How addicted to coffee are you?

Patrick just forwarded me this hilarious link :

HOW ADDICTED TO COFFEE ARE YOU?
and do the test yourself.
I score 79%. I don't know if that's any good or bad or whatever. I do only know it's a fun thing. Thanks Patrick and what was your score?

Guide to Latte Art

Pouring your first Rosetta

Over the past several months, Ben Bicknell from the WA Barista Academy has delved into the differences between home espresso machines, preparing your espresso shots and milk texturing but whether you’re a budding home enthusiast or a veteran barista, everybody wants to try Latte Art! The Rosetta, a fern or leaf shaped pattern, is the most well known and often the most difficult design to master. This month Ben explains the process step by step, so you can try it at home.

So you’re getting consistently good shots of espresso and you’ve mastered your milk steaming with silky consistency. But all your challenges are not surmounted! Increasingly in cafes around Australia, patterns and designs are flowing onto the surfaces of coffees — while everyone around you is happily enjoying the filigreed designs, your frustration builds as you get no closer to achieving more that what your friends and family fondly refer to as your ‘abstract phase’. Well it’s time for that to change — below are some tips and pointers for getting you closer to giving birth to your first Rosetta.

My first prefacing statement would be that without a good set of shots as the base for your coffee, there’s no way you’re going to be able to achieve great latte art, let alone a good tasting coffee: so get those shots right! Remember: once your face gets close enough for the first sip, no-one can see the latte art anyway!

Secondly, you really need to have mastered your milk texturing before attempting your Rosetta. If your milk is lumpy, airy, too foamy, not foamy enough or not folded together thoroughly, you’re going to have all kinds of problems as you try to pour.

Another important factor is the spout on your milk jug (something that you generally only learn after purchasing 37 different milk jugs to find — the right one). Make sure that your milk jug has a clearly defined spout — check out our Incasa Milk Jugs we’ve got in stock: one of the reasons we chose these jugs is that they’re great for latte art. A spout with no point or one that has a big lip at the edge will disperse your milk widely, restricting you from any fine detail.

Alright — you know what you’re aiming for and you’ve prepared your shots. For the Rosetta, you want to steam your milk as if for a flat white — much thicker than this and there will be no definition to your design. Once you’ve steamed your milk (check out last month’s Café in your Kitchen — Part II article if you’re not sure about this), you’re ready to roll!

Begin pouring straight into the center, keeping the jug low to the cup. Begin with quite a slow pour to help stabilise the crema in the cup. Once you’re around 1/3 of the way up the cup, move the jug so you’re pouring towards the back and start slightly shaking or ‘jiggling’ the jug side to side to throw the foam forward. Once the foam has marked the surface of the crema, continue that same shaking or swaying motion while moving the pour backwards through the cup. Upon reaching the front of the cup, pour in a straight line toward the back of the cup, through the lines you’ve previously created. Your swaying motion will create the leaves of the Rosetta with the final pull through creating the stem.

Alright … that’s a step by step walk through but check out the cool time lapse photos of the process! Firstly there is the close-up version so you can see the coffee in the cup.And secondly from a bit further away so you can see the hand movement.

Click here for the amazing pics from Ben. (and the extra tips at the bottom of the page)

Coffee and Shakespeare and ...

Shall I compare thee to a regular coffee?
Thou art more lovely and more intense:
My tongue dost find other lattes too bland,
And as for the frappé, I sitteth on the fence:
Sometime too hot the capuccino can be,
And oft’ is his foamy top too large;
And every Americano, although heavenly, is the same,
The element of surprise gone, the pleasure thus marred:
But thy unique flavour shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that buzz thou owest;
Nor shall Espresso brag thou wanderest in his shade,
When in caffeine thou satisfiest and in taste thou growest:

So long as the mouth can taste, or the nose can smell,
So long thou art above all coffees, and pleaseth me well.

Ode to a Starbucks' Gingerbread Latte, from Coffee Helps.

2 new coffee rarities in Asia

Monkey business yields coffee

Coffee connoisseurs are going ape for a rare brew that Taiwanese farmers are producing with the help of monkeys. Formosan rock monkeys have long been a scourge to coffee farmers in Taiwan's mountains because they eat the ripe berries and spit out the seeds. But now, the farmers are collecting these half-chewed seeds and roasting them to produce a coffee that is being brewed all over the island. Coffee farmer Liao Jingdong tried to roast beans which had been spat out by monkeys and discovered a unique taste, different from the original. Liao says the discarded seeds yield a sweeter coffee with a vanilla-like scent, which sells for about $56 a pound (450 grams).

Coffee-lovers unite for a cuppa at expo in Taipei

95% simularity to the all famous Kopi Luwak (civet coffee) at one-fifth of the price. That should be the new Fox Dung coffee, presented here at this expo.

	Pierre E. Leblache, left, founder executive of the World Alliance of Gourmet Robustas (WAGRO) and Khanh Dinh, owner of Vietnam-based QY-Coffe, display the latest innovation of lab-processed “fox dung coffee.” (Akie Ang, The China Post)

Read the whole article.

Knopes Championship Blend

François Knopes, fils du fameus torreficateur Knopes de Luxembourg et numéro sept au Championat Mercredi dernier a l'honneur d'avoir son melange du championat au Caffenation cette semaine si.
Merci pour le cafè, c'est vraiment excellent. Assez doux et peut-être sans risque, mais très agreable a boire!

For once an explanation in French. This blend from the Knopes Roastery in Luxemburg contains Brazil Santos, Costa Rica Terrazu and some Java and ... another latin bean i forgot. Very well roasted. Good balanced mix and very easy to work with. Congrats François with your performances at the Championship, the future is all yours.

And what to think about Bird's grafitti skills? Bloody awesome. :-)

Cupping en Barista Championship 2007

D Day in Gent, Belgium for the finals of the Cupping and Barista Championships.

In the morning it was up to me for cup tasting 8 triangles.
To my surprise it was no cupping the way we're used to, but filter coffee. Then we had these deep cups with a little bit of coffee in it. ????
My tactics were picking the 'wrong' ones (in every triangle you have a pair of coffee's and one that stands out, the wrong one ; this one you have to spot) just by smelling, all 8 of them, and afterwards by tasting.
Wrong. Not if you taste directly after smelling, but i first lost 2 minutes with sniffing the coffee's. It wasn't that difficult after all. I was almost sure of 6.
Then i started slurping and tasting. At ease. Wrong. No time to loose in a cupping championship.
Last year the first round was very easy, but this year they mixed up the difficult ones from the start. And with no (competition) experience, deep cups and only 5 cl of coffee a cup
it took me 7 minutes to full fill my duty.
I have to admit i lost it completely at the end. The last two combinations i didn't taste anything anymore. So for the 7th i picked the one i selected after the smelling round. Correct. The 8th one i changed out of panic. Wrong again.
4 out of 8 after all, but too slow.

Winner was Bart from Efico. He went as a Rocket. 8 out of 8 in the finals in a blistering 2 and a half minutes!!!!
Congrats Bart, but next year i'll be back with more experience, faster and new tactics.

Then our main championship for the Barista's.

I only have this far distant photo from my pupil Bird, which symbolises his the final results. A distant 8th place.
How is it possible the (probably) best Barista finishes last in a Barista competition? Well, because..... stress, not enough practise, a different grinder on stage from back stage, he had to open the competition and most of all ... a defect 'spuma' machine/bottle so he couldn't finish his signature drink. 360 points or 200 less compared to the semi's. God damned.

Brilliant winner was Detlev Battiau. Super performance and we may be proud to have this guy representing our country for the WBC next year in Copenhagen. Soon i hope to have a good photo of him, together with points. For now only the results :
1) Detlev Battiau
2) Vicky
3) Jeroen Lauwers
4) Myriam Bijnens
5) Patrick Hanssen
6) Michel Veneziano
7) François Knopes
8) Bert Van Wassenhove

Best Espresso : Michel
Best Cappuccino : Vicky
Best Signature Drink : Detlev

Belgian Barista Championship Tomorrow

This practising shot is one from monday eve.
After making final judgements on the verbal lines, decorations, blend and sig drinks, these last two days is just one rehearsal after the other.

Tomorrow at Flanders Expo in Gent we have the final of our national Barista Championship.

Hard to tell who's this year's favourite although everyone think Jeroen (Lavazza) of Myriam (Rombouts) really deserve to take the title after two close finishes the last two years.

For Caffenation i won bronze last year after Jeroen and Peter (Viva Sara). A medal ; that's the main objective for my man Bird who is competing with our House Blend, German organic milk and a signature drink called 'funky'.
Good luck to all participants. And for those who are willing to experience the event ; the Cupping starts at 9.30 and the BBC at 12.30, all in the small side building of the Expo. Free entrance!