CHOOSING THE BEST CHAI
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SMOOTHIES 101
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ROCKIN' COFFEE SUBSCRIPTIONS
Water Nature Versus Technology PAGE 32
July 2018 » freshcup.com
FINCA STAYS Experience life on working coffee farms. Page 14 >>
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 J U LY 2 0 1 8 | V O L . 2 7 . N O . 7 | F R E S H C U P M A G A Z I N E
D E PA R T M E N T S of the Month 10 Drink Hopped Cascara Soda by Stumptown Coffee Roasters
14 #Trending Finca Stays by Michael Butterworth Finca Bella Vista Two Years On by Garrett Oden
Bean 20 Whole The Handyman of Hedone by Dan Petrisor to Cup 50 Crop 3 new coffee subscriptions that rock! Purple Llama, Casa Brasil + Polecat
F E AT U R E S Eyes on Chai 24 All From user-friendly pre-made mixes to custom-crafted blends and concentrates, the chai’s the limit. by Susan Johnston Taylor
32 Water:
Nature VS Technology
Operators 36 Smoothie Cafés expand into healthful food options for today's on-the-go customers. by Susan Johnston Taylor
P HOTO BY JOANNA KOS INSK A
Coffee and tea can now be tuned to the ideal conditions for improving the taste of water while reducing environmental impact. by Peter Szymczak
EDITOR'S NOTE, PAGE 10 | CONTRIBUTORS, PAGE 12 | COFFEE FEST DENVER SHOW SHOTS, PAGE 44 | CALENDAR, PAGE 46 | AD INDEX, PAGE 48
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FRESH CUP MAGAZINE | 9
DRINK OF THE MONTH
EDITOR'S NOTE
Hopped Cascara Soda By Stumptown Coffee Roasters
T
he stars of this seasonal soda are cascara and Citra, a popular variety of hop from the world of beer. Brewed to order, mixed with a little lemon juice and simple syrup, soda and a splash of grenadine over ice. It’s a simple spritz— until you deconstruct it. “We’ve been excited about cascara for a while now, but we wanted to take a more calculated approach,” explains Brent Wolczynski, Stumptown’s Head Brewer at Cold Brew. The drink grew organically out of the Long Distance Relationship, the cold-brew collaboration between Stumptown in Portland, Oregon, and Slingshot Coffee Company in North Carolina. “It was our attempt to make a make a beverage that used the whole plant of coffee by blending coffee and cascara together,” Wolczynski says. “Since then we’ve been looking at other ways to use cascara, and this one was borne out of our love of beer.”
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Hops, which are used primarily as a flavoring and stability agent in beer, provide a citrusy counterpoint to cascara’s inherent sweetness. “Citra hops are popular for bringing out a grapefruit bitterness in a lot of beers, and the cascara we’re using is from Bella Vista, which is also exciting because it’s an opportunity to use a direct-trade producing partner.” Located in Guatemala, Bella Vista coffee farm is surrounded by three volcanoes—Agua, Acatenango, and the currently active Fuego Volcano. Stumptown and Bella Vista have been direct-trade partners since 2005. Belying its simple list of ingredients, this soda is nuanced with flavors of melon and pineapple, black tea and citrus—and much more. Its equal part ode to beer, part deft display of coffee's multi-dimensionality, and part homage to the spirit of collaboration here at home and with coffee-producing partners across the globe. FC
in this issue’s Crop to Cup column. Another is PURPLE LLAMA out of Chicago, a new distribution model for new music and freshly roasted coffee that trades on the similar traits between vinyl and specialty coffee cultures. Fresh Cup’s art director Cynthia Meadors dug up the DRINK OF THE MONTH during a recent visit to the original Stumptown on Division, which is where I lost my coffee cherry (I’m referring to the cover photo, of course—see FINCA STAYS on page 14) many moons ago, back when Duane was still roasting on the old Probat by the counter, simultaneously slinging shots, bantering with customers, and flipping sides of whatever vinyl was on his turntable that day. CHAI (on page 24) and SMOOTHIES (page 36) are this month’s duo of drink features, both written by a true rockstar, Susan Johnston Taylor, who has contributed to Fresh Cup Magazine for years and taste-tested everything from cheese tea to now cauliflower smoothies. Yuck or yum? It depends on whether you’re a fan of “You’ll Dance to Anything” by The Dead Milkmen or more fond of the cracking new album by Âme. Rock on. Brew strong. Play loud. PETER SZYMCZAK, EDITOR
editor@freshcup.com
ON THE COVER Michel-Antonio Jarra harvesting coffee at Finca Rosa Blanca near Santa Barbara, Costa Rica. Photo © Teake Zuidema
EDITOR PHOTO BY CHA RL ES GUL LUNG ; S ODA PH OTO COUR TESY OF ST UMP TOWN COF FEE ROA S TERS
What should I listen to? Every morning I start the day by first turning on some tunes, then turning on the tap in my flat’s kitchen to rinse out the coffee pitcher and measure out four cups of cold WATER (see page 32), which I really should be filtering before pouring into the coffee maker on the counter. I put on a pair of noise-cancelling headphones to drown out the sound of grinding the beans—an industrial soundtrack like a jackhammer breaking through city pavement. The prosumer-grade grinder elicits a consistent, clean grind, so I deal with the racket. The grinder is to coffee as the needle is to record. This morning I ground up some São Francisco courtesy of CASA BRASIL (see page 50), one of three new coffee subscription services I’m stoked to preview
CONTRIBUTORS MICHAEL BUTTERWORTH is a coffee educator and consultant living in Istanbul, Turkey. He cofounded thecoffeecompass.com, mostly as an excuse to visit more cafés. He’s also a licensed Q grader and a two-time United States Barista Championship competitor. For this month’s #trending topic, Michael reports on the latest in “Coffee Ecotourism” [see page 14] as more farms are building boutique hotels and hosting guided tours to transform the way people experience coffee origins. Writing “All Eyes on Chai” [see page 24] and "Smoothie Operators" [see page 36] inspired SUSAN JOHNSTON TAYLOR to try green tea chai and cauliflower smoothies—although not at the same time! Both are new favorites for the Austin, Texas-based freelance writer whose writing has also appeared in The Boston Globe, Entrepreneur, Pizza Today, and WSJ.com.
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To bridge the gap between origin and consumers, some farms have started to bring in baristas on exchange, allowing them to tour farms and work in local cafés. At the invitation of Finca Bella Vista in Guatemala, GARRETT ODEN spent the summer of 2016 exploring the region’s coffee industry and helping train local baristas. He returned almost two years later [see page 19] to report on how the program is faring. Garrett is currently a freelance copywriter covering coffee, tea, and food tech businesses. DAN PETRISOR is a former “corporatist” who quit his desk job and set out on a quest to improve his knowledge about specialty coffee. During a year of traveling around Southeast Asia, he visited specialty coffee shops and coffee plantations, documenting every place he visited on his blog, www.misternomadcoffee.com. Now residing in his birthplace of Romania, Dan sells specialty coffee from local roasteries and continues to write, this time profiling fellow countryman Dragos Manciu aka “The Handyman of Hedone” [see page 20], a coffee roaster, barista, and do-ityourself designer of espresso machines and grinders.
FRESH CUP MAGAZINE FRESH CUP FOUNDER WARD BARBEE 1938-2006 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 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
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LA PALMA Y EL TUCÁN features nine private cabins.
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P HOTO COURTESY OF L A PALM A Y EL TUC ÁN
TRENDING
#fincastays By Michael Butterworth
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pecialty coffee comes from the most remote places on Earth, often only accessible with fourwheel drive and fluency in the local language. But some coffee farms are using boutique hotels and guided tours to transform the way people experience coffee origins. This new wave of ecotourism is making coffee farms more accessible, and giving some farmers a chance to diversify their revenue streams. “Most farms aren’t set up to be super visitor friendly,” says Andrea Allen, co-owner of Onyx Coffee Lab in Springdale, Arkansas. “You go and you visit and you hike. You can’t stay there.” Allen’s experience visiting other coffee farms contrasted sharply with her visit to La Palma y El Tucán, a coffee farm with an experiential hotel in Zipacon, Colombia. “Everything about them is boutique,” says Allen. “It feels like you’re on vacation, even if you’re on a buying trip.”
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LA PALMA Y EL TUCÁN: view of the estate (above), cabin deck, and cabin interior.
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Located 90 minutes from Bogotá in the Eastern Andes Mountains, La Palma y El Tucán features nine private cabins. In addition to the horseback riding, yoga classes, and hot tub one might expect from a boutique hotel, La Palma offers a variety of coffee-centric experiences. Guests can enjoy coffee from the farm prepared by a staff barista, plant coffee seeds, pick cherries, and watch the coffee be processed with La Palma’s signature lactic acid processing technique. The hotel concept was borne out of the farm’s relationship with its coffee buying partners. “After a couple of years of establishing our coffee project and bringing clients to our farm, we began to notice that the experiences that we designed for each origin trip really made a difference for our clients,” says Elisa María Madriñán, cofounder of La Palma. “We invested a lot of time and resources in the infrastructure of the farm and this helped in better explaining what our model was all about. Having them diving deep into our daily activities at the farm was one of our obsessions and the most powerful way to transfer knowledge, empower all our stakeholders, strengthen relationships and share our value.” This has been true not only for professional coffee buyers, but other visitors as well. “At the beginning, most of [our guests] were related in some way to the coffee industry. One year later, we’re hosting visits from coffee lovers from all over the world who have an interest in further understanding what goes on behind their every morning cup,” says Madriñán. “What honors us the most, is that Colombians have also shown a lot of interest in visiting and for us is very satisfying to share our space with our compatriots.” For Madriñán, ecotourism can have a positive impact amongst coffee farming communities. “Not only does this activity generate additional income for the farm helping to cover its fixed costs, but it also promotes labor opportunities amongst the local coffee growers and their families,” she says.
P HOTO THIS PAGE COUR TES Y OF L A PA LM A Y EL T UC Á N
#Trending: Finca Stays
Where to Stay LA PALMA Y EL TUCÁN, ZIPACÓN, COLOMBIA Famous on the barista competition circuit for their proprietary lactic-acid processing technique, La Palma y El Tucán’s experiential hotel offers guests to fully participate in life on an award-winning specialty coffee farm. After a day of hiking around the farm, guests can book an in-room massage or stretch their sore muscles in a yoga class. Guests can sample the farm’s lots in the full café and even take a basics of latte art class to take their coffee game to the next level. www.lapalmayeltucan.com/boutique-hotel/
FINCA LERIDA, BOQUETE, PANAMA The farmhouse-turned private suite at Finca Lerida P HOTO THIS PAGE: TOP R IGHT COUR TESY OF L A PALM A Y EL TUC ÁN; CENTER COURTES Y OF F INC A LERIDA , B OT TO M CO URT ESY O F FIN C A ROSA B L A N C A
dates to 1929, built by plantation founder Toleff Bache Mönniche. The Norwegian engineer immigrated to Panama to work on the canal, but after contracting malaria he relocated to mountainous Boquete. Mönniche planted coffee trees and even invented a patented, gravity-fed system to sort coffee cherries by quality. Today the farm produces a wide selection of coffee varieties and processes, including their sought-after black honey Pacamara lot, popular with specialty coffee roasters in Panama City and abroad. www.fincalerida.com
FINCA ROSA BLANCA, SANTA BÁRBARA DE HEREDIA, COSTA RICA This organic and Rain Forest Alliance certified coffee farm boasts over 30 acres of coffee trees and more than 120 bird species. In addition to coffee tastings and bird watching tours, the staff at Finca Rosa Blanca can also organize zip lining and white water rafting tours for their guests. www.fincarosablanca.com
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#Trending: Finca Stays
FINCA ROSA BLANCA, COSTA RICA (ABOVE): The coffee plantation resort boasts a gorgeous hotel (left); raised drying beds, a roasting house, and 30 acres of certified-organic Arabica coffee plants.
FINCA LERIDA in Boquete has converted the old farmhouse and bungalows into a boutique hotel (above), offering cuppings and educational tours (below).
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The “coffee farm as eco-tourist destination” trend is not limited to Colombia. Across in the border, the Panama Tourism Authority has embraced specialty coffee as a way to attract ecotourists. Their recent “Visit Panama” advertising campaign heavily features Boquete, a growing region famous for producing some of the world’s most expensive micro-lots. Tourists who stop by the visitor center in Boquete can book a coffee tour, which includes a cupping at Elida Estate, one of the Lamastus’s families three farms and a frequent winner at the Best of Panama. For many visitors, this will be their first cupping, and some will be lucky enough to taste the Lamastus’s famed green tip geisha variety. Just on the other side of the hill from Elida Estate is Finca Lerida, a coffee farm which converted its farmhouse and bungalows into a boutique hotel. According to hotel naturalist Cesar Caballero, most guests came at first for bird watching, but increasingly, coffee buyers and enthusiasts have edged out the ornithophiles. Far from “roughing it,” guests stay in bungalows outfitted with Scandanavian furniture (a nod to the plantation’s Norwegian founder), satellite tv, internet, and a personal hammock. Guest can take a guided tour of the farm, taste a sampling of the different varieties and processes in the cupping lab, or take a shuttle into town to sample Boquete’s locally brewed craft beer. FC
F INC A ROSA BL ANC A PH OTOS COUR TESY OF F INC A ROSA BL A NC A; FI NCE L ER IDA P HOTOS COURTE SY O F FIN C A LERIDA
BOQUETE
Finca Bella Vista Two Years On GARRETT ODEN revisits the Guatemalan coffee farm he journeyed to as a barista and documented his experiences for the October 2016 issue of Fresh Cup Magazine.
P H OTOS BY G ARR ET T ODEN
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t’s been nearly two years since I visited Antigua, Guatemala, visiting coffee farms and working in Finca Bella Vista’s own café. The cobblestone streets, brightly colored buildings, and friendly locals are just as I remember them. Upon my return, one of the first things I do is reconnect with friends I made and see whether the experimental barista invitation program I participated in is still going strong. Have they gained clients, made long-lasting relationships, and helped locals learn professional barista skills? “Wow, two years already?” Luis Pedro Zelaya Zamora wondered aloud. The fourth-generation farmer in charge of Finca Bella Vista met me on the deck overlooking his farm and the towering Volcan Agua. His eyes were soft, his hands rough. Though Luis Pedro lives in Guatemala City, he loves visiting the farm in Antigua. He comes out whenever he gets the chance. “Has it been worth it?” I asked. “Hosting baristas from around the world, showing them around the farm, and letting them work in the café?” “Well, you never know what network you’re building for the future,” Luis Pedro said. “A lot of people know us in the industry now. Some of those baristas may become roasters and others may become green buyers—it’s been a good investment for the future.” Though the relationships he’s formed with the program are still new, Finca Bella Vista has actually seen some partnerships form with baristas who have moved up in their companies or launched their own coffee businesses.
Of the baristas who worked in the café in 2016, Karina is still the manager, but Marleny and Hilda had moved on and been replaced by five new employees. “The girls have learned a lot from the baristas. Now, when visitors come from the States, the girls can show that they’re not inferior in skill or knowledge. It’s really great for them personally.” Melanie Herrera, one of the farm’s administrators and the organizer of the visiting baristas program, is the same as two years ago: she’s still warm, friendly, and optimistic. She said the program has made an impact in terms of sustainability. “That’s one of the other reasons we started the barista invitation program,” Melanie says. “When someone complains about price in their café, baristas can explain how higher-priced coffee is actually a good thing.” In Guatemala, coffee farms experience an annual 3–5% increase in labor minimum wage. Pair that with the typical 3–5% increase from importers, and you get a 6–10% fixed increase every year. And that doesn’t even account for the growing risks that climate change presents. “The kind of big change we’re after really only happens when people come here and see what it’s actually like—see the human side of things—and take those experiences back with them,” Melanie said. Luis Pedro agreed. “It’s difficult to quantify the results, but we’ve seen a variety of benefits start to appear in the last year or so—for the farm and for the industry.” When I asked if they plan to stop the program anytime soon, they both smile. “Only if people stop wanting to come and see,” Luis Pedro said. FC
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The WHOLE BEAN DRAGOS MANCIU started roasting coffee on a machine he made himself. Now he operates this 60kg roaster.
The Handyman of Hedone Passion for coffee drives Dragos Manciu of Hedone Cafe, Romania’s first and only maker of espresso machines.
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ragos Manciu got his start in coffee when he bought a broken espresso machine for 200 Euros. He disassembled the unit and repaired it himself. A short time later, he found a Ditting grinder on the fritz and fixed it. Next, Dragos needed some coffee beans to test out his repairs, so he bought some commercially roasted coffee beans. But once again, something wasn’t quite right. Dragos sensed the taste was off; it needed fixing. So, Dragos, the do-it-yourselfer with a degree in food chemistry, read up on
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coffee roasting and built his own home roaster. He fashioned the drum out of an Ikea cutlery drainer, a cardboard box became the chaff collector, and a car’s wiper motor became the drum’s rotary motor. Driven by his passion for coffee, Dragos and a friend opened up a small coffee shop in their hometown of Craiova, Romania. Dragos roasted the coffee on his handmade roaster and pulled espressos on the repaired espresso machine. Dan Barbu, a regular customer, was so impressed by Dragos’s ambition he proposed starting a coffee business together, called Hedone Cafe.
The name was inspired by Hedone, the Greek goddess of pleasure, enjoyment, and delight. Hedone is the daughter of the Greek gods Eros (Cupid) and Psyche. She is associated more specifically with sensual, hedonistic pleasures. “We associate coffee with pleasure,” Dragos says. “We have pleasure roasting it, smelling it, drinking it with friends: it’s all a pleasure.” Hedone Cafe has grown from its original small shop with three employees to a company that not only roasts and serves coffee, but produces professional espresso machines and grinders,
P HOTO COURTESY OF H ED ONE
By Dan Petrisor
provides customers complete and integrated solutions for coffee preparation. Hedone provides fresh roasted coffee, private label coffee, coffee equipment, complementary products, and bar accessories. The coffee roastery now has its own facility, equipped with 60-kilo and 15-kilo roasters. (The original DIY roaster will make a fine museum piece one day, Dragos says.) Total roasting capacity is over 100 tons per month, including Arabica and Robusta beans imported from Ethiopia, Brazil, Colombia, Guatemala, Jamaica, India, Kenya, Mexico, and other origins. With a staff of 30, Hedone Cafe currently provides complete solutions for coffee preparation for over 800 commercial accounts in Romania, including hotels, restaurants, and cafés.
Some of the manufacturing and most of the assembly is done in Hedone’s factory. Boilers are produced and insulated in-house, while cases are fabricated locally. The E61 group heads and a few other components are imported, and then everything is assembled in their Craiova assembly plant. Hedone makes one, two, and three group machines, all featuring independent boilers and a separate head for steaming, electronic PID with thermal adjustment between 50–100 degrees Celsius, cup heater, and thermal stability
THE MACHINES ARE BUILT ACCORDING TO DRAGOS’S SPECIFICATIONS FOR OPTIMUM THERMAL STABILITY AND SUPREME CONSISTENCY, WHETHER PULLING ESPRESSO OR GRINDING.
Hedone also makes its own line of professional espresso machines and grinders, based on Dragos’s designs. The machines are built according to Dragos’s specifications for optimum thermal stability and supreme consistency, whether pulling espresso or grinding. “The idea is to refresh the culture of coffee in Romania and to bring specialized coffee to the gorumet on the market,” Dragos says. “The equipment used—the espresso machine and grinder—are of significant importance in this process, which is where the need to develop professional coffee equipment emerged from.”
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The Whole Bean: Hedone
system with an oscillation of less than one degree Celsius. The two-group Wally was inspired by Dragos’s favorite movie character, the robot Wall-E from the computer-animated science fiction film of the same name. Wally comes in two versions: manually controlled pre-infusion (Wally GM) and automatic (Wally GFA). The one-group version is called Evo, after Eve, Wall-E’s girlfriend in the movie. Evo also comes in manual and automatic models. Triton, the three-group version with four boilers, is only available in an automatic version. Hedone’s grinder is called Honne and features a striking design and broad spectrum of technical parameters: grind size with micrometric accuracy, permanent magnet motor with high efficiency, 68-millimeter hybrid burrs (two conical, two flat), two hoppers with individual capacity of one kilogram, and low coffee retention on the burrs—under 0.2 grams. Honne evenly distributes coffee via its portafilter holder. Because Honne comes with a dual hopper system, the dosing of the coffee beans is done through a handler, which takes out between 8.3–8.5 grams of coffee from the hopper and sends them to the burrs. Dosing volume can be customized as well. Dragos and his team later developed Honne Home Edition, a version of the grinder for baristas-at-home and coffee prosumers. This singledose version has the same technical features as the original Honne. “The best is yet to come”, Dragos says. The team is currently working on a new line of espresso machines and coffee grinders. They will present the new coffee equipment at Host Milano 2019 edition, but they do not wish to reveal more information until everything is ready. What Dragos will say, is that the new equipment will surprise coffee enthusiasts from all over the world. His goal is to launch Romania as an important player on the world market of coffee equipment.
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HEDONE MANUFACTURES one-, two- and threegroup espresso machines (from top to bottom) Evo, Wally and Triton.
From its humble origins to today, Hedone Cafe is dedicated to promoting third-wave coffee in Romania and helping people love their coffee. The Craiova team is trying to educate its customers about coffee consumption. "There is a false perception about the consumption of coffee based preparations," Dragos says. “A lot of people drink coffee for the stimulation effect. They think coffee has to be strong and bitter, with lots of sugar,” Dragos says. “But for more and more of our customers, single-origin coffee that is roasted lighter is more interesting. For them, it’s an experience: you wake up in the morning and smell the coffee. If people want dark roast and bitterness, we can offer that, too. However you like it, it is important to drink fresh coffee, with life in it.” FC
DRAGOS IN THE DETAILS: (clockwise from bottom left) the two boilers and insides of Wally, a prototype for reduced retention in its mold, and the Honne grinder.
MORE INFO > WWW.HEDONECAFE.RO
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P HOTO BY M ELODY NEL SON
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BACKLOT COFFEE makes its own chai concentrate brewed with bourbon barrel-aged tea.
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All Eyes on Chai
P HOTO BY S ONNIE H ILES
ICED CHAI LATTE: If a drink can be both warming and cooling, this is it.
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W
hy would a coffeehouse serve tea— chai, specifically? For some, it’s simply because they love it. As its name suggests, Highwire Coffee Roasters began as a coffee roaster. But when founder Rich Avella launched the California-based roastery in 2011, he felt it was important to also serve chai. “For a certain number of people, they love chai and we recognize chai as a legitimate tea tradition,” he says. “For a lot of people, it’s a gateway. A lot of people enter tea through chai ... It’s not something that changes our identity as a coffee roaster; it’s another thing that we love.”
I WAS REALLY STRUCK BY WHAT WAS IN THE CUP— THIS BALANCED CHAI THAT HAD TEA CHARACTER, A BLEND OF SPICES, NOT A ONE-NOTE SPICE. Highwire served a house-made chai from concentrate at first. But Avella says it was “difficult to make consistently to get the same taste all the time.” He remembered trying and liking Tipu’s Chai at a trade show in 2008, so in 2012 Highwire switched to Tipu’s Chai powder, which is combined with hot water to make a chai concentrate. According to Amy O’Hoyt, Tipu’s sales manager, Tipu’s dry format doesn’t require any preservatives. “It was an easy solution, because we love their chai and it’s so quick and easy to make,” Avella says. “I was really struck by what was in the cup—this balanced chai that had tea character, a blend of spices, not a one-note spice.” Highwire’s tea division has since rebranded as 4track tea and also became a local distributor for Tipu’s. “That’s deepened our relationship,” Avella says.
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All Eyes on Chai
DIY CHAI While Highwire uses a chai mix, Backlot Coffee in Chicago and Evanston, Illinois, does its own chai concentrate, brewed with bourbon barrelaged chai tea from Chicago-based Rare Tea Cellar and chai spice mix from The Spice House (located across the street, which simplifies inventory management), and topped with the shop’s own blend of spices. Backlot co-owner John Kim says they used to serve boxed chai but customers often asked to see the ingredient list so they’d know what was in it. “If we can simplify the ingredient list by the things that we know are in it, it’s easy for us to tell people, no there’s no X in it,” he explains. As part of a move towards making more materials in-house, Backlot also
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makes its own lavender and vanilla syrups. “It’s fun to be able to make things and taste them,” Kim says. Consistency hasn’t been a huge issue, because he has a lean staff of eight people and the employee handbook includes instructions on making the chai concentrate. “I think the inconsistencies are sometimes part of the fun,” Kim says. “It’s the same way with pulling shots, once somebody starts to learn the factors that make it taste the way it does.”
CUSTOM CHAI For operators who want a bespoke (made-to-order) chai but don’t want to make it in-house, Portland, Oregonbased Pearl Beverage Co. creates custom chais for its clients. The Jasmine Pearl is a sister company to
Pearl Beverage Co. and serves its custom chai in its Portland tasting room and wholesales the blend. “It’s a traditional recipe [using black tea] but ours does have ginger, so that’s a little twist on things,” says Jodi Harrison, The Jasmine Pearl’s wholesale account manager. Some cafés feature multiple chai offerings. O’Hoyt says many cafés carry the black and green tea versions of Tipu’s chai. “We focus on regional chais from India,” O’Hoyt says, “much like beans being sourced from different areas from across the globe.” Highwire originally served Tipu’s Masala chai, which is made with black tea like in the Gujarat region of India— where Tipu’s founder’s grandmother is from—but it has also added Tipu’s
P H OTO COUR TES Y OF TIPU’S CHA I
GHOST TOWN COFFEE ROASTERS in Bozeman, Montana, uses Tipu’s Chai, a preservative-free mix made in Montana, for making hot chai lattes.
Kashmiri chai, which is made with green tea and saffron, as in the Kashmir region in northern India. “We thought the story of regionality was so compelling,” Avella says. “We use a map of India to show where the roots of both styles of chai were coming from. That’s been a really great conversation-starter.” Masala and Kashmiri chais offer different flavor profiles, and Kashmiri chai has less caffeine than Masala since Kashmiri is made with green tea; however, Tipu’s offers a decaf version of the Masala, which O’Hoyt says is popular in bookstore cafés.
ONE, TWO, CHAI-CHAI-CHAI Like Tipu’s, The Chai Company also offers several chais and encourages cafés to provide their customers with multiple flavor options. “It does position you as more of a specialist in this category,” says Catherine Wong, the Chai Company’s director of marketing and sales. The Chai Company has an Authentic Chai, Rooibos Chai, Spicy Oolong Chai, and Grizzly Chai. All are sold as boxed concentrate. According to Manish Shah, founder of Tucson, Arizona-based Maya Tea Company, chai is sold as a concentrate, a powder, in tea bags, or in a loose-leaf format. “Chai in tea bags is really just for the home user,” he says. “Because of the amount of volume that most coffee shops have with their chai, the decision that they need to make is whether they want to use a pre-made concentrate or if they want to brew their own concentrate.” Shah sells his concentrate wholesale but he makes it much stronger than other chai concentrates to avoid paying to ship large quantities of water. “Most chai companies are one-to-one,” Shah says. Maya Tea Company’s chai is one part chai to 11 parts milk (or alternative).
SWEET CHAI OF MINE While many American customers have come to know chai as a sweetened drink, Maya and Tipu’s offer unsweetened versions as well. “For the more spicy version, we’ve taken down the sweetener and added a little bit of heat to the back,” Shah says. “In India, good chai is pretty spicy. Fresh ginger which is what makes it spicy.” A less sweet chai is more versatile, according to Simon Lam, director of operations at The Chai Company. Customers can always add sweetener, if that’s their preference. “It gives people more options if they want to make it sweet,” he says. “You can’t take the sweetness out of the Authentic Chai without diluting it, which would imbalance the flavor profile.”
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All Eyes on Chai
P HOTO BY M ELODY NEL SON
BACKLOT COFFEE uses its housemade chai concentrate to make this gorgeous chai latte topped with fresh ground spices.
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GOT MILK? Choice of milk can complement the flavor profile in a chai latte. In Northwest India, where Shah is from, many people use buffalo milk, which is much fattier than the milks served in the United States. He says regular whole milk most closely mirrors buffalo milk and adds richness to the drink. “Outside of that, the milk that we favor the most is macadamia nut milk,” Shah says. “After that, I think coconut milk if your next-best option. Coconut flavor gives it a nice flavor.” Soy, almond, or skim milk can also work in a chai latte, but those options tend to have less body.
CHAI’S THE LIMIT
THE CHAI COMPANY specializes in boxed concentrates and bold flavors, such as its Grizzly Chai which is half sweet and double spice.
Chai is a versatile ingredient, with applications in cooking and baking as well as beverages. Lam says some of The Chai Company’s customers use the Grizzly Chai to marinate meat, for instance, because the sweetness lends a caramelized flavor. “I think the real key is to understand that chai has a lot of different facets to it— it’s not just a drink on the menu,” Shah says, noting that some of his customers use his product to make chai-ice cream shakes. Chai opens customers’ minds to new flavors, Shah also points out. The popularity of chai has helped spur interest in other Indian spice flavors, such as turmeric, Shah says. “Chai set the stage for so many other flavors,” he says. “When I look at everything that’s happened, where would turmeric milk be if it hadn’t been for chai?” FC
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P HOTO BY ER DA ESTR EMER A
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T
he Bull Run Watershed is a protected surface water supply, located in the Mt. Hood National Forest, 26 miles from Portland, Oregon. The watershed is managed “From Forest to Faucet” by the Portland Water Bureau, the municipal department led by Commissioner-in-Charge Nick Fish (appropriately enough), to sustain and supply clean drinking water to a quarter of Oregon’s population. In a typical year, the watershed receives an abundant 135 inches of precipitation—rain and snow—that flows into the Bull Run River and then into two reservoirs that store nearly 10 billion gallons of drinking water. The quality of Oregon’s water infrastructure is a big reason commonly cited for the abundance of local breweries, wineries, distilleries, agricultural and horticultural greenhouses, acres of farmland growing hazelnuts, hops, berries, walnuts, and now tons more marijuana than the population’s already considerable appetite can possibly consume. Abundance aside, how clean and pristine is the water? Consider that we have roughly seven billion people on the planet today, and yet we have the same amount of water available to us today as when there were only a million of us. Humans have greatly mucked up the water, while the Earth’s atmosphere struggles to cycle water through Mother Nature’s natural process of evaporation, condensation, and
precipitation, the water wheel constantly churning to sustain life on this Earth. And yet café owners wonder, “Why do I need another filter?” Stating the obvious, water is integral to coffee and tea. Whether chai or cold brew, cappuccino or kombucha, macchiato or matcha smoothie, the majority of the beverage is water, way up there in the high 90th percentile. In short, your product is only as good as the water you put in it. Brent Wolczynski, Head Brewer at Cold Brew for Stumptown Coffee Roasters in Portland, Oregon, makes full use of that abundant Bull Run water supply and a robust filtration system. “Water must be delicious, not tasting of anything used to treat it that would distort the profile of the coffee,” he says. “The water we’re using in our cafés is being filtered and calibrated to be consistent. At the cold brew facility, water goes through a sediment filter, carbon filter to strip chlorine, and UV filters to kill bacteria.” Technology helps take out, put back, and balance water back to the way Mother Nature intended. Café owners must filter for themselves the numerous ways they can achieve the best water supply in their operations and determine where they fall within the water purification and filtration spectrum. Filtration options currently available to café owners,
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Water: Nature Versus Tech
baristas, and aficionados include reverse osmosis, ion-exchange cartridges, and simple chambers. WaterWise uses a patented, accurate adjustable head to pass incoming water quality through a filter. “It takes out what’s needed to be taken out to leave you with a recipe-quality water,” explains Keith Black, managing partner of WaterWise in Alcoa, Tennessee. For cooking, not much mineral content needs to be left behind. But for coffee and tea, the exact opposite is true. “For coffee and tea, you need more mineral content left behind to get that flavor exchange, but you still need to remove the things that are objectionable from a taste and aroma standpoint,” Black says. WaterWise technology looks at incoming quality of water the makes adjustments. “For instance, if you have 10 grains of hardness coming into your water, our chart would say to set your head for a bypass of 40 percent, so that 60 percent of the water coming in will remove all of the hardness and 40 percent will be bypassed—only the questionable taste and odor stuff will be removed,” Black
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explains. “Then it joins up with the water that has had its hardness removed and that goes through the carbon filter for taste and odor as well.” Hardness levels in water are mostly determined by geography. Water is different everywhere, whether you live by the ocean, in a drought-stricken region, or in regions where minerals are prevalent due to an abundant level of rock formations underground or other contaminants and pollutants. Dialing in water at one specific place is a challenge in and of itself, let alone multiple locations. “We get a lot of people who say they have six locations now, I use the same coffee, the same brand espresso machine, the same grind, the same everything, and my coffee doesn’t have that same consistency across all my café footprints that I want,” Black says. “The coffee doesn’t taste the same in this town as it does in that town, even just 20 miles away.” Café owners and consumers alike may say it’s a regional thing. Coffee and tea tastes a certain way depending on where it’s brewed. It’s terroir. But
once you know what a good cup of coffee or chai tastes like, people are less willing to put up with anything that tastes “off.” Consistency across regional and national brands is one thing, but people may become more attuned to another water rationale: protecting their equipment. Water filtration can save money in operational and maintenance costs. Scale, from a physics and chemistry standpoint, is impossible to form when filters are properly installed and set up. Higher hardness levels can be detrimental to valuable espresso equipment and scale formation may go unnoticed until it’s too late for a quick fix. In addition, treating hard water with traditional water desalination technologies such as RO that use chemicals and salt can cause environmental-related issues because of the amount of salinity released back into the ecosystem. Major coffee manufacturers such as Bunn and Franke use WaterWise technology in their specialty coffee equipment, as do roasters such as Canterbury in British Colombia, Canada, and Sparrow Coffee in Chicago, Illinois.
A MER IC A NO P HOTO BY T Y LER NIX
the amount of soft salts, such as sodium and potassium, preparing the water to process easily through the reverse osmosis system, which then removes all the soft salts to produce ultra-pure water with no minerals remaining. Lastly, the remineralization bed adds back the level of salt and other minerals required for quality, taste, and health benefits. Generally, these systems achieve on average just 50–70 percent water recovery. Up to half of VOLTEA’S DIUSE is a the water treated gets discharged miniaturized version of its back into the environment, full current CapDI© systems of the harsh, damaging salts that specifically made for were removed along the way. point-of-use applications, like for the water in a New water softener regulasingle americano. tions have been established especially in areas of water scarcity, limiting the amount of salts and other minerals that flow back into the local water source. Water quality is worth looking into—in Portland or wherever in the world you are located. FC THE FUTURE OF WATER SOFTENING: ELECTRO-DEIONIZATION A new technology known as Membrane Capacitive Deionization (MCD) stands to improve the typical water desalination and softening process. MCD’s works via “electro-deionization,” where oppositely charged salt ions are attracted to electrodes, leaving pure water flowing out of the cells in a two-step process of purification and regeneration. A major difference with this technology is “tunability”— the level to which a user may choose to remove dissolved salts. This feature automatically eliminates one of the steps of the typical desalination and softening process—the remineralization bed—because the level of salts chosen remains in the water throughout the process. Another key difference is that MCD’s modules are able to receive and remove hard salts in addition to soft salts, which also eliminates the need for a water softener as the first step. “Water is a very important and often overlooked ingredient in the coffee making process, and water chemistry or dissolved solids can affect extraction and result in underextracted (bitter) or over-extracted (sour) tastes,” explains Dewitt Dees of Voltea, the pioneer of Membrane Capacitive Deionization (CapDI©). Traditional desalination and softening systems typically include three pieces of equipment: a water softener, a reverse osmosis system, and a remineralization bed. First, the water softener removes all the hard salts, such as calcium, magnesium, and carbonates, and replaces them with twice
FRESH CUP MAGAZINE | 35
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P HOTO BY A LEX LOUP
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Smoothie Operators
C
offeehouses and teashops are looking for ways to expand beyond beverages, and offer healthful food options for today’s busy customers. Smoothies and smoothie bowls can provide a natural, healthful extension for the food and beverage sides of the menu. The varied colors of super foods and textures of different ingredients that go into making smoothies and smoothie bowls appeals to the Instagram crowd. Smoothies offer portability for those who can’t easily eat on the go, while smoothie bowls appeal to those who want something they can’t prepare as easily at home. “With smoothies, it’s harder [for customers] to justify a high expense because they think they can recreate it at home,” says Ryan Carpenter, founder of the Portland, Oregon-based açaí bowl and smoothie shop Moberi. “Recreating a bowl at home and sourcing the highend ingredients is difficult.” But while it may seem easy to throw fruit in a blender, operators need to plan their smoothie and smoothie bowl menus carefully. We talked to several smoothie experts about how to get started.
DEFINE YOUR DEMOGRAPHICS Smoothies and smoothie bowls can appeal to different types of customers, so first figure out what would make your customers order a smoothie or bowl. • Are they seeking a sweet treat? • A chance to refuel protein post-workout? • A dairy-free or soy-free snack? • A plant-based meal on the go? Carpenter says his shop appeals to “a plant-based lifestyle audience, predominantly female, but there’s a growing number of men interested in it, especially in Portland.” The term “plantbased” is now used in place of vegan in an attempt to shed some of the negative connotations of veganism. In 2011, when Moberi first opened with a custom bike-powered blender in front, Carpenter thought his customers
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P HOTO COURTESY OF M OBER I
MOBERI’S (clockwise from left) Fresh Prince of Brazil and Turtle Power Smoothies, Uncle Jesse Acai Bowl and Breakfast Club Oatmeal Bowl.
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Smoothie Operators
VITALITY BOWLS has its own superfood blend consisting of some of the world’s leading superfoods like mangosteen, aronia berry, camu camu, moringa, açaí, blueberry, and pomegranate.
40 | JULY 2018 » freshcup.com
would be families drawn to the interactive element of the bike. “It took a couple of years to figure out that the bread-andbutter would be people who come in on a daily basis,” Carpenter says. “People are more interested in our high-end products [than the novelty of the bike].” He says the photogenic açaí bowls took off on social media, and bowls now make up about 80 percent of products sold.
IN THE TWO TO THREE O’CLOCK TIMEFRAME, KIDS ARE OUT OF SCHOOL AND INTO THEIR ATHLETIC EVENTS. THE FUN PART IS WE GET TO FEED KIDS SOMETHING THAT’S GOOD
P H OTO ON OPP OS ITE PAGE COURTES Y OF V ITALI T Y BOW L S ; PHOTO ( RI GHT ) BY EDG AR C A ST RE JO N
FOR THEM.
Dan McCormick, founder of Bowl of Heaven, which opened in Southern California seven-and-a-half years ago, says the time of day dictates who’s ordering from his shops. “In the morning, it’s ladies coming out of yoga and Pilates class,” he says. “At lunch, we might get our business crowd or school kids. In the two to three o’clock timeframe, kids are out of school and into their athletic events. The fun part is we get to feed kids something that’s good for them.” Uriah Blum, vice president of operations at Vitality Bowls, which opened its first location in Northern California in 2011, says Vitality Bowls also appeals to health-conscious high school students. “The food’s so beautiful, the young kids have really helped blow it up in social media with pictures,” Blum says. “We get the pre- and post-workout gym people coming in, people with dietary restrictions and allergies.”
ENERGIZE with this açai bowl containing fresh fruit, nut butter, and seeds.
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Smoothie Operators
BIG CHILL: Produce like these blueberries and blackberries are frozen at peak freshness for optimal nutrition and flavor.
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P HOTO ON OP POSITE PAG E BY R EZEL APACIONADO ; PH OTO ( ABOVE) BY LUKE M ICHA EL
CONSIDER THE (PRODUCE) SOURCE Once you know who’s likely to order your smoothies and bowls, you can start developing your menu with that in mind. Blum says Vitality Bowls develops its recipes through “a lot of thought and trial-and-error and tweaking.” What started with just four smoothies has since greatly expanded the menu. When they want to add menu items, they’ll typically test it as a special of the month and then add it as a regular menu item if it proves popular. For instance, detox bowls and green bowls—both began as monthly specials and are now regular menu items. McCormick says Bowl of Heaven typically has regular items with a few seasonal items rotated in, such as a pumpkin bowl in the fall or a tropical bowl in the summer. Seasonality and the ability to source produce should be key considerations as you develop your smoothie and bowl offerings. “Obviously, fruits and vegetables have their seasonality,” McCormick says. “Pomegranates are more fresh in the winter. Raspberries are super expensive in the winter, so you have to be conscious of that.” “Super foods”—antioxidant-rich fruits such as papaya and açaí—are popular in smoothies and bowls, but sourcing them year-round isn’t always easy or cheap. “It’s always one of our challenges as we want to bring in these super foods,” Blum says. Specialty smoothie shops order larger quantities of these super foods through
different vendor relationships, but for coffeehouses and teashops, which produce a smaller volume of smoothies, less exotic ingredients like bananas and berries may make more financial sense.
DARE TO BE DIFFERENT A recent trend that popped up on Instagram and elsewhere was cauliflower smoothies, but sane minds resist the rush to jump on the bandwagon of every new fad that comes along. “We’ll wait until something has been proven in the market before we commit to carrying some of these more crazy super foods,” Carpenter says. “We’ve done a lot of adventurous things over the years, but a peanut butter and chocolate smoothie is still our most popular.” Customers prompted Moberi to also offer more smoothies made with almond butter. McCormick says a key smoothie trend is greens like kale, arugula, and spinach. “If you make it green and it tastes good, you’ll have a winner,” he says. “You can offset the bitterness with citrus or sweetness or both.” McCormick recommends mixing mango, pineapple, or banana with greens. “It helps the green color come through,” he adds. “If you mix with strawberries or blueberries, you’ll have a brown smoothie and that looks gross, so stick with those more neutral-colored fruits.”
WASTE NOT, WANT NOT Health-conscious consumers generally prefer smoothies and bowls made with fresh produce. But fresh produce is
highly perishable. If you over-estimate how much you’ll need, it can cost you. Forecasting and only ordering what you need are key. For instance, Vitality Bowls gets fresh produce delivered at least three times a week. Frozen produce is also your friend when it comes to minimizing food waste. “Frozen produce is great,” Carpenter says. “It’s obviously shelf stable in a freezer and has a higher nutritional content because the fruits are picked at the peak of ripeness, as opposed to fresh fruits that are ripened in transit. Fresh strawberries are great but frozen strawberries are better for blending up a fresh base [for bowls].” Moberi’s bowls are topped with fresh product. To optimize workflow and minimize waste, Blum says Vitality Bowls tries “to utilize similar ingredients, so we already have them prepped and available in the same place.” If you do wind up with excess produce, try to use it or freeze it before it goes bad. McCormick offers another solution: “Whatever extras we have we like to sample to our existing customer base,” he says. Free samples can help engender goodwill with customers and prompt repeat visits. Adding smoothies and smoothie bowls to your menu might be more than you can digest right now, but as Carpenter says, “Keeping it simple would be my best recommendation. You don’t have to get as crazy as you’d think. People want something pretty simple, and they want it to be good for them.” FC
FRESH CUP MAGAZINE | 43
COFFEE FEST DENVER SHOW SHOTS RANCILIO SPECIALTY: pre-show throwdown at Coda Coffee Co.
COFFEE FEST WORLD LATTE ART CHAMPIONS: Takehiro Okudaira (3rd place), Mason Marth (1st place) and Matthew Bolchi (2nd place)
TIPU'S CHAI
BOLIO: Reusable hemp and titanium filters, double-walled glass decanters, servers, and mugs.
RANCILIO SPECIALTY: pre-show throwdown
STAUB: enamel kettle WORKBENCH COFFEE LABS JULY 2018 2018»»freshcup.com freshcup.com 44 | JUNE
BONDI CHAI'S Martin Buggy and Melissa Edyvean with Fresh Cup publisher Jan Weigel. JULIE'S REAL: Grain-free granola
ELEVATION COFFEE TRADERS
SOL hand blown glass cups
ETUK RIDE
FRESH CUP MAGAZINE | 45
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 5 TEA MASTERS CUP Riga, Latvia teamasterscup.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 NOVEMBER 7–9 INTERNATIONL COFFEE WEEK Belo Horizonte, Brazil semanainternacionaldocafe.com.br/en/
NOVEMBER 7–9 WORLD LATTE ART CHAMPIONSHIP Belo Horizonte, Brazil worldlatteart.org
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
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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
Barista Pro Shop
866.776.5288
baristaproshop.com/ad/fresh
23
Brewista
888.538.8683
mybrewista.com
23
The Chai Co.
888.922.2424
chaico.com
Coffee Fest
425.295.3300
coffeefest.com
Divinitea
518.347.0689
divinitea.com
47
Fresh Cup Magazine
503.236.2587
freshcup.com
35, 49
Ghirardelli Chocolate
800.877.9338
ghirardelli.com/professional
Golden Bean
503.706.1330
goldenbean.com
Gosh That's Good! Brand
888.848.GOSH (4674)
goshthatsgood.com
Grandstand Glassware + Apparel
800.767.8951
egrandstand.com/coffee
7
Java Jacket
800.208.4128
javajacket.com
9
Lotus Energy Drinks
888.702.5584
lotusenergydrinks.com
51
Malabar Gold Espresso
650.366.5453
malabargoldespresso.com
21
Maya Tea Co.
877.629.2832
mayachai.com
29
Monin Gourmet Flavorings
855.FLAVOR1 (352.8671)
monin.com
RetailMugs.com
970.222.9559
retailmugs.com
47
Sattwa Chai
952.476.0117
sattwachai.com
31
SelbySoft
800.454.4434
selbysoft.com
TEA House Times, The
973.551.9161
theteahousetimes.com
47
Tipu's
888.506.2424
tipuschai.com
27
Toddy
888.863.3974
toddycafe.com/wholesale
27
WaterWise
865.724.1200
maveapro.com
35
Western Foodservice & Hospitality Expo
203.242.8124
westernfoodexpo.com
Your Brand Café
866.566.0390
yourbrandcafe.com
Zojirushi America
800.264.6270
zojirushi.com
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CROP TO CUP Three new niche coffee subscriptions showcase the best of Brazil, Asia, and vinyl?
By Peter Szymczak
PURPLE LLAMA
CASA BRASIL
POLECAT
The “Purple” part of this twofer’s name refers to the color associated with musicians like “Purple Rain” Prince and “Purple Haze” Jimi Hendrix, while the “Llama” comes from the song “Ride My Llama” by Neil Young. Based in Chicago, the coffee shop and record store hybrid is jockeyed by Joel Petrick, who founded Purple Llama after spending a decade in the corporate world, and General Manager/vinyl buyer Adam Hirzel, who brings 13 years’ retail beverage experience to the turntable. Dylan Connell is Director of Coffee, moving over from Sump Coffee in St. Louis where he won first in the 2017 National “America’s Best Espresso” competition. “We love the ritual of brewing and enjoying coffee in the same way we love dropping the needle on a record,” Petrick says. “We feel that these two processes enjoyed together heighten the experience of both.” Purple Llama's first release was “El Progresso,” a microlot of coffee grown by Julian Palomino in Colombia and roasted by The Barn in Berlin. The boxset ($50) also included "Spagat Der Liebe," the new record by Swiss garage rockers Klaus Johann Grobe, released on Trouble in Mind, one of their favorite Chicago labels.
“Casa Brasil” gets its name from a Brazilian Cultural Center in the Hyde Park neighborhood of Austin, Texas. The center helps support the local Portuguese-speaking community and promotes Brazilian culture. Long-time local roaster Joel Shuler of Little City Coffee Roasters helps support the center’s mission by importing the best beans from Brazil he can find. “Just like fine wines, fine coffees now have their place among consumers who value the uniqueness and origin of the products consumed,” Shuler says. Shuler spearheaded this project in partnership with the Cerrado Coffee Growers Federation to bring the first Brazilian Designation of Origin coffees to the United States. He sources coffee directly from growers in Brazil and imports to his facility in Austin, Texas, and roasts in small batches. The project includes five new micro-lots and the Sweet Cerrado Blend, produced in the Cerrado Mineiro Region by Gil César de Melo, and another by Yuki Minami. “For me and my family it is an honor to be part of this project,” Minami said. “It unites local and global through this universal drink which is the coffee.” Subscribers can sign up for every other week ($14) and monthly ($15) delivery options.
This ferret-like creature known for its curiosity serves as the spirit animal and mascot of Deric Loh and his Singapore-based coffee subscription service, currently in Kickstarter mode. Since being turned onto specialty coffee in Bali in 2010, Loh the polecat has sussed out artisan coffee roasters from all over Asia— China, South Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia and Indonesia—such as Lam Yeo Coffee, which has been roasting in Singapore since 1959. One of the few traditional coffee powder grinder companies remaining that still specialize in "Nanyang" Coffee or "Kopi," Lam Yeo has started venturing into single-origin coffees from around Asia, Africa, Central America, and India, under second-generation roaster Tan Peck Heo. Trading on his background in e-commerce and marketing, Loh hopes to launch the service this September. “Roasters tend to have their own styles, but sometimes large regions of the world can fall into similar roasting trends,” Loh says. “This is a chance to experience coffee roasted by craftsmen across the world’s largest continent.” Monthly subscriptions start at $22 and include 7–8 ounces of coffee, which can be shipped to Singapore and the States. The Starter Pack Special includes a hand grinder and drip coffee bags.
WWW.CASABRASILCOFFEES.COM
DISCOVER.GOPOLECAT.COM
WWW.PURPLELLAMACHICAGO.COM
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