever NCRBC Brewers Cup!

We are very excited to have Ryan be the 3rd confirmed person to join us on our big Barista trip to Brazil this July!  Also, some exciting developments, we have finalized our dates, July 10th-19th 2011.  Sarah Allen from Barista Magazine is confirmed on the trip, as well as Mr Italy himself Giovanni Simonelli is now coming.  This will be Giovanni's 1st trip ever to origin.  We are so excited to have those two industry icons along with us. 

Congrats to all the competitors this year!

I am off to LA this weekend for the SWRBC.

-Noah

Posted by NoahPermalink

South West RBC Recap

March 9, 2011

This past weekend the South West Regional Barista Competition was held in Hollywood California at Siren Studios.  This was a  nice change of pace for us at Cafe Imports because it was snowing in Minnesota when I left, and I landed in 80s and sunny.  It was a little tough to come back...

The judges calibration meeting was held at the SCAA headquarters in Long Beach California, and this regional had a huge pool of judges.  It was nice to have a rotation of judging and also time off to enjoy the event.  The notorious LA food trucks would stop by the studios around lunch time during the event and fill us up with delicous snacks like crepes and gourmet sandwiches. The event was extremely well attended, and it was very nice to meet a lot of our customers on the West Coast.  Ritual even brought a whole bus of people down from the Bay Area to attend the event.  The awesome folks at Sprudge.com brought a lifesize Justin Bieber just to further paint a picture for you.

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Siren Studios was an excellent place to have this event, and their lighting/camera crew made the whole thing seem extremely professional and well documented.  I was able to wander off for a bit and uncover some other great LA food spots. Loteria Mexican Grill on Hollywood was hands down some of the best modern Mexican food spots I have ever been in my life. 

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Musicares, a fantastic organization that helps support the Music community, held benefit concerts at the studios following both nights of the competition. 

From Musiccares' Site:

MusiCares provides a safety net of critical assistance for music people in times of need. MusiCares' services and resources cover a wide range of financial, medical and personal emergencies, and each case is treated with integrity and confidentiality. MusiCares also focuses the resources and attention of the music industry on human service issues that directly impact the health and welfare of the music community.

Thank you to Musiccares for adding such a cool music element to this barista event! 

3.JPGSaturday Night the finalists were announced:   Row Aczon of Honolulu Coffee, Kevin Bohlin of Ritual Coffee, Jared Truby of Verve, Sara Peterson of Verve, Pete Licata of Honolulu Coffee, and Nikolas Krankl of Gelato Bar and Espresso Cafe took the top 6 slots. 

These top 6 all competed again on Sunday for the finals, and honestly I was completely blown away at how incredibly prepared these 6 were.  All of their routines were really well executed, and I am sure the finalist judges had challenges determining a winner. 

Pete Licata of Honolulu Coffee took 1st place once again for the SWRBC, followed by Nikolas Krankl 2nd, and Jared Truby in 3rd.  We are very excited to have Pete along on our trip to Brazil this July.  Pete talked a lot in his routine about how he actually was able to pick and process his Hawaiin coffee.  I'm sure Pete will be bringing a whole new perspective for us all on coffee processing. I can't wait!  This trip is shaping up to be one for the books...

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Congrats to all of the SWRBC Competitors!

-Noah

Posted by NoahPermalink

Chiapas March 2011: El Triunfo coop, CESMACH coop

March 18, 2011

 

Chiapas March 2011: 
El Triunfo coop
CESMACH coop, Union el Triunfo
 
By: Tim Chapdelaine
 
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People take back Mexico. The final panel in the extraordinary Diego Rivera Mural in El Palacio Nacional, Ciudad Mexico.
 
The Diego Rivera mural is magnificent. His friendship with Trotsky and choppy marriage to Frida Kahlo fed his art. This piece, of which this photo is the last panel of three. The massive middle panel is the largest in a series that lines the halls surrounding it. There are small rooms holding other art around it but they are mere satellites to the sun that is Diego Rivera’s art. The inescapable flavor of his art was the truth and the revolutionary flipoff that he gave to corrupt power in his work.   One painting in a side room by a very good artist showed a family working hard as the father built a wooden cart; a tribute to the workers and peasants who built this great nation taking back land from their overlords.  Coffee people are still fighting and the grace and poise with which the people of Cesmach, El Triunfo and their two sister coops are changing their lives in an area that has great coffee is stunning.
 
El Triunfo Coop Patios

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El Triunfo Coop serves producers who grow coffee in a buffer Zone around the El Triunfo Biosphere Reserve (Zona Amortiguamiento).    Various activities are carried out in this zone to encourage the preservation of the land in the preserve in balance with a livelihood for the people. A permit is needed to enter the preserve, which is 3-4 hours further than the farm we visited.
 
El Triunfo and Cesmach work closely to supply a number of buyers. Café Imports supports this reserve with an additional 20 cent premium which goes to funding the preservation of the Zona Nucleo of the preserve.  
 
What most astounded me on this trip was the quality of the coffee that they are capable of producing. This is a group worth placing your bets on.
 
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The Village above was severely damaged by floods during the heavy rains from Hurricane Mateo in October 2010. You will ride 2-3 hours by truck and 4 hours by horse in the rainy season to get to the farm.
 
The area has a distinct dry season which allows for good drying conditions for the coffee. 
Short rains occur during the dry season which trigger a flowering. (below) indicating a very compact ripening which may be ready for harvest in November, 2010.

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Humberto Roblero has a farm of about 20 hectares (large for this area). It is full shade and has a section where there is old growth forest shading a spring which feeds his little pulpery. 
 
His coffee is @ N 15°44.424’ W 092°.43.313’ at 1400-1700 meters. His varietals are Bourbon, typical and a little Mundo Novo. Bourbon and Typica are the predominant cultivars in this area. He produces about 140-150 qq/annum ave. He had 126 in 09/10 which was a bad harvest and expects 180 this year which will be a very good one. He was just finishing the harvest when I visited so the ripeness is not uniform below.
 
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The climate here is ideal for patio drying. He has a good pulper and uses a short canal to separate by density after fermentation . It is a compact system and could use some additional controls. Most important first steps will be improving ripeness in picking and cleanliness in Mill. 

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Cesmach Receiving

Coffee is brought in 10-25 bag increments by farmers. They bring the coffee in clean woven plastic bags and transfer them to clean sisal. The bags are weighed and each bag is tried by Jeremiah who is also the cupper. Each bag in every lot is tagged with a unique number and then stored in a tonga which is a larger lot intended for export. 

This is a sound segregation system. Representative lots are well built and they are working on improving their cupping and calibration with clients.

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Lot segregation and tagging is just right. Coffee will be stored in warehouse for a month or more of additional reposo. (Resting the coffee in parchment also known as curing in Africa)

After the coffee is received it is physically inspected and the defects are taken out and weighed as well as moisture being tested. To this point the controls are solid.
 
Lab
 
We cupped 18 coffees of which a couple coule be approaching 90 with a little more rest, and also a number were solid 87s despite being fresh. 
 
These coffees had minimal rest in parchment and I was blown away by the potential here. This is an incredibly well run coop with excellent management and stellar relations with the growers.    They seem genuinely unconcerned about the growers delivering and the growers are relaxed; they know the expectations when they bring coffee. My favorite part was watching the growers deliver their coffee and watching Jeremiah try each bag and pull samples for testing as the growers watched.   This is the people’s coffee and Co-op.

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We are expecting these spectacular coffees in the 2nd Half of April/ 1st Half May. 

Keep your eyes peeled for their arrival!

-Tim Chapdelaine

Posted by NoahPermalink

The Coffee "Fix"

March 28, 2011

The Coffee Fix:

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Depending on where you reside along the coffee trail from farm to cup your perspective of the current “coffee fix” will be very different.

For the average consumer needing their morning or afternoon coffee “fix”, many see rising coffee prices as an assault on their basic human right to have cheap coffee. And if there is noticeable drop in the quality of their preferred cup they will look to blame the roaster or more likely the poor barista behind the counter. The fact that two year old exchange grade coffee now sells for what a high end boutique coffee did just a year ago has no impact on their world, they just want the same quality coffee at the same price. For the consumer, the end of cheap coffee and gas are two realities they are just going to have to get used to as higher prices may be here to stay.
 
This is putting the roasters and coffee retailers in a “fix” as the rapid rise in the market and its duration has left little room to just absorb the higher green coffee costs and having to raise prices or renegotiate contracts every other month is awkward and risky for business as you do not know which clients might walk away. Stocking up on green coffee just got pricier so operating capital is tighter, all in an economic time when even stable clients may be slower to pay or cutting back orders. Hard decisions between minimum quality level of green coffee and price are being made every day now. There are very few people in specialty coffee now who were even in business back in the late 70’s to have prior experience dealing with green coffee prices this high or have a business model that can accommodate them. Finding the new “pain threshold” or quality/value limit for clients is now a major pre-occupation for roasters. 
 
For the importers and green buyers trying to buy good coffee and “fix” a price with exporters and producers is more complicated than ever. The risk of buying green coffee just multiplied as inventory costs have doubled and banks have made getting extended credit lines harder. Many coffee contracts that were negotiated fixed price before the spike in the market are not being fulfilled or the quality dropped as the many cooperatives or exporters can not buy coffee fruit to sell if they have contracts set way below market value. The price of coffee has soared and producers have been selling large amounts of coffee to market speculators on the street for great prices in cash rather than local mills. Many producers are also not selecting best fruits or processing properly as they are rushing to get beans to market before the high prices go away. This is why with the higher prices the average quality in many coffees areas has actually gone down instead of up. This in turn has also pushed the remaining top coffee prices even higher as there is less on the market.
 
As we on the consuming side of the coffee trail struggle to adjust to this new coffee reality the one “coffee fix” that is not getting much attention is that the producers are getting prices many have never seen before. Having just returned from 3 origin countries and seeing a very different atmosphere in the coffee regions than I normally would witness, it seemed that at origin these prices are a huge “fix” over the many years of inequitable or even artificially low coffee prices in many coffee regions that allowed many small producers survive, but very little else. These are some good times for producers and, for many, there are now some extra funds to invest in the coffee farm, fix up the house, get new clothes, send kids to school, pay off debts, and fix the work truck. Spending money in the same communities that need it most.  Producers seeing a brighter future for the next generation on the family coffee farm is priceless. That is the silver lining on this challenging coffee market for us on the consuming end.
 
The consumers and roasters are fighting to adjust to higher prices, though we hope the price swings will lessen and stabilize soon, this is actually healthy for our industry in the long term. Coffee prices are now more in line with actual production costs and people who see a decent income from their farms will be more ready to care for them and increase their production and quality. Higher long term supplies of better coffee is in the best interest of the specialty coffee industry as a whole rather than a market that supports overproduction of cheaper coffee. With some patience and understanding, we will make it through this current market shift, and we are confident that the long term outlook for specialty coffee is extremely promising. 

-Tim O'Brien

 

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Posted by NoahPermalink