FOOD
TAKS ARGUELLES 2019 PHILIPPINE AEROPRESS CHAMPION
Words by Ren Alcantara | Photos by Chini Soriano
For many people, coffee is the only way to be useful in the morning. It’s a reasonably benign way to kickstart our brains, and throughout the day, offers a great way to step away from work for a minute, collect our thoughts, and keep from drooling all over ourselves at our desks.
For Taks Arguelles though, it’s become much more than that. After developing a taste for specialty coffee, he jumped right into the deep end, becoming part owner of a small, third-wave shop, and making a cup of coffee that won him first place in the recently concluded Philippine Aeropress Championship. Now gearing up as the official Philippine representative in the World Aeropress Championship in London this November, we got a chance to speak with Taks, and take a quick look at how he got from dabbling in specialty coffee, to national champion. Taks’ interest started in 2012, after graduating from College. At the time, EDSA Beverage Design Group was open to the general public, and anyone could head in and have a cocktail or specialty coffee. At that point, third wave coffee was just starting to gain traction in the country, and Taks had little more interest in it than the next person. A cup of coffee from Arvee, EDSA’s resident barista at the time, revealed coffee as a much more complex drink than he had given it credit for.
72
SEPTEMBER 2019
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