WORLD OF COFFEE 2018 | SHRUBS | DON FRANCISCO’S COFFEE CASA CUBANA | COLD BREW FOOD SAFETY
Peerless Coffee Coffee by a chef, for chefs PAGE 35
August 2018 » freshcup.com
Jiri
MOUNTAIN Legendar y Tea of South Korea Page 42 >>
T H E M AG A Z I N E F O R S P E C I A LT Y CO F F E E & T E A P RO F E S S I O N A L S S I N C E 1 9 9 2
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CONTENTS AUGUST 2018 | VOL . 27. NO. 8 | FRESH CUP MAGA ZINE
D E PA R T M E N T S of the Month 10 Drink Basil Coffeeade by French Truck Coffee Filter 14 The World of Coffee by Michael Butterworth
18
#Trending
24
Behind the Bar
Shrubs by S. Michal Bennett Energy on Tap by Fresh Cup Staff
Don Francisco’s Coffee Casa Cubana By Michael Butterworth
Bar 32 Nine Making Sure Cold Brew Is Food Safe By Rachel Northrop
35
Pairings
70
The Last Plastic Straw
Oakland, CA’s Peerless Coffee + 5-Star Food By Lon LaFlamme
Chicago cafés ditch plastic straws By Robin Roenker
F E AT U R E S 42 The Legendary Tea of Jiri Mountain
The lives of tea makers run fast in this hallowed, wildgrowing region dating back over 1,200 years, but is the future for tea here running out of time? By Josh Doyle
54 Choose Your Criteria, Find Your Green
Green coffee procurement, part two. By Rachel Northrop 10 12 64 66 68
EDITOR'S NOTE CONTRIBUTORS WORLD TEA E XPO SHOW SHOTS C ALENDAR AD INDEX
AUGUST2018 2018» »freshcup.com freshcup.com 8 8| |AUGUST
PHOTO BY ROBERT KOEHLER
DRINK OF THE MONTH
EDITOR'S NOTE #STOPSUCKING
T
Basil Coffeeade
F
rench Truck Coffee in New Orleans jazzed up their signature coldbrew with lemon and peppery basil for their summer menu. Basil is an amazing herb that works well in savory applications, from pesto with pasta to grilled meats, and also sweet, such as with ripe summertime berries, balsamic vinegar, and ice cream. The recipe is easy to make in house, as French Truck does, and can be adapted to whatever herb is in season.
his past July saw the big fireworks announcement by Starbucks. News that the global coffee chain would eliminate plastic straws from their operations by the year 2020 reverberated across social media, signaling something of major importance. Or was it? It is estimated that 175 million straws are used and then thrown away every day. But according to geologist Trevor Nace, the actual impact of eliminating straws may be more of a symbolic display than of actual significant impact for the environment. “It is estimated that by 2050 there will be more plastic than fish in the entire ocean. In addition, studies have found microplastic pieces in practically every type of seafood found in markets and restaurants globally,” he states in a Forbes.com article. “While eliminating plastic straws globally doesn’t solve the much larger plastic problem, environmentalists hope it will jump-start other individuals’ efforts in eliminating other singleuse plastics from their life.”* So while it may seem the tide is against us, every attempt to change course matters. While massive Starbucks monopolizes newsfeeds, the no-plastics movement actually has its roots at the micro level, in the small indie shops like Backlot Coffee in Illinois, which stopped using plastic for takeaway way back in April of this year. Turn to page 70 for inspiration how turning away from plastic turned into a boon to their business. Brew strong,
PETER SZYMCZAK, EDITOR
editor@freshcup.com *Nace, Trevor. “Starbucks To Ditch Plastic
INGREDIENTS
Straws—Will It Actually Help The Environment?”
1 cup filtered water
1 cup fresh basil
1 cup raw sugar
French Truck Coffee Cold Brew
Zest of 1 lemon Put water and sugar in a saucepan and heat, stirring until sugar is dissolved. Take off heat and add lemon zest. After the syrup has cooled to room temperature, roughly chop the basil and add to syrup. Leave in the
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fridge overnight (14–18 hours is acceptable). Strain. Add equal parts syrup and lemon juice, to taste, to French Truck Coffee medium roast cold brew and serve over ice with a sprig of fresh basil. FC
Forbes.com. July 10, 2018.
ON THE COVER Daehan Dawon tea plantation in Boseong, South Korea. Photo by Robert Koehler
BASIL COFFEEADE PHOTO COURTESY OF FRENCH TRUCK COFFEE
FRESH CUP MAGAZINE
CONTRIBUTORS
FRESH CUP FOUNDER WARD BARBEE 1938-2006
S. MICHAL BENNETT is coowner of Coffee Roboto, a mobile coffee cart that slings shots on the streets of Coeur d’Alene, Idaho. She’s also a big proponent of shrubs, the far-from-simple syrup that holds a special, though not widely known, place in beverage history. Turn to page 18 and learn about the variety of uses this potent potion has for both bricks-and-mortar cafés and onthe-go operations.
FRESH CUP PUBLISHING Publisher and President JAN WEIGEL jan@freshcup.com EDITORIAL Editor PETER SZYMCZAK editor@freshcup.com Associate Editor JORDAN JOHNSON freshed@freshcup.com ART Art Director CYNTHIA MEADORS cynthia@freshcup.com ADVERTISING Sales Manager MICHAEL HARRIS michael@freshcup.com Ad Coordinator DIANE HOWARD adtraffic@freshcup.com
Globe-trotting coffee educa-
Marketing Coordinator ANNA SHELTON anna@freshcup.com CIRCULATION Circulation Director ANNA SHELTON anna@freshcup.com ACCOUNTING Accounting Manager DIANE HOWARD diane@freshcup.com EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD DAVID GRISWOLD
ANUPA MUELLER
Sustainable Harvest Coffee Importers
Eco-Prima
CHUCK JONES
BRAD PRICE
Jones Coffee Roasters
Phillips Syrups & Sauces
JULIA LEACH
BRUCE RICHARDSON
Toddy
Elmwood Inn Fine Teas
COSIMO LIBARDO
MANISH SHAH
Toby’s Estate Coffee
Maya Tea Co.
BRUCE MILLETTO
LARRY WINKLER
Bellissimo Coffee Advisors
Torani
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12 | AUGUST 2018 » freshcup.com
tor and consultant MICHAEL BUTTERWORTH pulled double duty for this issue of Fresh Cup Magazine. First he traveled to Amsterdam, where the Specialty Coffee Association showcased the wide World of Coffee, and where the World Barista Championship crowned its first female champion, Agnieszka Rojewska. Turn to page 14 for his recap of the show’s highlights. He then ventured to Downtown Los Angeles, California, where Don Francisco Coffee has built the beautiful Casa Cubana, the new signature café for the Gaviña coffee family, whose legacy dates back 150 years. Read all about the award-winning café on page 24. Based in Istanbul, Turkey, Michael is a licensed Q grader and a two-time United States Barista Championship competitor.
JOSH DOYLE is a writer living in Asia. His byline has appeared in Colours, the inflight magazine of Garuda Indonesia, newspapers in Canada and Korea, and he also creates content for brands around the world. His fluency in Korean made him the perfect person to speak with South Korea’s rapidly aging tea farmers and to document their travails. Find out why the local youth aren’t following in the footsteps of past generations, putting millennium-old traditions at risk of dying out—read more starting on page 42. Follow Josh’s stories-in-the-making on Twitter and Instagram @jdoylewriter.
LON LAFLAMME is a specialty coffee consultant based in Palm Springs, California. His profile of trained chef–turned–coffee roaster George Vukasin Jr. appears on page 35. As CEO of Peerless Coffee & Tea, Vukasin applies the same rigorous hospitality standards he learned at Le Cordon Bleu in Paris, France, to his family’s coffee company based in Oakland, California.
RACHEL NORTHROP dug into the Food Safety Modernization Act of 2011, which has far-reaching implications on the production of cold brew—actually, every link in the coffee supply chain has some requirement to comply with the law. Turn to page 32 and prepare to get food-safe. She also penned part two of our ongoing series on green coffee procurement, this time outlining the various criteria— origin micro-region, farm name, environmental certifications, cup score and profile, personal connections, and social responsibility—that importers must prioritize in order to make the best buying decisions for their roastery and their customers. Based in Brooklyn, New York, Rachel is communications manager with Ally Coffee and the author of “When Coffee Speaks: Stories from and of Latin American Coffeepeople.”
ROBIN ROENKER is a Lexington, Kentucky-based freelance writer with extensive experience reporting on business trends—from cybersecurity to real estate, personal finance, and green living. Previously, she covered sustainable to-go packaging options in the February 2018 issue of Fresh Cup Magazine, and now extends the storyline to the war being waged against the use of plastic straws. Turn to page 70 for the backstory on how Backlot Coffee in Chicago, Illinois, went strawfree and created a slew of new merchandising opportunities in the process.
FRESH CUP MAGAZINE | 13
THE FILTER THE RAI EXHIBITION and Convention Center in Amsterdam hosted World of Coffee, June 21–23.
World of Coffee Baristas, coffee exporters and importers, equipment manufacturers and roasters from around the globe gathered in Amsterdam for SCA’s premier European expo. Go Polska!
By Michael Butterworth
M
ore than 11,000 coffee professionals and enthusiasts came to Amsterdam’s RAI Exhibition and Convention Centre for World of Coffee 2018, Europe’s largest specialty coffee trade show. The event, organized by the Specialty Coffee Association, hosted a large exhibition hall, lectures, and the 2018 World Barista Championship, featuring baristas from 56 different countries.
WORLD BARISTA CHAMPIONSHIP Agnieszka Rojewska of Poland won the competition, becoming the first woman to take first place in the WBC’s
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18-year history. Charismatic and confident, Rojewska began her routine calling for a return to the fundamentals of hospitality. “[The] coffee industry is evolving fast,” Rojewska said. “What was new yesterday is basically the standard today. This is good and exciting because it let us taste this perfect cup of coffee. But at some point this got me thinking, ‘Where are we heading?’ ” Rojewska presented the three courses of the competition—milk beverage, signature beverage, and espresso—as three visits to a coffee shop. With each course, she revealed more and more about the Ethiopian coffee she was using. She featured coffee from Mesina, Ethiopia,
processed using carbonic maceration. This experimental technique, popularized by ONA Coffee’s Project Origin, ferments the coffee in an oxygen-deprived tank, increasing levels of lactic bacteria during fermentation. Throughout her routine, Rojewska utilized interactive visual and tactile aids. To describe her espresso course, she instructed judges to slowly run their fingers across pieces of velvet and silk fabric. “The texture of this material is changing, and the texture of the espresso will change from velvety and finish with silky,” she said. Although it was her first time to make finals, as the three-time Polish barista champion and four-time Latte Art
PHOTO BY MICHAEL BUTTERWORTH
AGNIESZKA ROJEWSKA of Poland won the World Barista Championship, becoming the first woman to win the event in its 19-year history.
BOTTOM LEFT PHOTO BY LIZ CHAI/WORLD COFFEE EVENTS; OTHER PHOTOS BY JEFF HANN/WORLD COFFEE EVENTS
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THE FILTER
WOC 2018: (clockwise from top left) World of Coffee attenders take a break in the SCA Lounge, which featured a giant Taster’s Wheel. A panel at the Sustainability Forum leads a conversation on gender issues at different levels of the coffee supply chain. Author Jeff Koehler presents research from his book Where the Wild Coffee Grows. Conference-goers crowd together at the Panama Varietals booth to taste fresh crop Panamanian coffee.
Champion, Rojewska is an experienced competitor. Earlier this year, Rojewska won the Coffee Masters competition at the London Coffee Festival. “Every competition for me is a reason to develop,” Rojewska said. Throughout all three rounds of the competition, Rojewska was the clear crowd favorite, filling the grandstands to capacity. In an atmosphere more akin to a World Cup match, spectators cheered loudly and sported red and white balloons—the color of the Polish flag. “Aga’s win is a historic moment, but more so, I hope that it serves as a turning point in history,” said Laila Ghambari, director of education for Stumptown Coffee. As a former US barista champion, Ghambari was on hand to offer commentary and emcee the competition. “Woman around the world can finally see themselves as a World Barista Champion,” she said.
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SUSTAINABILITY FORUM Nestled between equipment companies debuting their latest models, the Sustainability Forum provided a space for lectures and panel discussions to address the issues affecting specialty coffee production today—such as equitable farm labor and shared case studies like Manos al Agua, a private and public sector collaboration that’s fixing water imbalance in coffee producing communities in Colombia. “The Sustainability Forum was originally designed to provide a platform to non-profit organizations to promote their work at World of Coffee,” said Kim Elena Ionescu, chief sustainability officer at the Specialty Coffee Association. “I hope that we provoked some new thinking, especially among members of the industry community who wouldn’t necessarily self-select as sustainability advocates.” In the lecture halls, curious coffee professionals crowded together to hear
SCA Symposium Director Peter Giuliano explain the sensory science behind the SCA’s tasting wheel and accompanying lexicon. The lecture was so popular that volunteers had to turn people away from the at-capacity room. In other lectures, award-winning author Jeff Koehler presented research from his book Where the Wild Coffee Grows: The Untold Story of Coffee from the Cloud Forests of Ethiopia to Your Cup, followed by a book signing. SCA President Paul Stack gave a talk entitled “Opportunities to Innovate: How Product Designers Can Impact Tea and Coffee Experiences.” Stack said that younger coffee consumers are more experience-oriented, and brands need to focus on more than just their product. “A barista is not someone who makes coffee,” Stack said. “A barista is someone who creates value for the customer through service.”
PHOTOS BY MICHAEL BUTTERWORTH
SCA PRESIDENT Paul Stack presents winners of best new products.
BEST NEW PRODUCT AWARDS For the coffee exporters, importers, equipment manufacturers, and roasters in attendance, World of Coffee is a pivotal week of networking, negotiating, and learning about the latest, greatest new products in the marketplace. Winners of the coveted Best New Product Awards were judged on their quality and value to the specialty coffee and tea industry. Winners in each category included: • Coffee Accessories: KINTO: Travel Tumbler • Commercial Coffee or Tea Preparation and Serving Equipment: Ascaso Factory: Big Dream • Consumer Coffee or Tea Preparation and Serving Equipment (NonElectrical): Asobu by Adnart Inc.: Cold Brew Coffee • Open Class: LALCAFÉ YEAST: LALCAFÉ Intenso • Packaging: Cloud Picker Coffee Limited • Specialty Beverage Flavor Additive: Monin: L’Artiste de Monin • Specialty Beverage Stand Alone: Beyond the Bean: Zuma Organic Tumeric Chai • Food: Solid Coffee Ltd.: Coffee Pixels Cascara • Technology: Qualysense: Qsorter Explorer Attendance in Amsterdam set a new record for World of Coffee, and by the last day, conference goers were already talking about next year’s expo, which will take place in Berlin from June 6–8, 2019. FC
PHOTOS COURTESY OF WORLD COFFEE EVENTS
FRESH CUP MAGAZINE | 17
TRENDING
#shrubs The sweet-and-sour melding of fruit, sugar, and vinegar has a rich history bridging the Middle East and America. Now, modern mixologists are rediscovering shrubs and their ability to create exciting sodas, cocktails, and other caffeine-free concoctions.
By S. Michal Bennett
GRAPEFRUIT ROSEMARY shrub soda from Coffee Roboto.
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H
ardly a week goes by at our mobile café when someone doesn’t ask us, “What is a shrub?” Shrubs have been a mainstay on our menu ever since we opened, and I never tire of talking about the deliciousness of this modest, yet mighty libation. A shrub, in the beverage sense, is a powerful potion combining fruit, vinegar, and sugar. It can be added to carbonated beverages, tea, alcohol, foods—anything, really, that needs a punch of flavor. It is not simple syrup. The main difference between simple syrup and shrub is vinegar. Vinegar, in its most elemental form, is alcohol turned sour, and has been in existence as long as wine and beer. Its most ancient use was to sanitize contaminated water. The word “shrub” is derived from the Arabic word sharāb, which translates as “beverage” in English. Sharāb is also the root of the words sherbet, sorbet, and syrup. Liquid shrub traditionally refers to one of two things: a beverage made of fruit, an acid (vinegar or lemon), sugar, and water, or a blended drink made of fruit juice, sugar, and rum or brandy. The first shrubs originated in Turkey and Persia as a social drink enjoyed by teetotaling Muslims. The next wave emerged from the early days of rum, as people sought to offset the negative flavors of the young molasses-derived spirit. Another forerunner of the shrub is fruit vinegar. This culinary liquid is made by infusing fruit into vinegar and was widely made and used before refrigeration to use up fruit that was in danger of rotting. Fruit vinegars were used in sauces, dips, vinaigrettes, marinades, and alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks. These vinegars were also employed medically to clean wounds and as tonics for stomachaches and pretty much anything else that ailed you. Shrubs have other health benefits, too. First, they are more hydrating than just water and more effective at quenching thirst. The soldiers of the Roman Empire, as well as the Union Army
during the American Civil War, received drinking vinegar rations to slake their thirst. Shrubs also have a gentle cleansing effect on the body, since vinegar is antimicrobial, contains powerful antioxidants, assists insulin management, and supports good gut bugs.
in 1919, the everyday use of shrubs further dwindled. Gradually, recipes disappeared from cookbooks, and the craft of making shrubs was threatened with extinction. If it hadn’t been for the Pennsylvania Dutch and their passion for safeguarding
Shake it up! TAIT FARM makes more than 16 flavors of shrubs, from beet to wild blueberry and rhubarb, for making mocktails and cocktails like this Rhubarb Mojito. More recipes on FreshCup.com.
THE SHRUB REVIVAL In the late 1800s, the commercialization of soda delivered a blow to shrubs. Then, refrigeration was introduced into the world, providing a more effective way to preserve fruit. After the 21st Amendment repealed Prohibition
PHOTO, OPPOSITE PAGE, BY JOEL RINER PHOTOGRAPHY; RHUBARB M0JITO PHOTO BY JUSTIN WHEELER PHOTOGRAPHY
food traditions, shrubs might have been completely lost to American progress. A recipe for raspberry shrub was passed down through generations of cookbooks, including one written by a woman named Betty Groff. A copy fell into the hands of the Tait Farm in Pennsylvania in 1986.
FRESH CUP MAGAZINE | 19
#TRENDING
“A close family friend had made something called Raspberry Shrub nearly 40 years ago,” says farm owner Kim Tait. “Until this time, we had never heard of them.” That same year, the farm’s pick-your-own raspberry patch was rained out, which compelled Tait to freeze the fruit rather than let it rot. Unable to sell the frozen fruit, Tait decided to try turning it into Raspberry Shrub. BEE’S KNEES features Shrub & Co.’s Yucatan Honey Shrub.
Today, there are more than 16 flavors of Tait Farm Shrub, and the farm is pretty much responsible for the renewed interest in this syrup. In 2004, Wall Street Journal columnist Eric Felten wrote a piece on Tait Farm Foods and their Raspberry Shrub, launching the modern shrub revival. In 2014, Michael Dietsch’s book Shrubs: An Old-Fashioned Drink for Modern Times solidified its standing in the mixology world. I fell in love with shrubs in 2014 after Black Coffee Roasting Co. in Missoula, Montana, added shrub sodas to their summer menu. Then Barista in Portland, Oregon, made the Coffee Balsamic Shrub Spritzer, a concoction that you simply have to taste to understand.
SHRUBS IN THE CAFÉ The introduction of the Italian soda to the United States is attributed to Rinaldo and Ezilda Torre, the founders of Torani. For decades, these sodas have
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PHOTOS BY GORDON LAZZARONE PHOTOGRAPHY
provided a tasty café beverage for customers who want to pass on the caffeine. Shrub sodas are a tart twist on the Italian tradition. Mix two ounces shrub syrup with 12 ounces of sparkling water, add some ice, and you have a new drink on the coffee shop block. Shrubs can also be added to hot tea, making them a drink for every season. With shrub brewers popping
RUM & ROOT features Shrub & Co.’s Spicy Ginger Shrub. More recipes at FreshCup.com.
up around the country, including at coffee roasters and cafés, shrubs are also becoming highly accessible. Shrub & Co. in Sacramento, California, offers a variety of shrubs for retail and wholesale. “The history of shrub in the United States is a long one,” says cofounder Deborah Marskey. “We like to think that they were only temporarily lost, and the recent resurgence will grow as more and more people come to love how they work.” Marskey and her husband and co-owner, Juan Garcia, chose shrubs because of their versatility, balance, and vibrant history. “It’s exciting to see people embrace taste profiles like sour and bitter,” Marskey adds. In 1996, the non-profit organization Slow Food USA (www.slowfoodusa.org) began developing an Ark of Taste, which catalogs endangered heritage foods. Shrubs are in the Ark’s registry. At my mobile coffee cart, Coffee Roboto, I am also preserving this age-old, newly rediscovered
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#TRENDING
refreshment. One of our young customers calls it “sour juice” and gulps it down before his mom has finished half her coffee. As the coffee community continues to grow, here’s a recipe to get you started exploring the ripe potential of shrubs.
ENERGY ON TAP
C
offee is essentially an energy drink, and like all consumer goods and trends, the industry is driven by key factors such as convenience and function. Better and
faster is a potent combination of pure energy. Millennials make up the largest group of coffee consumers, consuming 44 percent of coffee in the United States. But the demographics are changing. The fastest-growing group of coffee drinkers is made up of those aged 13–16 (Generation Y). As the market shifts from traditional older coffee drinkers to younger adults, more consumers are asking for innovative, alternative energy drinks. According to David Morris of Dillanos Coffee Roasters, “The sale of energy drinks can be up to 50 percent of an espresso stand’s revenue.” The trend in both coffee and energy drinks is healthier, better-for-you, plant-based products made from natural ingredients. Lotus Energy Drinks has tapped into this trend with its innovation of plant–based energy drink concentrates featuring lotus flower and other adaptogenic botanicals, such as Rhodiola Rosea and Schizandra Berry, infused with super fruits and natural caffeine from green coffee beans. Adaptogens are nature’s elite medicinal plants, claimed to increase the body’s ability to resist the damaging effects of stress and promote better overall physiological functioning. These herbs and roots have been used for centuries in Chinese and Ayurvedic healing traditions, but they’re having a renaissance today. According to Lori Brewer of Caffe D’Arte Alaska, “We are really seeing a lot more products and inno-
Simply Berry Shrub 1 pound fresh berries (blueberries, raspberries, blackberries, huckleberries, or a combination) 1 cup sugar 1 cup apple cider vinegar In a large bowl, mash the berries and sugar by hand or with a potato masher until well mixed, then pour or ladle into a 1 quart glass container. Seal and let sit at room temperature for 1–2 days, shaking the container occasionally to help the sugar dissolve. Add the vinegar and stir or shake to combine. Strain the fruit solids from the liquid and seal in a glass container. Keep refrigerated and use within 10 days. Serve with soda water, ginger beer, or vodka. FC
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PHOTO BY ASHIM D’SILVA
vation like Lotus from the health channel due to the increasing consumer demand for healthy choices.” Steve Smith of the Coffee Warehouse says, “Until now, no energy drink has been able to compete with Red Bull. Lotus really resonates with our customer base as the healthy energy alternative.” Adding to its eco pioneer appeal, Lotus Energy Drinks are served fresh on tap, delivered by soda gun, and in efficient pump-and-serve energy concentrates mixed with soda water to mitigate storage space, instead of individual ready-to-drink cans. MORE INFO >> www.lotusenergydrinks.com
BEHIND THE BAR
DON FRANCISCO’S COFFEE CASA CUBANA 541 S Spring Street
hello@dfcasacubana.com
Los Angeles, California
#donfranciscoscoffee
213-537-0323
#dfcasacubana
www.dfcasacubana.com
Open 7 a.m.–7 p.m. daily
Curtis G4 Seraphim brewers brew micro-lot coffees by the cup with Chemexes.
Curtis G4 ThermoPro Twin Brewer and a BUNN G9-2T Portion Control Grinder brew up Casa Cubana’s batch brew option.
Nuova Simonelli Mythos One Clima Pro espresso grinders keep the espresso dialed in.
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BY MICHAEL BUTTERWORTH
Two-group Victoria Arduino 388 Black Eagle Gravitech allow Casa Cubana to double their output during peak hours.
W
e are real coffee people who have a strong history,” says Lisette Gaviña Lopez, co-owner of Don Francisco’s Coffee Casa Cubana in Downtown Los Angeles. In specialty coffee, a strong history might mean 20 or 30 years of experience. For the Gaviña family, their coffee legacy dates back 150 years—to when they immigrated from Spain to Cuba to start coffee farming and, later, roasting. Her grandfather, Don Francisco, obtained a license to roast coffee in the 1930s during the Great Depression.
PHOTO COURTESY OF DON FRANCISCO COFFEE CASA CUBANA
FRESH CUP MAGAZINE | 25
BEHIND THE BAR
Casa Cubana is located in the Spring Arcade Building, which has a sunlit covered three level courtyard (below) and is home to a variety of restaurants and residential spaces.
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T
The Roaster: A Probatino 01 coffee roaster sits tabletop in the front of the café.
PHOTOS COURTESY OF DON FRANCISCO COFFEE CASA CUBANA
oday, Don Francisco’s signature, copied from that very license, hangs next to a Probatino 01 coffee roaster, used in-store for roasting micro-lots exclusively available at their café. Casa Cubana is Don Francisco’s first foray into retail this year, though the company has been roasting coffee in Los Angeles for more than 50 years. “Retail is a new segment for us,” Lopez says. “Coffee is what we do and what we love, but we never had a place the consumer could go to.” The café has garnered design awards, including nods from the American Institute of Architects Los Angeles, the International Interior Design Association, and the Los Angeles Business Council. “The design is inspired by our Cuban and Spanish heritage,” Lopez says. Casa Cubana is bright and airy, with floral tile motifs, wicker light fixtures, and splashes of gold.
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BEHIND THE BAR
Relax in the living room. The framed images show the Lopez family’s history.
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Architectural firm Omgivning created a space that paid homage to Don Francisco’s legacy. “When you walk in, you really feel like you’re in Havana in the 1950s,” says Lopez.
Keeping it Cuban: A pastelito de guayaba y queso or guava cheese pastry and a cortadito.
AS A COMPANY WE’RE OBSESSED WITH THE QUALITY OF OUR PRODUCT. YOU CAN SEE THAT IN OUR PLANT AND WE WANTED IT TO BE REFLECTED IN OUR
One of two Victoria Arduino Black Eagle espresso machines on the espresso bar.
CAFÉ, TOO.
The aesthetic might be classic, but the espresso bar feels right at home in Downtown Los Angeles, stocked with the latest technology. Two Victoria Arduino Black Eagle espresso machines flank Nuova Simonelli Mythos One grinders. Micro-lot coffees, some purchased at auctions, are brewed by the cup by twin Curtis Seraphim brewers. “As a company we’re obsessed with the quality of our product. You can see that in our plant and we wanted it to be reflected in our café, too,” Lopez says.
PHOTOS COURTESY OF DON FRANCISCO COFFEE CASA CUBANA
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BEHIND THE BAR
The café is an expression and an extension of the family. “It’s really set it up like a home,” Lopez says. “There’s the dining room, a wine bar, a stand-up bar where you can stand and drink your espresso, and then there’s the living room.” A wall in the living room documents the family’s history through pictures, starting with Lopez’s grandfather on the family coffee farm in Cuba through to their first roastery space in Los Angeles. “It features my grandfather, Don Francisco, on the coffee farm in Cuba in the 1950s,” Lopez says. “In the 1960s, my family fled Castro’s Cuba and basically started their lives over in
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Wine Bar: Enjoy a glass of wine—or an espresso—at the stand-up, bar-style seating.
Los Angeles. My grandfather was 60 years old when he came to the United States and started his life over. Imagine, when most people are looking to retire, he’s looking to start his life over.” Cupping Table
Make it a Meal: A classic Cubano sandwich with mariquitas (plantain chips) and a cold brew with cream.
Dining Room
Along with a coffee menu that features Cuban classics like Café con Leche and Cortadito, the café serves an array of Cuban sandwiches, made on fresh-baked Cuban sweet bread. “When people come in, we really want them to feel like a part of our family,” Lopez says. FC
PHOTOS COURTESY OF DON FRANCISCO COFFEE CASA CUBANA
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NINE BAR
BACKYARD BEANS established food safety protocols for service of their cold brew on tap and for their canned product (below).
Making Sure Cold Brew Is Food Safe Food-safe cold brew is the future, if coffee is to continue as an enjoyable, low-risk drink, whether served boiling hot, ice cold, bottled, canned, nitro’d or concentrated. By Rachel Northrop
I
t’s just coffee and water, right? What’s the big deal about food safety regulations and cold brew? Actually, it’s quite a big deal, according to the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA), which became law in the United States on January 4, 2011, ushering in a new era of stricter regulations on food manufacturers of all sizes. The focus of this food safety legislation is on the prevention of food-borne illness outbreaks rather than reactions to contamination. It also comprehensively approaches all angles of our food supply system. Every part of the coffee supply chain has some requirements to comply with the law.
RETHINKING COLD BREW Cold brew, unlike iced coffee, is made with water that is never brought to a boil and therefore carries a higher risk for mold or pathogens to grow. A risky rumor in the industry is that coffee is its own antiseptic, which is only marginally true for coffee, where certain concentrations of caffeine are inhibiting, but not necessarily killing some strains of bacteria.
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“It’s partly cultural that coffee is assumed to be safe,” says Matt Adams, owner at Backyard Beans Coffee Company, a Lansdale, Pennsylvania roaster, retailer, and wholesaler that cans and kegs nitrogen cold brew for distribution. Among consumers and manufacturers, hot coffee bears the generally accurate connotation of being a safe product, with less of the risks inherent in other café products, such as dairy-based drinks. But the difference between hot coffee and cold coffee is major, and any product that
is bottled, canned, kegged, boxed, or otherwise packed for distribution must have stringent food safety protocols as part of its manufacturing procedures. To produce food-safe cold brew, manufacturers must have a “Food Safety Plan” explaining how they will prevent any contamination or adulteration in their products. The plan should include a formal hazard analysis and risk-based preventive controls, as well as a supply chain program, validation, verification, stated corrective actions, and a recall plan. “We spoke to our Food Lab and the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture about microbial spoilage and professionals in the [beer] brewing and food industries,” Adams says of the process he went through when Backyard Beans began building their new roasting and canning facility in 2015, back when few coffee professionals were yet familiar with FSMA and FDA regulations. Adams worked backwards from the question of how to make a food-safe product to the requirements of national distributors and accounts. The requirements of those who stock cold brew and
PHOTOS COURTESY OF BACKYARD BEANS COFFEE COMPANY
HATCH BEVERAGE COMPANY’S bottling facility.
FDA regulations are the starting points for a roadmap in building and operating a safe cold brewing facility.
FOLLOW THROUGH Knowing the regulations and compliance procedures is the first step. The next is building them into a cold brew manufacturing facility. “There were quite a few factors in designing the plant,” describes Alfonso Tupaz of Hatch Beverage Company roaster and cold brew bottler in Markham, Ontario. “From material selection, such as making sure all product contact points were food grade stainless steel, to process flow—minimal to no external exposure from brewing directly to bottling and cleaning.” Cold brew production must also have a kill step. “No question,” Tupaz says. “Whether it’s new or old tech treatment, it’s necessary, especially with canned products that are hermetically sealed. Nitrogen is not a kill step; keeping a product in the fridge is not a kill step.” A kill step is a point in the production process where potentially deadly pathogens are eliminated. Roasting, for instance, is a kill step in coffee that eliminates yeast and bacteria organisms that reside on green coffee and can cause illness in humans. The risk of cross contamination throughout a coffee production facility is considerable, however, especially with cold brew. And it’s not just the coffee that’s of concern for contamination. There’s water quality, and employees are also potential carriers of pathogens.
PHOTO COURTESY OF HATCH BEVERAGE COMPANY
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NINE BAR
Hands, fingernails, hair, beards, clothing, and shoes carry bacteria and viruses. In addition to the biological hazards, FSMA also covers chemical and physical hazards, and cold brew manufacturers need to have a heightened awareness that their “ready-toeat” products need to be analyzed differently than roasted coffee that consumers prepare themselves. Allergens are considered chemical contaminants, too. Physical hazards like glass, plastic and metal may
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also possibly land in cold brew vessels. Cold brew manufacturers need to be vigilant to keep these contaminants and others out of the coffee, primarily following FSMA’s Final Rule on Current Good Manufacturing Practice (cGMP), Hazard Analysis, and Risk-Based Preventive Controls for Human Food (21 CFR part 117).
PLAN FOR GROWTH & SAFETY “To distribute across state lines and grow as a wholesaler, we have to take proactive steps to change the culture and focus on food safety,” Adams says. “In many ways, the liability falls on the business owner. My wife and I own the business, so if someone gets sick from our cold brew, it’s on us.” FSMA requirements explicitly hold coffee manufacturers accountable, and integrating food safety into cold brew production is not an option—it is legally required. “Don’t do it until you understand the risks, consequences, and costs of
producing a safe product,” says Ildi Revi of Ally Coffee in Greenville, South Carolina, and author of Food Safety for Coffee Roasting Operations, a course on compliance. “The last thing you want to happen is to make someone sick—or worse—from drinking your cold brew.” FDA manuals are available in full, for free, online but they are daunting to sift through. The law also requires that a Preventive Controls Qualified Individual (PCQI) writes a company’s food safety plan. “Not only does a PCQI write the plan, but he or she should be involved in implementing the food safety system and creating a culture of food safety at the company,” Revi says. Being knowledgeable and vigilant in averting contamination by using good manufacturing practices and risk-based preventive controls, labeling shelf-life accurately, and keeping cold brew coffee refrigerated in production and distribution are steps to ensuring your cold brew is food-safe now and into the future. FC
PHOTO COURTESY OF HATCH BEVERAGE COMPANY
PAIRINGS
GEORGE VUKASIN JR. outside of Peerless Coffee headquarters in Oakland, California. James Beard award-winning chef GARY DANKO (inset).
Coffee by a Chef, for Chefs Trained chef George Vukasin Jr. leads Peerless Coffee with his food-focused palate and partnerships with top chefs. By Lon LaFlamme
A
s a graduate of Le Cordon Bleu Paris, George Vukasin Jr. was rigorously trained to have an executive chef’s palate for quality, consistency, and innovation. As CEO of Peerless Coffee & Tea in Oakland, California, he applies
those same hospitality standards to his family’s coffee company. In addition to leading the roasting team, Vukasin sources top-scoring coffees from around the world. He has hosted culinary students from the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park
GEORGE VUKASIN JR. PHOTO COURTESY OF PEERLESS COFFEE; GARY DANKO PHOTO COURTESY OF GARY DANKO
New York and Singapore to spend time at the roastery and become immersed in coffee. Over the years, culinary graduates have become clients of Peerless after opening their own restaurants. CIA graduate and multiple James Beard award winner Gary Danko, owner
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PAIRINGS
of the five-star San Francisco restaurant on Fisherman’s Wharf named after him, worked closely with Vukasin to pair coffees on his dessert menu. “Our partnership with Peerless and the Vukasins started many years ago at the Dining Room at the Ritz Carlton. We partnered with Peerless because they PAIRING: George Jr. (left) and chef Gary Danko share a passion for coffee and cooking.
LIKE DANKO’S RESTAURANTS, MAJOR BOUTIQUE HOTELS ARE SHIFTING FROM COMMODITY COFFEE TO CRAFT COFFEE TO MEET GUEST EXPECTATIONS.
were able to elevate our coffee program to the level of our cuisine. When we opened Restaurant Gary Danko, we continued to work with Peerless and have enjoyed a first-class relationship ever since,” Danko says. Like Danko’s restaurants, major boutique hotels are shifting from commodity coffee to craft coffee to meet guest expectations. Hyatt, Hilton, and Ritz Carlton properties have worked with coffee roasters to add their own private label coffee and open kiosks in hotel lobbies.
PHOTO COURTESY OF PEERLESS COFFEE
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PAIRINGS
LE CORDON BLEU Paris, graduating class of 1996.
AT ORIGIN: George visiting a coffee farm in Guatemala in 2015.
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PHOTOS COURTESY OF PEERLESS COFFEE
In 2019, Peerless will celebrate 95 years of roasting craft coffee for premier individual and chain restaurants and hotels, including resort hotel and golf resorts like Pebble Beach and Pelican Hill Resort. All of Peerless’s Pacific Hospitality Resorts properties, from Napa Valley to Southern California and Hawaii, have added craft coffee to the menu. “Craft coffee is the fastest-growing part of the restaurant industry. When people taste the difference between standard brews versus more distinct terroir-based coffees, chefs and restaurant owners switch from free refills in favor of craft coffee as a profit and customer experience,” Vukasin says. He blends his tasting skills with his cooking background to match coffees with various food items and create pairing menus for some clients.
chocolate-based dessert,” Vukasin says. “Distinct citrus and berry flavor notes in many single-origin coffees, like the easily recognizable blueberry flavor notes in Ethiopian coffee, are a great way to introduce the idea to chefs,” Vukasin says. To meet the growing demand for cold brew nitrogen draft coffee drinks, many of Peerless’s clients now offer cold brew nitro on tap, with some even offering several different proprietary blends. Peerless developed a two-parts water, one-part cold brew concentrate to not only serve on tap in the restaurants, and added a cold brew tap for the refreshment carts for golfers.
SIMILAR TO WINE PAIRINGS, VUKASIN WORKS DIRECTLY WITH EXECUTIVE CHEFS TO PAIR SINGLE-ORIGIN ESPRESSOS AND BLENDS WITH DESSERT MENU ITEMS.
“Considering we source some of the world’s best and highest scoring beans, it means restaurant owners are spending more for their coffee, but getting this smart investment back via cappuccinos, lattes, hand-poured coffees, which match the quality of their food,” Vukasin says. Vukasin also brings specialty coffee to fine dining via dessert pairings. Similar to wine pairings, Vukasin works directly with executive chefs to pair single-origin espressos and blends with dessert menu items. “A number of blends I have created have milk or dark chocolate flavor notes that perfectly compliment any
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PAIRINGS
THROUGH THE YEARS: (clockwise from top left) George judging coffee at Best of Chiapas, Mexico in 2008; George and Wolfgang Puck tasting espressos; with George Sr. cupping coffees; George at Peerless Coffee & Tea.
Peerless crafted a 64-ounce plastic bottle cold brew concentrate that is shelf stable for six months. It was so popular in the hospitality industry, from colleges and restaurants to California hotel and golf resorts, that they added a 32-ounce consumer size for the supermarket chains that sell Peerless coffee in bags and bulk. “This breakthrough process allows the heavy volume of drink orders to be filled
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without having to cycle through the typical 17-hour cold brew process,” Vukasin says. Vukasin also works with mixologists to develop cold brew cocktails that increase sales and expand menu offerings on progressive fine dining menus. Seeing the coffee experience from all sides and applying his knowledge for fine and fast casual dining environments drives Vukasin and Peerless Coffee.
“I worked alongside my dad at Peerless when I was growing up, just as he had when his father started Peerless Coffee and Tea in 1924. Whether it was going to origin or Friday cuppings, specialty coffee started running through my veins,” Vukasin says. “It is in my DNA to strive for perfection.” FC MORE INFO >> www.peerlesscoffee.com
PHOTOS COURTESY OF PEERLESS COFFEE
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The lives of tea makers run fast in this hallowed, wild-growing region dating back over 1,200 years, but is the future for tea here running out of time? By Josh Doyle Photos by Robert Koehler
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ORIGIN: SOUTH KOREA
T
he legend of tea on South Korea’s Jiri Mountain goes back some 1,200 years and is steeped in mystery. What is known is that everything that grows from Jiri Mountain’s slopes, every crop of fruit, vegetable, and wild herb, is a cut above the rest. Better than average. Imbued with some unseen elixir, as though the mountain itself was feeding each plant from the stream of its millennia’s old life force. Or so the local people of Hadong, keepers of Korea’s first tea fields, once believed. The locals don’t go in much for the mountain-spirit talk anymore. They’re too busy running hotels and saving money to put their kids through school. But they still admit what can’t be denied: on the slopes of Jiri Mountain, things grow well. Really well. And one of those things is tea. One of the men keeping that reputation alive is Sangyong Lee. Based out of Hadong County, in a lush valley called Hwagae at the foot of Jiri Mountain, he’s a grower, harvester, and tea maker—a tea man in every sense of the word. And he’s one of the last of his kind. In a region once defined by artisan pride, where tea making was passed down through generations like swordsmiths in medieval Japan, the number of tea makers is dwindling. Call it brain drain, or maybe tea drain. Today’s youth are more interested in careers in the city than toiling to learn the art of tea. “I want to make the tea no one else can make,” Lee tells me. When I hear these words, we are driving in Lee’s car at breakneck speed along a Hadong valley highway, on the way to his café and workshop. I want to alert him to the speed limit, but I don’t dare interrupt. One question, and Lee unfurls a torrent of tea history on me. Lee has been steeped in tea for 30 years, since he finished his mandatory military service. He learned the craft of tea from his parents, who learned it from theirs. He didn’t always dream of being a tea maker, but here he is and
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STAY HERE: Tea fields outside a guesthouse in Hadong.
Artisan tea master SANGYONG LEE at his café and workshop in Hadong.
ORIGIN: SOUTH KOREA
he appears to be enjoying it. Lee can hardly contain himself when we drive by one of his crops. “That’s one of my fields,” he says throwing an excited arm out the window. I can picture him as a young boy proudly showing off a toy train set. “The other one is twice that size.” I peel my eyes off the road and glimpse a field carved into the mountainside. I admit it’s not what I’m expecting. There are no perfectly trimmed rows of green. The bushes are untamed, spread out like connect-the-dots, as if whoever planted them didn’t care about saving time at harvest. And what’s with all those giant boulders sitting in the middle of the field, taking up valuable tea real estate? Surely those are costing him money. These questions will have to wait. We arrive at Lee’s café, a wooden hanok that glows with a sunlit stain. Lee rushes inside, where he talks to an associate at light-speed before sitting
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One of Hadong’s scenic tea fields on the slopes of JIRI MOUNTAIN. Tea was planted here after visitors from China brought the plant over some 1,200 years ago.
HANDMADE CUPS (opposite) and green tea (below) served at Sangyong’s café.
behind the counter and pouring tea for the three of us. He moves fast, as though something inside him is itching to break free. I take a seat on a handcarved wooden bench and accept a clay cup steaming with mellow green. “Good, right? Soft, isn’t it?” He’s insisting I like it, but he doesn’t need to. The tea is soft, and it is good. A savory warmth washes over my palate. Flavor peaks through like sprouts shooting up from a bed of soil. Lee’s phone rings constantly while we talk, more like the phone of a Hollywood agent than a man tucked away in a valley. This is his busiest time of year, and the calls come from all over: Gwangju, Seoul, Busan. He even ships to Canada. When he answers, it’s always the same. Short and sweet. Large orders to individual customers and cafés. At one point he tells a customer to search him on Naver, which is the equivalent of telling someone to Google you.
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ORIGIN: SOUTH KOREA
A well-groomed tea field in HADONG VALLEY. Growers here have passed down their craft through generations.
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WHAT MAKES HADONG TEA SO SPECIAL? In between calls, I learn the story of Hadong. Aside from being a grower’s paradise of perfect temperature, timely rainfall, and ideal soil, there is a deep history behind the valley’s success that entails a long-running collusion between tea grower and Mother Nature. When people first tried to etch out a living here 1,200 years ago, opportunities were slim. The mountains are too steep for rice, and whatever they did plant would be washed away by notoriously heavy monsoons. So the tenacious locals turned to the tea plant, with its deep roots, and learned to work with nature, instead of against it. After a millennium of permaculture, the tea plants here are not only resilient, but also diverse. They reproduce via insects and the wind, bringing genetic diversity to each field. That’s why there are still giant moss-covered boulders in the tea fields, and why they call it “wild tea.” There’s a balance here and they’re not about to disturb it just to fit in a few more bushes. It’s also why the United Nations named Hwagae tea farming a Globally Important Agricultural Heritage System, up with the likes of saffron farming in Kashmir and the Hani rice terraces in China. It’s organic, sustainable, and it wins awards. And here I am, sitting with one of the region’s best tea makers, watching his phone erupt into seizures while he attentively refills our cups. On a nearby table is a magazine with Lee’s face on the cover. On the wall, faded photographs of Lee accepting awards for his tea. Touchstones of a long career. And yet he still runs his business like a mom-and-pop shop. “I don’t sell to department stores,” he says. That would require more quantity, which would mean using machines. But for Lee, and for every true Hadong tea artisan, everything is done by hand. That’s where Lee’s tea gets its flavor, and that’s why artisans can charge from $50 up to $300 for their finest batches. That’s why he can’t let anyone else make the tea, because it would change the taste.
A JIRI tea artisan who sells his handmade teas in Korea and overseas.
Jiri Mountain steeped in fog overlooking the HADONG TEA MUSEUM. Lingering fogs are common, and nourish the tea bushes.
TEA CEREMONY at the Hadong Tea Museum.
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ORIGIN: SOUTH KOREA A Buddhist tea maker at the HADONG WILD TEA FESTIVAL.
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It’s also why the next generation doesn’t want his job. “It’s hard to get enough labor, especially with young people,” Lee tells me. Making tea isn’t glamorous work, non-stop phone calls notwithstanding. Lee’s shoulders ache constantly from the work. By the end of harvest season he’s exhausted, both mentally and physically. Even his son is hesitant to take over the business. If he leaves, he’ll end a family lineage of high-end, profitable tea makers. But Lee says he’s okay with that because he knows from his own near-escape 30 years ago, this business isn’t for everyone. “You have to be stubborn to be a tea maker,” he says. When I ask if he’ll be attending the Hadong Wild Tea Festival two weeks later, he waves it off. Maybe this is part of his stubbornness, or maybe he wants to give the valley’s other growers a chance. Tea makers like Lee cast a big shadow.
The Hadong Wild Tea Festival is like Coachella for tea lovers, a four-day freefor-all with live music and food—except the concert ends at 9 p.m. and there’s no beer tent. Instead it’s tea tents, lined up along the Hwagae Stream. Tea makers sport their wildest outfits of longsleeved shirts and cotton vests. Here, I meet Yoon-suk Cho, a man of 47 who could easily pass for 30, save for the gray hairs peeking through. It must be all that tea and mountain air keeping him young, but according to this thirdgeneration tea maker, the tea life wasn’t his first choice either. “I wanted to do other things. I was actually going to leave,” he says. Looking around the valley, I struggle to understand why. Lush trees cover the mountains all around. The air here is so clean they capture it in bottles and sell it to Seoullites trapped in the concrete gridlock of South Korea’s capital city. But as they say, the tea field is always greener on the other side. One well-
known tea maker had a daughter set to take over the family business, until that daughter decided she wasn’t going to spend her life in a valley, and fled to Seoul for a career in IT. This was something like Yoon-suk’s plan, until a family tragedy tied him to tea making and the valley, indefinitely. “My mother suffered a serious burn. She couldn’t make tea anymore.” Yoon-suk was the only one who could take her place. He abandoned his plans and dove headfirst into the craft. Twenty years later, it’s hard to imagine him anywhere else. Everything about him speaks tea. His hand-made greens and blacks are well-known in these parts. He’s respected for his art. A flock of middle-age women are lined up at his booth, hanging on his every word. “I really fell in love with making tea,” he says. His company Jukro Cha sells online and in cafés in Insadong, a Seoul neighborhood packed with high-end
Celebrated tea artisan YOON-SUK CHO, a third generation artisan, smiles while serving a flock of loyal customers at the Wild Tea Festival.
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ORIGIN: SOUTH KOREA
tea houses. His is a word-of-mouth business, and when you’re as good as Jukro is, word travels.
THE FUTURE IS GREEN Not everyone falls in love with tea making and stays enraptured by the warm groves of this lush valley. Many youth leave in pursuit of air-conditioning and steady salaries. Coffee has eclipsed tea as the drink of choice on the peninsula, making it even harder for tea growers to get top price for their product. It’s getting harder and harder to convince the kids that making tea is cool anymore—but boy does Hadong try. Ga-yeong Lee, who works at the local Tea Museum, filling the halls with a mixture of earthy charm and high fashion, tells me they have a tea-focused kindergarten program, a kind of Tea 101 for toddlers. “They’re trying to instill interest. They’re planting the seeds, but no one knows if they’ll bear fruit.”
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GA-YEONG LEE, host at the Hadong Tea Museum.
TEA SCULPTURE art outside the Hadong Tea Museum.
Hwagae isn’t Palm Springs, but there’s a crowd of serious tea drinkers here, ready to spend on the right batch. And commerce is alive in other forms. When I meet Jong-gyun Kim, owner of Dong Cheon Tea and the only factory in the valley, he looks calm, like a cat sunning outside his café door. For years he’s been buying tea from the area’s growers and turning it into dollars, doing so in a way their ancestors may not have predicted. “Most of the tea ends up as powder,” Kim says while we sip his highend brew in a café overlooking the fields. “It goes into lattes, green tea ice cream, green tea cakes. They put green tea in everything now.” The remainder of his sales are in tea bags, which get stamped with another brand’s name and sold in grocery stores in Korea and abroad. That’s good news for local growers, even if their tea isn’t being consumed the way their parents or grandparents would have intended. In this day and age, even artisan tea makers need to make concessions in return for steady income. While coffee is still a relatively new fad, tea has a 1,200-year history in South Korea. In China, its history goes back much further. Tea may need to sit tight for a while, but it’s hard to envision a future here without the tea plant. Some things never disappear, they’re too essential to the human experience. Love, war, wine … “The greatest beverage of human history is tea,” Lee tells me, whilst driving much too fast. That’s when I finally understand why he’s always in a hurry. He’s got something to prove to the world, and he hasn’t got forever to do it. FC
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BIRD FRIENDLY: Mateo Reynoso points out a bird’s nest in his Bourbon trees. His farm is a part of Manos Campesinas in the highlands of southwestern Guatemala.
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After several waves of specialization, the options for sourcing green coffee are greater than ever. Deciding what to buy depends on what’s most important to you: origin micro-region, farm name, environmental certifications, cup score and profile, personal connections, or social responsibility. The choice is yours.
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GREEN COFFEE, PART 2
W
hat is a coffee buyer to do when presented with such a wide array of choices, where each option claims to be the best and where green coffee costs must stay within a company’s operating budget? One approach is to work backwards: to start with a prioritized list of qualitative and quantitative specifications and use those as a lens for sourcing green coffee that is the best fit. Brio Coffeeworks is a wholesale roaster owned and operated by husbandand-wife team Nate and Magdalena Van Dusen in Burlington, Vermont. As a small, local roaster serving a community who values responsibly sourced food and expects great taste, the Van Dusens look for coffees that meet a crosssection of criteria. “Brio’s criteria for sourcing green coffee fall primarily into five categories: quality, traceability, social and environmental impact, seasonality, and price,” Nate explains. “We look for coffees that exhibit exceptional flavor relative to the origin and price point. Our customers seek coffees at a range of prices, so our sourcing has to reflect that. More and more we’re seeking lots traceable to the farm level that are relatively uniform in terms of varietal and where there’s more of a story that we can relate to our customers.” Keeping in mind what customers want is a major facet of selecting green coffee. Selected coffees have to resonate with customers. While the possibility of finding something new and exciting can make green sourcing seem like a treasure hunt, choosing green coffee is just one small part of running a coffee business. A balance must be struck between coffees that meet customers’ taste expectations and ethical considerations about best business practices. “Balancing social and environmental sustainability criteria with cup score and profiles is a challenge because there is not a sufficient quantity of certified coffees on the market to meet our needs,” Nate says. “So it’s really about
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LA MINITA coffee estate in the Tarrazu region of Costa Rica is known for innovative and progressive farming and management methods.
BRIO COFFEEWORKS: owners Magdalena (left) and Nate (roasting below) Van Dusen look for specific criteria when purchasing their green beans.
PHOTOS COURTESY OF BRIO COFFEE
GREEN COFFEE, PART 2
building relationships with importers that we trust are committed to incorporating social and environmental responsibility into their sourcing criteria.”
CHOOSING TRUSTWORTHY PARTNERS Trust is crucial to sourcing coffee. Lionel Robitalle is the founding owner of Mountain Coffee, an importer based in Vancouver, British Columbia. What he looks for when sourcing is dictated by the needs of the roasters he sells to. “The lead criterion for the Third Wave is coffee that stands out,” Robitalle says. “[Companies] don’t want the same coffee as people down the street, so microlots are a big part of that.” In addition to uniqueness, transparency, equity, and price sensitivity are additional expectations of roasters. “Everyone wants to know that funds are going back to the farmer,” Robitalle says. Trust is the link that binds importers and export partners along the supply chain. “Logistically you can’t order 30 bags of Honduras and have it shipped to Vancouver, so we rely on exporters to keep costs down,” Robitalle says. “The story goes on our website and gets told in the café, so clients can get excited and there’s buzz.”
MANY BUYERS WILL ACT ON THE PERFECTLY GOOD INTENTION OF WANTING TO PAY TOP PRICE FOR EXCELLENT QUALITY, BUT WITHOUT CONSIDERING THE BROADER IMPLICATIONS OF LITERAL CHERRY PICKING.
Sourcing coffee based on a farm story is one area where dicey dilemmas arise. Is it valid to accept or reject a coffee based on the narrative of the people and place that produced it? Is it valid to use a farm or producer’s name as marketing to sell a product, rather than branding the product with a name unique to the roaster/retailer and then identifying the provenance of the original beans? Producers are always proud to see their names represented on final packaging when they have directly built a connection with roasters, but there is a fine line between transparency and misusing someone’s personal information as ready-made branding. “Many buyers will act on the perfectly good intention of wanting to pay top price for excellent quality, but without considering the broader implications of literal cherry picking,” says Felipe Gurdián Piza, sourcing manager for Cooperative Coffees in Americus, Georgia. Cooperative Coffees is an importing company owned by its 21 roasting members, each with different needs and volumes for their corresponding markets. What unites Coop’s members is their focus on smallholder cooperatives, and priorities on Organic and Fair Trade certification, when procuring green coffee. “If production areas or producers get favored for their quality potential based on well-known preconditions—altitude, varietal, geographic area, historic performance—and coffee is sold in a quality differentiated market,
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without any broader form of validation, a door is left open for producers to question the partiality of their organization,” Piza says. Green sourcing requires asking some tough questions: Which is more important, accessing high-quality coffees or contributing to fair pricing ecosystems at origin? Traceability to an individual farm or consistent quality from year to year?
FELIPE GURDIÁN PIZA (left) with Marco Antonio Tzunún, production coordinator Manos Campesinas.
CUPPING at Sol Y Café in Peru—one of Cooperative Coffee’s farms that boasts Organic, FLO and SPP certifications.
Sometimes, sourcing with specific, demanding criteria can have unexpected consequences. “Cooperatives are enterprises based on solidarity,” Piza explains. “A cooperative continues to provide a home for coffee when quality is sub-par, and the farmer can still enjoy benefits provided by the social safety net afforded by their cooperative. The organization offers consistent supply by casting a wider net, drawing on a wider farmer base to meet quality demands of more stringent buyers and rewarding that farmer producing higher quality.”
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For larger roasters who need consistent volumes and who value commitment to supporting the safety nets offered by well-managed cooperatives, sourcing through cooperatives provides access to stratified quality.
COFFEE VALUES: Pricing differentials for farmers based on their certifications.
Organizations such as Cooperative Coffees provide validation and verification, and the promise of rewarding quality. They effectively provide positive reinforcement for continual development and diffusion of best agricultural practices, while encouraging competition among farmers, solidifying trust in the organization, and building producer capacity.
ONE OF THE CONSEQUENCES OF HOW THINK PURCHASES IS THAT WE BIND OURSELVES TO RELATIONSHIPS, NOT TO THE BLEND PROFILE.
PERFECTING THE BLEND Think Coffee is a roaster/retailer in New York with 11 Manhattan cafés, two shops in Korea, and a café/roastery in Brooklyn. Think’s goal of sourcing green coffee that supports fair quality economics at origin is similar to that of Cooperative Coffees, but Think approaches the process as a single entity and with criteria around community projects, rather than looking to source from smallholders organized into certified cooperatives.
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MARKETPLACE “We call it ‘Social Project Coffee,’ ” says Noah Welch, Think’s director of coffee and international projects. “Instead of paying a premium as a certification of quality or responsible production practices, we pay a premium that directly funds a social project at origin.”
SOCIAL PROJECT COFFEE: Think Coffee concentrates more on community projects at origin and less on expensive certifications.
Since 2011, Think has imported nearly all the coffee they roast, more than 16 containers. Today, they move 10,000 roasted pounds per month from Ethiopia, Nicaragua, Mexico, and Colombia. Projects around feminine hygiene, worker housing, and clean water are ongoing as Think imports an average of six containers each year. Think’s priority when sourcing is determining the plausibility of developing a long-term partnership where they can be actively involved by buying consistently and by implementing a project based on the needs expressed by the community. Think makes this level of commitment to the same coffee-producing communities and farms at full container volumes year after year. The tradeoff is that Think has to accept the inevitable variations in coffee quality, which they are able to do using one of coffee’s oldest tools: the blend. “A blend program allows us to keep relationships steady over time. We aren’t buying what is good in the moment,” Welch says. “We instead buy based on what supports a project and a relationship over the long term. A single-origin program doesn’t give us that kind of flexibility.”
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GREEN COFFEE, PART 2
NICARAGUA: Refurbishing and covering five wells in Nicaragua’s Totogalpa area provide clean drinking water to 80 beneficiary families, thanks to Think Coffee.
The blend is a crucial tool roasters can use to make a positive impact in the communities of workers. Instead of asking, “Is this the most exciting and unique coffee available?” roasters should ask, “How will this coffee work in my menu? Will it satisfy my wholesale customers? Will it work as a special offering or fit as an ongoing blend component? Does it comply with my company’s mission, vision, and values?” Answering these questions helps narrow the pool of options. “One of the consequences of how Think purchases is that we bind ourselves to relationships, not to the blend profile,” Welch says. “Every coffee changes from year to year, and we work with those changes. Maybe one year we get 88 points, sparkly and delicate. The
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next year, from the same place, maybe because of the climate, maybe the age of the trees or a countrywide lack of labor, it’s 83 and dirty. This doesn’t really matter to us, as long as the workers continue to be supported and the social project continues. A great blend can bridge the gap between two styles of coffee drinker. It can hold milk and sugar well and still provide the more distinct flavor notes of a high-scoring single origin.”
ASSIGNING TRUE VALUE While an overwhelming number of green coffee options exist today, it’s important to remember that green coffee has historically been bought and sold according to physical specifications— mainly defect count, screen size, and country of origin.
The new art of assigning value and price differentiation based on physical, sensorial, and certified green coffee quality characteristics has typically been the work of importers and exporters, but more and more roasters are becoming actively involved at origin and making specific requests of their suppliers. While all coffees will not cup 90 points, cost $2 per pound, bear seals of certification, and be traceable to a single plot of land, it is possible to prioritize the attributes of a coffee that are most important to you. Based on those criteria, roasters can source the beans that satisfy their unique approach to making coffee viable for producers—and a truly special experience for customers. FC
PHOTO BY NOAH WELCH
WORLD TEA EXPO SHOW SHOTS
PBFY FLEXIBLE PACKAGING
SAKU TEA: superfood latte blends
METROPOLITAN TEA COMPANY: wholesale teas and accessories
INNOVATIVE PACKAGING WINNER Justea
T-TALES: 100% organic teas
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TRIO: (from left) Fresh Cup publisher Jan Weigel, Tea House Times publisher Gail Gastelu and SerendipiTea owner Linda Villano.
PO: Pao thermal mugs, cups and infusers
June 12–14, 2018 | Las Vegas
BITACO: Colombian tea
TOSI: plant-based super bites
CASAWARE: travel infusers/tumblers
MARA CHAI: chai made with Kenyan tea.
CHALO chai latte mix
FRESH CUP PUBLISHER: Jan Weigel (left) with Swarna P Gunaratne, Consulate General of Sri Lanka.
WIZE MONKEY coffee leaf tea
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TRADE SHOW & EVENTS CALENDAR AUGUST AUGUST 19–21 COFFEE FEST Los Angeles, California coffeefest.com
SEPTEMBER 20–24 LET’S TALK COFFEE Huila, Colombia letstalkcoffee.org
AUGUST 19–21 WESTERN FOODSERVICE & HOSPITALITY EXPO Los Angeles, California westernfoodexpo.com
SEPTEMBER 23–24 CANADIAN COFFEE & TEA SHOW Toronto, Canada coffeeteashow.ca
AUGUST 30–SEPTEMBER 1 EXPO CAFE MEXICO Mexico City, Mexico tradex.mx/expocafe
SEPTEMBER SEPTEMBER 3–5 TEA & COFFEE WORLD CUP Birmingham, United Kingdom tcworldcup.com
SEPTEMBER 6–8 FLORIDA RESTAURANT & LODGING SHOW Orlando, Florida flrestaurantandlodgingshow.com
SEPTEMBER 8–9 MIDWEST TEA FESTIVAL Kansas City, Missouri midwestteafest.com
SEPTEMBER 15–17 CAFE SHOW CHINA Beijing, China www.cafeshow.cn
SEPTEMBER 19–22 GOLDEN BEAN Portland, Oregon goldenbean.com
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SEPTEMBER
SEPTEMBER 24–27 PIR EXPO COFFEE Moscow, Russia pirexpo.com/en
SEPTEMBER 29–OCTOBER 1 ATHENS COFFEE FESTIVAL Athens, Greece athenscoffeefestival.gr/en/
OCTOBER OCTOBER 10–12 COTECA Hamburg, Germany coteca-hamburg.com/en/
OCTOBER 16–17 CAFFE CULTURE London, United Kingdom caffecultureshow.com
OCTOBER 18–22 CHINA XIAMEN INTL. TEA FAIR Xiamen, Fujian Province, China teafair.com.cn/en
OCTOBER 25–27 TRIESTESPRESSO EXPO Trieste, Italy triestespresso.it
NOVEMBER
DECEMBER
NOVEMBER 7–9 INTERNATIONAL COFFEE WEEK Belo Horizonte, Brazil semanainternacionaldocafe.com.br/en/
DECEMBER 1–2 COFFEE & TEA FESTIVAL VALLEY FORGE Valley Forge, Pennsylvania coffeeandteafestival.com
NOVEMBER 7–9 WORLD LATTE ART CHAMPIONSHIP Belo Horizonte, Brazil worldlatteart.org
DECEMBER 3–7 INTERNATIONAL COFFEE & CHOCOLATE EXHIBITION Riyadh, Saudia Arabia coffeechoco-expo.com
NOVEMBER 7–11 SINTERCAFE San Jose, Costa Rica sintercafe.com
NOVEMBER 8–9 ALLEGRA WORLD COFFEE PORTAL CEO FORUM Los Angeles, California allegraceoforum.com
NOVEMBER 8–11 CAFE SHOW SEOUL/ WORLD COFFEE LEADERS FORUM Seoul, Korea cafeshow.com
NOVEMBER 9–18 KONA COFFEE CULTURAL FESTIVAL Kona, Hawaii konacoffeefest.com
NOVEMBER 11–12 HX: THE HOTEL EXPERIENCEROOMS TO RESTAURANTS New York City, New York thehotelexperience.com
DECEMBER 5–7 INTERNATIONAL COFFEE & TEA FESTIVAL Dubai, UAE coffeeteafest.com
JANUARY 2019 JANUARY 17–19 CAFE MALAYSIA Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia cafe-malaysia.com
FEBRUARY 2019 FEBRUARY 12–15 AFRICAN FINE COFFEE CONFERENCE & EXHIBITION Kigali, Rwanda afca.coffee/conference
MARCH 2019 MARCH 1–3 AMSTERDAM COFFEE FESTIVAL Amsterdam, Netherlands amsterdamcoffeefestival.com
NOVEMBER 11–12 INTERNATIONAL RESTAURANT & FOODSERVICE SHOW New York City, New York internationalrestaurantny.com
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ADVERTISER INDEX
Go to freshcup.com/resources/fresh-cup-advertisers to view the Advertiser Index and the websites listed below.
ADVERTISER
CONTACT
ONLINE
1883 Maison Routin
800.467.7142
1883.com
AeroPress
650.493.3050 aeropressinc.com
58
Alchemy Golden Turmeric Elixir
928.814.9943
gsdglobaltrading.com
31
Barista Pro Shop
866.776.5288
baristaproshop.com/ad/fresh
47
Berney-Karp / Ceramic Source
800.237.6395
thesource4drinkware.com
69
Breville USA
310.755.3000 x3089
breville.com.au
63
Brewista
888.538.8683 mybrewista.com
46
Café Femenino Foundation
360.901.8322
coffeecan.org
57
Caravan Coffee
503.538.7365
caravancoffee.com
59
The Chai Co.
888.922.2424
chaico.com
45
Coffee Fest
425.295.3300
coffeefest.com
30
Custom Cup Sleeves
888-672-4096
customcupsleeves.com
69
Descamex
844.472.8429
descamex.com
46
Divinitea
518.347.0689 divinitea.com
61
Eastsign
sales@eastsign.com eastsign.com
20
Empire Tea Services
812.375.1937
empiretea.com
61
Flair Packaging
888.202.3522
flairpackaging.com
47
Florida Restaurant & Lodging Show
203.242.8124
flrestaurantandlodgingshow.com
60
Fresh Cup Magazine
503.236.2587
freshcup.com
69
Frozenta
888.786.0701 frozenta.com
Gaviña Gourmet Coffee
800.428.4627
gavina.com
Ghirardelli Chocolate
800.877.9338
ghirardelli.com/professional
Golden Bean
503.706.1330
goldenbean.com
71
Gosh That’s Good! Brand
888.848.GOSH (4674)
goshthatsgood.com
11
Grandstand Glassware + Apparel
800.767.8951
egrandstand.com/coffee
34
Java Jacket
800.208.4128
javajacket.com
52
Lotus Energy Drinks
888.702.5584
lotusenergydrinks.com
23
Malabar Gold Espresso
650.366.5453
malabargoldespresso.com
39
MOCAFE
888.662.2334
mocafeusa.com/charcoal
Monin Gourmet Flavorings
855.FLAVOR1 (352.8671)
monin.com
Mountain Cider Co.
800.483.2416
mountaincider.com
21
Organic Products Trading Co
888.881.4433
optco.com
53
Pacific Foods
503.692.9666
pacificfoods.com/foodservice
Peerless Coffee & Tea
510.763.1763
peerlesscoffee.com
RetailMugs.com
970.222.9559 retailmugs.com
61
SAKU Tea
360-820-3995
58
SelbySoft
800.454.4434 selbysoft.com
27
SerendipiTea
888.TEA.LIFE (832.5433)
serendipitea.com
69
Service Ideas
800.328.4493
serviceideas.com
20
Sonofresco
360.757.2800 sonofresco.com
StixToGo
800.666.6655
royalpaper.com
Tea Trade Show
973.551.9161
teatradeshow.com
TeaSource
855.320.4832 teasource.com
51
Theta Ridge Coffee
800.745.8738
thetaridgecoffee.com
69
Toddy
888.863.3974
toddycafe.com/wholesale
Torani
800.775.1925
torani.com/foodservice
Your Brand Café
866.566.0390
yourbrandcafe.com
13
Zojirushi America
800.264.6270
zojirushi.com
41
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sakutea.com
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MARKETPLACE
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THE LAST PLASTIC STRAW Backlot Coffee serves STAINLESS STEEL STRAWS to dine-in customers and will soon offer them for sale. PAPER STRAWS are offered to to-go customers who request one—ideally, in one of Backlot’s brand-new branded, reusable mugs. Switching from plastic can pay off.
Backlot Coffee switched from plastic to paper and stainless steel straws, and created a slew of new sustainable packaging merchandising opportunities. By Robin Roenker
B
ack in April—months ahead of Seattle’s citywide ban, which went into effect this July—Backlot Coffee abolished unrecyclable plastic straws in their Chicago and Evanston, Illinois, cafés. “The idea was really brought to us by customers who wanted to see us do better, and we were like, ‘You’re right, we should!’” said Isaac Bloom, who cofounded Backlot in 2016 with business partner John Kim. Starting on Earth Day (April 20) 2018, Backlot replaced standard plastic straws with paper and PLA (plastic biodegradable) straws for takeaway. They also started serving stainless steel straws for dine-in customers, and additionally began composting all their coffee grounds and compostable serving products with Evanston, Illinois-based Collective Resource, a commercial composting service. All told, Bloom estimates they’re redirecting about 2,000 pounds of waste every month from going into landfills.
Meanwhile, Bloom ramped up Backlot’s marketing of branded mugs, glassware, and Hydro Flasks, selling them at cost during the launch of the Earth-friendly campaign. Furthermore, the cafés started offering an ongoing, per-cup discount to customers who bring in their own reusable container, with bigger savings for those who use the shop’s branded ware. “If you bring in one of our large Hydro Flasks, we charge you for a small size,” Bloom said. “We are seeing a ton of them now every day. It basically pays for itself in a matter of months, and from that point forward it’s like a reward program for our regular customers, without having a punch card.” Bloom decided not to go completely straw-free. Some customers still choose to use them, while others have a genuine need for one. So he researched alternatives, manufacturers, and suppliers online. He ordered samples and tried them out with hot and cold drinks, asking his staff and customers for their feedback.
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/FreshCupMagazine
Bloom found that paper straws tend to fall apart in lattes and other hot drinks, so he opted instead for PLA straws, which are made from a compostable, corn-based polymer. Backlot has also switched to recyclable or compostable to-go cups and lids, and compostable paper bags and utensils. Most popular of all, though, are the stainless steel straws Backlot now uses for dine-in service. “Those have been the biggest hit—so much so that people have asked if they can buy them from us,” Bloom said. “So now we’re looking at making custom-branded stainless straws to sell as well. That’s been a surprise we didn’t see coming.” Cleaning the reusable steel straws has not been overly burdensome. “They come with a little brush which goes into the straws, so we scrub them out on both ends with soap and water, rinse them, and soak them in sanitizer. It’s an extra step, but it’s not that difficult,” Bloom said. “For businesses, it’s an easy decision to make—it’s a small change that can have a big impact,” Bloom said. FC
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@freshcupmag PHOTOS COURTESY OF BACKLOT COFFEE