The purpose of these posts is to honestly recount my experience during the four days I spent in St Petersburg representing Ireland at the 2011 European Team Coffee Challenge. Other than that, I have little motivation for the post. The dearth of publicity surrounding the event, considering that it is an international event, speaks volumes to the low regard in which it is now held. This is a pity, as in terms of potential this competition could have been one of the better events in the SCAE’s calendar. It has been allowed to fall into disrepair, to remain rudderless for far too long. Whatever potential it had may never now be realised under the weight of its own beleaguered history.
a coffee blog
The topology of the coffee extraction and strength landscape remains rather poorly charted, and pocketed with pitfalls. In searching for and as yet not finding documents that sufficiently described the methodologies originally employed by the Midwest Research Institute (and other bodies) in collecting and tabulating preference data we have revealed that there are more questions about how exactly that data, and our coffee control brew charts were created. That isn’t to say I have grave doubts over their validity, certainly my own palate tends to mostly agree with their optimal ranges. Questions remain though. How many samples did they collect? What coffee did they use? To what degree was it roasted? How was it ground? What was the grind profile?
It has been quite a couple of days. I thought I was done with the saccharin thank-yous and recaps, hence this. However, it would be remiss of me not to properly acknowledge everyone who helped me out with the IBC this year. It all came together very late, but I just found a willingness all around me for friends to pitch in.
Firstly my roaster, Peter James, of James Gourmet Coffee. I’ve never met Peter, we’ve only exchanged emails and phone calls. The UK is currently blessed with a number of excellent coffee roasters and Peter stands among them. I wanted to use funky naturals this year, and I knew Peter had some amazing ones, and I’ve long been an admirer of his roasting. The first blend he sent me contained 4 different naturally processed coffees from all around the world. It was to be called the Interplanetary Natural Bomb. It was good, very good but what followed was better, an 80:20 split of the Ethiopian Shilcho OCR Sidamo Natural and the Costa Rican Las Lajas Natural. Strawberries and apricots and natural funky town all day long, chewy, big, sweet. It won best espresso. Thanks Peter – you rocked it! Read the rest of this entry »
Dear Marie, Fergus and Paul:
It is without sincere regret that I must inform you that your employment with DAVID™ as Logistics/Support/Strategy Technicians will be terminated immediately.
Due to gross incompetence and failure to meet key objectives your services are no longer required. Read the rest of this entry »
I’ve found the Coava Disk filter for the Aeropress to be a very impressive piece of work. It produces an adequately clean cup (comparable to Clover type brew in my opinion), different in character from paper filtered and also allows different techniques to be employed during brew – such as pulling up (without making a balls of the filter). Check out the video. Notice the weirdness at the end. Thoughts?