Category Archives: Discussion

Posts containing discussions about coffee

Cafe X, San Francisco

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The robot arm at the heart of the Cafe X operation.One of the Coffee Spot’s tag lines is “places I like to have coffee”, so today’s Saturday (on-a-Wednesday) Supplement is something of a departure for me since I’m not sure I’d describe Cafe X as somewhere I’d like to have coffee. Somewhere I’d go to get coffee, perhaps, but it’s definitely not somewhere to have coffee. However, there I was on Monday, in San Francisco, minding my own business, when Cafe X announced its grand opening. A block from my hotel. It was too good an opportunity to pass up, so along I went.

So, what is Cafe X? Well, put simply, it’s an automated coffee shop, with a pair of high-end bean-to-cup machines and a robot arm that takes the place of the barista. There’s a choice of beans from local roasters, such as Verve (Santa Cruz) and Oakland’s AKA (previously known as Supersonic), plus a fairly standard selection of espresso-based drinks, but only one size (8oz). You order using one of the tablets attached to the Cafe X kiosk, or preferably ahead of time on your phone using the Cafe X app. Typically your coffee will be waiting for you in under a minute. Well, that’s the theory…

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Reusable Cups

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A flat white from Pitch in Fulham Broadway in my Therma Cup, a double-walled, thermally-insulated china cup which I take with me on my travels.I was inspired to write this Saturday Supplement after reading an article earlier this week by Ashley Tomlinson on The Little Black Coffee Cup about the issues surrounding disposable coffee cups. If you have been following the Coffee Spot for a while, you will know that I really, really dislike disposable cups, although I’ve come at it from a very different direction. While I don’t like the waste that comes with disposable cups, my primary motivation is one of taste. Put simply, I can’t stand the way most coffee tastes when drunk from disposable cups.

This has led me to adopt a somewhat evangelical attitude to reusable coffee cups and, while I’ve been championing them for some time now, I realise that I’ve been doing it in a rather haphazard fashion, writing about cups as I’ve come across them (usually at coffee festivals). I’ve also been making the argument for them (and hence against disposable cups) in a similarly piecemeal fashion. This Saturday Supplement attempts to rectify that by bringing everything together into one place in the form of a new Reusable Cups section of the Coffee Spot where I can add new cups as and when I find them.

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Beyond the Bean Barista Bursary 2017

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The Beyond the Bean Barista Bursary logoRegular readers will remember that last year I was involved with the Beyond the Bean Barista Bursary as one of the judges, a somewhat ironic situation given my dislike of (watching) barista competitions. As I explained back then, while watching barista competitions is not for me, I fully appreciate the value that they bring to the speciality coffee industry. So many top-notch baristas I know credit the UKBCs with taking them on a massive learning curve. They talk of how competing gave a boost to their careers, something which applies to everyone, not just the winners: simply taking part has been critical to many a barista’s development.

I’m also painfully aware that competing in the UKBCs is not a trivial matter. It involves a huge investment in both time and money for the competitors, something which is in danger of shutting out baristas who don’t have a large organisation backing them. With that mind, Beyond the Bean set up its Barista Bursary last year, to provide funding for a barista who would compete in the UKBCs. I was asked to be a judge and must have done something right because Beyond the Bean has asked me back again this year!

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Caffè Culture Connect

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The store front of Modern Society on London's Redchurch StreetWelcome to today’s Saturday Supplement. Most of you will know that I write a feature for Caffeine Magazine, where I go around the country, checking out the coffee scene in various towns and cities. I know, it’s a hard job, but someone’s got to do it. What’s perhaps less known is that I also write a monthly column for the on-line publication, Caffè Culture Connect.

I’m rather proud of this one, actually. I’m given a free hand by Caffè Culture Connect, the only brief being to write about what I think makes for a good coffee shop, using one of my Coffee Spots to illustrate my point. This gives me the scope write about aspects of the coffee industry that I don’t really cover on the Coffee Spot, although there is quite a bit of overlap. I’d encourage you to take a look, hence this Saturday Supplement, which provides a summary of all my articles, plus links to the originals over on Caffè Culture Connect. You can also click on any of the pictures in the gallery which will take you to the relevant article.

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Speciality Coffee in Capsules?

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A shot of speciality coffee from an Nespresso-compatible capsule served by Maxwell Colonna-Dashwood at a talk at Modern Society.Not long ago, Caffeine Magazine ran a twitter poll, asking whether people would drink capsule coffee (for example, using an Nespresso machine) if it tasted better. Without much thought, I answered no (along with 72% of the 251 respondents) revealing, in the process, a whole host of (my) prejudice and presumption. At about the same time, I received an invitation from coffee roasters, Assembly: did I want to come to a talk on speciality coffee in capsules? Well, no. Given by Maxwell Colonna-Dashwood? Okay, let me reconsider that… Yes, of course I do!

For those who don’t know, Maxwell is the reigning UK Barista Champion, owner of Bath’s Colonna & Small’s and now a coffee roaster. He’s one of the British speciality coffee industry’s best-regarded figures and if he’s got something to say about capsules, then I want to hear it, regardless of my prejudice.

So, on Thursday night, I made my way to Modern Society, a general-purpose store on Redchurch Street in Shoreditch (which just happens to have what I believe is the UK’s only full Modbar installation) to hear Maxwell’s talk. Did he challenge my preconceptions and prejudice? Did he, in fact, change my mind on capsules?

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Beyond the Bean Barista Bursary Judging

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The Beyond the Bean Barista Bursary logoThe UK Barista Championship (or UKBC as it’s usually known) competition is in full swing, with the three regional heats underway. On Wednesday and Thursday this week, Timberyard’s new Soho location hosted the London heat, Origin’s Dan Fellows coming out on top, followed by colleague Will Pitts and Lina Piprek of Knot Coffee. On Wednesday, the focus switches to Glasgow, where Dear Green Coffee hosts the next heat. Things wrap up on 9th March with the Bristol heat, hosted by Beyond the Bean. By then we’ll then know who’ll be competing to the semi-finals on Saturday, 9th April, the finals occurring the following day, Sunday, 10th April. Both the semi-finals and finals will be at the London Coffee Festival.

Competing in the UKBCs has become ever more challenging in terms of the investment of both time and money. At the end of last year I wrote about the Beyond the Bean Barista Bursary, an impressive package of financial support and training designed to help someone either get started on the road to competition or to reach the next level. We had entries from around the UK and in January, I went to Bristol to judge the three shortlisted entries…

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The Decaf Challenge

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A handful of green coffee beans on the left and a handful of decaffeinated green beans on the right, showing the difference in colour, with the decaffeinated beans a dark shade of grey.Today’s Saturday Supplement is something of a hobby horse of mine: the search for great decaf coffee. Generally speaking, I believe that the state of decaf in the speciality coffee industry is pretty healthy. For example, I was in Cardiff on Monday, where I had two excellent decaf flat whites, one in Artigiano Espresso (roasted by Origin) and the other in The Plan (roasted by James Gourmet Coffee).

So, it’s not that there isn’t great decaf out there, being roasted by some top-quality roasters. Instead, the issue’s one of perception, with the decaf drinker often being made to feel like a second-class citizen. It’s a rare day when I don’t see a tweet along the lines of “death before decaf”. Frankly, I find it insulting to all decaf drinkers out there, not to mention the great roasters who are going to considerable lengths to produce amazing-tasting (caffeinated) coffee, extracting the maximum flavour from the beans, only to have their products reduced to a mechanism for delivering caffeine. Why? I just don’t get it.

To counter this, I launched the Coffee Spot Decaf Challenge at this year’s London Coffee Festival, the aim being to highlight the great decaf coffee out there.

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Mastering the Cezve with Vadim Granovskiy

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A cezve on the gas burner, with the crema almost at the top, signifying it's time to serve it.I first met Vadim Granovskiy in 2014 at a London Coffee Stops Awards event, where he gave a fascinating presentation on the ibrik, or cezve, as Vadim prefers to call it. A few days later, I had the pleasure of watching Vadim win the Ibrik Competition at the London Coffee Festival, which only confirmed my interest in this unique way of making coffee. So, when I caught up with Vadim at this year’s London Coffee Festival and he offered me a private cezve lesson, I jumped at the chance!

The cezve is an ancient method of making coffee, with more in common with the stove-top moka pot than espresso or modern pour-over methods. My lesson took place one evening in early May and although the focus was the cezve, it wasn’t all about making coffee. We explored the cezve itself and how to look after it, as well going on a journey of taste and perception which was every bit as fascinating as, for example, the Cimbali sensory sessions at this year’s Coffee Festival.

As well as the intensive lesson I had, Vadim also runs introductory workshops for 10-15 people. For more details, take a look at his website www.coffeeinaction.com.

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Coffee Tasting Flight at Slate

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The sign from the window of Slate Coffee Roasters in Seattle: the words 'SLATE COFFEE ROASTERS', one word per lineEvery now and then something comes along that is so special that it immediately jumps out at you. Such is the case with the wonderful Slate Coffee Roasters of Seattle and its amazing coffee tasting flight. Slate is a coffee shop/roaster that has been going for a couple of years now and somewhere where the focus is more clearly on the coffee than anywhere else I’ve been. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the coffee tasting flight.

I’ve written about Slate as a Coffee Spot in its own right, while this Saturday Supplement is solely about a detailed description of the coffee tasting flight because I feel it deserves the attention. I’d already been forewarned by my friend Kate Beard about Slate and its amazing deconstructed espresso (more of which later), but it was the coffee tasting flight that jumped out at me, partly because it has no price attached.

Why? Because the coffee tasting flight is pretty much what you make of it and its charged accordingly. Think of it as a 45 minute, personal curated coffee tour. Want to taste the same coffee four different ways? No problem. Want to explore the differences between processing methods? You got it.

June 2019: My visit to Slate was one of my personal Coffee Spot highlights. I’m therefore deeply saddened to learn of reports of mistreatment of the staff.

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Caffeine Magazine Newcastle: Flat Caps Coffee

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One of the cleanest cups of coffee I've ever had, at Flat Caps Coffee, Newcastle.I started this series of articles, taken from my feature in Issue 6 of Caffeine Magazine, with one established player in Newcastle’s coffee scene (Pumphrey’s Coffee). So it seems appropriate to end it with another, Flat Caps Coffee, run by the ever-affable Joe Meagher, ex-banker turned purveyor of fine coffee.

When Joe left banking to become his own boss, he chose coffee as his natural outlet. Initially considering a coffee cart, he quickly realised that there was no consensus must-visit coffee shop in Newcastle. Spotting a gap in the market, Flat Caps Coffee was born. For a long time Joe was a one-man band, but recently he has taken on what he terms “an apprentice” with the view to being able to take the odd day off without having to close the shop!

Flat Caps Coffee will celebrate its fourth birthday in August, making it something of an established player in Newcastle’s fledging speciality coffee scene. I spent a very happy hour perched on a stool at the counter chatting coffee with Joe (who disappointingly wasn’t wearing his trademark flat cap) pausing only while Joe served his customers.

You can find out what Joe had to say after the gallery (which is from my original visit to Flat Caps Coffee).

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