dear santa please put this under the tree for me...

budding barista in the making!

Is 2 1/2 too young to get into the coffee game?























I think not!

random coffee shots (from my phone that is!)

Hidden barista cam strikes again at Caffeineatics in Collins Street, Melbourne!

Great coffee too...



Curious about this two group machine which I saw on Brunswick Street, Fitzroy, the other day - not too sure about the specs but considering how much coffee I've been making at home recently, I'm starting to wonder if it's worthwhile upgrading to a two group!
(Actually, technically not sure that replacing my E61 lever Bezzera Domus Galatea with the above is strictly an 'up-grade' - at least not in so far as price is concerned!)



Hidden coffee cam - Single Origin



Yummy soy Piccolo from Single Origin in Sydney



Yummy (short) espresso from Single Origin in Sydney


Man did I need this coffee. I think the owners knew we were industry when two of us ordered nine coffees... not sure how but something managed to give us away...

Question? What's the difference between a short espresso and a ristretto?
AnsweR: About a dollar ninety five!



Not strictly coffee related but these are the loos in the cinema complex at the Como building in South Yarra

I thought that they were wort a mention as the building itself is relatively new, but the bathroom manages to capture some gothic charm



Not strictly coffee related but yummy nevertheless... This is a couple of kilos of honey and honey comb which had been growing in the wall in the side of my house


Didn't want to fumigate so I got the bees smoked out and relocated to a commercial hive, and managed to score some honey for my self in the process, which you can in fact add to coffee - see... I knew there was a tie-in there somewhere!



Here's a random shot of BBB taken a couple of weeks ago as I grabbed a coffee on the fly Noticed the other day though that the front window had been smashed in - what a stupid thing to do - and not much fun for the first staff member of the day to discover either, not to mention the unnecessary expense of having to replace the thing either

My joint got broken into a couple of weeks ago so I can sympathise with having to fork out for unnecessary costs for repairs. Still... it gave us an opportunity to beef up security, and now each staff member is issued with a sawn-off upon arrival...



My latest home roast made up of equal parts Ethiopian Limmu & Colombian Peaberry with a hint of Kenyan Fire Estate thrown in for good measure!
The image is a bit fuzzy but the coffee itself is a double ristretto base with only a tiny dollop of steamed milk on top - four days post roast and bloody delicious! I back-blended a small quantity of the Kenyan coffee through it, and it seems to provide added complexity, whilst at the same time drinking very well relatively early! I'm starting to get into the whole 'blend' (as opposed to single origin) thing, and I'm loving the fuller flavours that blending seems to bring out.

From memory I roasted (on my Gene Cafe home roaster) the Ethiopian and the Colombian both at 235C with 100C pre-heat, and 16min / 16.5 min roast times respectively - which surprised me really as I thought that the Limmu would go for longer than the Peaberry, but bang on 16min I saw the first puff of smoke, indicating that I had just reached second crack, so I pulled the roast

Yum. Bloody yum.

alia celebration blend

Well... little Alia Rainbow was born on the 4th of November at 12.20am weighing in at a healthy 4.2kg - we had a home birth without complications, and a short 3 hour labor, and both mother and daughter are well and doing fine

So in Alia's honour I have created "Celebration Blend" which contains 50 / 50 Tanzanian 'Fire Estate' and Costa Rican 'Royal Tarruzu' AA - roasted for 17mins @ 235C on my gene cafe home roaster

And five days post roast the results are in the cup!

Thick and luscious crema which just pours and pours, with cinnamon, cardamom, and strawberry dominating the nose, and Persian Tart on the palate - complete with a lovely buttery texture, and firm, fleshy notes on the mid palate!

I could drink this coffee all day long, in fact, I do!

The caffeine content seems to be pretty gentle, it provides a pleasant buzziing sensation, but does not overwhelm, and high altitude coffee ensures low acidity, which is very gentle on the stomach

And the benefit of home roasting is that I know exactly when the coffee was roasted, so I know that I am consuming it in the 'sweet spot' window of opportunty, which for me is five to ten days post roast

Kind of makes it hard to go out for coffee though, which is probably just as well, as with a new child on board there is less demand to venture outdoors and more reasons to stay at home - makes sense when you think about it

Opps... baby is crying and its daddy's turn to comfort her so better go...

7gms

soy piccolo before and after shots: before shot

after shot:

The Brunswick East Project

If you haven't been here already then you owe it to yourself to go

Is it Melbourne's best coffee? No, perhaps not - it is as the name suggests a work in progress, but what these guys lack in experience they make up in dedication and enthusiasm, which seems to be missing from a lot of coffee establishments these days

Here the question seems to be about the possibility of what coffee can be, bearing in mind that coffee is and should be a constantly evolving project - rather than an attempt at laying down the law and saying: this is what coffee is!

The boys here are only too willing to open their doors and to let other budding baristi / roasters in to have a play on what can only be described as top of the range and state of art equipment

So venture in for yourself and see what it's all about - you may just be able to add to the espresso equation...

espresso coffee at the european

I cant quite recall the circumstances that lead to this cup and saucer lying side by side, on by table in the back corner of the European, but I do recall that alcohol may have been a contributing factor.  And while its true that there are 'fresher' products on the market than the coffee on offer here, there is no doubting that they make it well.

Not to everyones taste, and a bit 'ashy' on the palate - but still good coffee, better than many places are serving elsewhere

Inside Gerald's Silvia

This is why you should never trust anyone other than a trained / skilled barista with your precious espresso machine.  Gerald's housemate ran his Rancilio Silva dry and burned out the boiler and welded in heating element

So Gerald and I decided to pull it apart and get the boiler out so we could replace it ourselves - which we did - get the boiler out I mean. The replacement part is not so easy as worldwide demand for copper has meant that prices and parts are at a premium, and the boiler is on backorder.

Although, we did have a local distributor in Melbourne offer to replace the boiler for us at a cost that was almost equivalent to the purchase price of the machine - so we decided to do the job ourselves, now we're waiting on parts

All in all its been been a very worthwhile job pulling the machine apart, as I also now have an ageing Baby Gaggia, and a Eurolab all-in-one machine on my bench,waiting to be pulled apart, as I'm cannibalising the Eurolab to fix the Gaggia

Believe it or not you can actually but a Eurolab new for half the price of a replacement vibration pump for a machine

Wierd but true...

soy piccolo - a minor place

I happen to think that this is the best coffee in Melbourne at the moment: soy piccolo from A Minor Place in Albion Street, Brunswick - using Atomica Dark Espresso Blend on a Synesso Cyncra machine.  Not only great tasting coffee but total cool ambience, great service, and a fantastic total chilled vibe.  

My No 1 pick for Melbourne espresso right now:

some snaps from st ali

panoramic view of st ali

me pride and joy - where does she get those expressions from?

this is how good coffee (or baby chino) should make you feel
st ali hidden groin cam...

some images of the Auction Rooms - Errol Street, North Melbourne

etched into my psyche

doesn't surprise me really: everything else at Starbucks seems to be super-automated, so why not?

latte art machine

smoke em if ya got em...

what to do with all those left over husks from roasting!

the caffeine test

Increasingly caffeine plays a more and more important role in our lives, with ramifications not only for our own health, and that of our nearest and dearest, but our daily consumption has the ability to impact positively or otherwise on the entire planet

I strongly suggest that you take the following caffeine test to assess your level of addiction to this noxious weed, measure the carbon footprint that your consumption is having upon the world, and see how your daily consumption may impact upon the credit rating of third world countries in times to come:


Created by OnePlusYou

Columbian Peaberry & other pressing business...

Well... its been awhile between roasts, which is not surprising really, since we've been 'between houses' for the last little while

Just moved from Hampton in Vic, AU to Coburg, on the other side of town - lovely little multi-cultural heart of Melbourne with a wonderful blend of middle-eastern, indian, greek, and italian sub-cultures all mingling harmoniously together

And every where you go there is coffee, coffee, coffee! Little coffee houses and cafes full of elderly men chain smoking and playing cards, just as they did when I last lived in this area (albeit briefly) some 22 yrs ago!

A walk down Sydney Road (no relation to the City of the same name) reveals a multitude of middle-eastern bakeries and cafes, all brimming with life and activity - not to mention the yummy smells that emanate from within...

Our new house is also located at about the half-way mark between Coffex and Genovese coffee houses, so on a good day, if the wind is blowing in the right direction, you can actually smell the coffee roasting from at least one of these coffee destinations

And the new Grinders roasting facility is also not too far away in Fairfield, which is a lovely little suburb located on the Yarra

Perhaps of greater interest to coffee aficionados, however, is the location of A Minor Place cafe, located just around the corner from me, on Albion St, and Small Block, on Lygon St, East Brunswick - both of which serve exceptional coffee

And just opened recently is Artisan Espresso, also located on Lygon Street (if my memory serves me well) - where Josh roasts his own out the back, and he has a Cynesso Syncra out front with guest baristi fronting the machine on the weekends

He's also open to coffee snobs bringing in their home roast to run it through the machine, which is a real boon for anyone who has not had the opportunity to work on one of these beauties...

Back to the home roasting: I just sampled my first batch of Columbian Peaberry, which at only 3 days post roast is pouring beautifully and exhibiting lovely lifted peach blossom and plum liquor aromas on the nose, which follow through on a smooth and creamy palate with bright acidity and good grippy tannins

I roasted these beans at 230C for 16.6mins - which is longer than I thought it would take to reach 2nd crack, given the small size of the beans, but the beans coloured up well, and they had only just entered 2nd crack when I pulled the roast

Well... the 2yr old is demanding attention, and the mother in law is on the phone, which means its time to go!

Cheers,

Pat

back to the drawing board

well... I haven't been roasting as much as I'd like to recently mostly due to work commitments, so it comes as no surprise to me then to learn that some of my recent roasts have been, well, less-than-perfect

as a mater of fact I've been pulling my roasts early recently in an effort to avoid burning them, when in fact most needed a good couple of minutes longer to reach rolling second crack

this is what happens when you roast sporadically - you take your eye off the ball, then it takes some practice to get it all happening good again

I think I got it right with some Datera beans last night, though - I roasted these for 18mins at 235C, and they looked and smelled great when I pulled the roast

In fact, the whole house smelt amazing, and going to sleep with the alluring aroma of freshly roasted coffee lingering in the air is a fantasy dream come true for a died-in-the-wool barista / roaster like me!

I also popped my roasting temperature up marginally from the usual 230C to 235C about half way through the roast, as I noticed that the Gene Cafe was struggling a bit to maintain optimum temperature, probably due to the chilly 15C temp in my freezing kitchen!

So it's onward and upward with my roasts from here on in!

At least I've got a backlog of about 5kg of green beans to work through - being equal amounts of Columbian Peaberry, and Ethiopian Yirgacheffe; so that should keep me busy for awhile, and I should have plenty of time to get the roast profiles right for each of these, as i have plenty of product to work with

Will keep you posted on my progress...

On a bright and cheerful note: new store is going great guns and it was our busiest coffee day today and we kicked some serious butt! I suppose it helps that it was only about 12C outside - which means that everyone was drinking coffee or hot chocolate - and for some strange reason we are selling heaps more 16oz coffees here than any store that I have ever operated or worked in: I mean 7 or 8 large coffees in a row at a time?

What's going on with that?

I put it down to all those industrious education (teaching) students located in the adjacent building - what with their teaching rounds and classes all crammed together and all

We also got our large (1.5m diameter?) signage outside today, which I'm sure helps to attract some passing interest

I'm certain that the uni will say something about 'not approved signage' and 'not going through the proper channels' to put it up - which is why its up high and on hooks so we can bring it in at night!

Still... with the commercial rent that we're paying - you can't really blame a guy for advertising, can you?

Pat

so long and thanks for all the yirgacheffe!

Well actually this blog should probably read: "Hello! And thanks for all the Yirgacheffe!"

As I made myself a double ristretto with some packaged Yemen Ismaili beans (long considered to be the premium Mocha coffee) yesterday - but the coffee was stale - and it left a bitter taste in my mouth!

So I thought I had better do something about this post haste, so I whipped out some Ethiopian Yirgacheffee beans which I'd roasted 6 days ago (at 230C for 15 min in my Gene Cafe home roaster. I pulled the roast at fist sign of second crack and rolling second crack became established about 2 1/2 min into the 'cooling down' cycle) - and whacked them in the Mazzer Major

How can I describe the taste sensation and still do it justice?

I took a good long sniff of my short-poured espresso and loved what I found there!

To me the Yirgie exhibited lovely lifted lemon-scented and floral aromas, with the predominant impression on the nose being that of lemon merange, crossed with a Portuguese custard tart!

Although my wife (who is a far better cook than I am but I'm still not bad and I'm particularly good with the seasoning) suggested that Pavlova was the predominant feature on the nose - and she should know as she has a wonderfully gifted palate for a non-coffee drinker (don't ask)

Whatever you want to call it - these wonderful citrus and custard characters followed through on the palate, and I could still taste the remnants of the coffee an hour or so later as we walked along Hampton beach

All in all the lovely Yirgie espresso completely obliterated my previous disappointing coffee experience - which is just as well... as we all know that a good coffee can make your day but a poor one can ruin it!

compak k10

Well... it's finally here! My new Compak K10 WBC Silencio grinder (thanks to Chris from Talk coffee)

I can't begin to tell you how much these amazing grinders have revolutionized my coffee making technique!

The K10 purrs like a kitten when it is in motion, which makes a nice change from the loud 'ack, ack, ack' sound of some of the equipment I've worked on in the past!

An additional bonus is that the ergonomics of these machines are very smooth indeed. Whether you're making 80 or 800 coffees a day, the grinder has no problem keeping up - and its very smooth dosing action, and easy-to-use rocker switch (for on / off grind-on-demand), provide a fluid dosing motion which eases strain on wary limbs!

But pehaps best of all is that these grinders have a clean sweeping motion in the dosing chamber, and they produce a very even dose, regardless of how much coffee is in the chamber

This takes a lot of the guess work out of dosing, which is important especially when you're busy, it also means that there is much greater consistency in the coffees, which is important especially if there is more than one person working the machine

Remind me and I'll take some photo's and post them up

Although, it's almost pornographic how well this machine performs, and don't be surprised if you start dreaming of them at night after using one!

Pat

victorian barista championships

well... yesterday was a great day for coffee if the finals of the Victorian Barista Championships are any indication, with a good turn-out by the public, great food and coffee served at the Beach House, and a fantastic performance from all of the finalists, with David Makin taking top honours again this year

Here's a few photos from the day:

David Seng's table set-up for the judges incorporating his 'apple' theme that featured in his signature drink:


Eager judges and contestants clamor for the results:


The deserving winners from l to r: david seng 3rd place, david makin, 1st place, sponsor, con from 7gms 2nd place

Beautiful LA Marzocco FB70 coffee machines (the red one would look good on my bench tp at home!)

victorian barista comp semi finals

well wouldn't you know it... I bought my Olympus camera along on the day but left my sd card at home - so the following photos are from my phone: apologies about the quality!

Here's Con from 7gms demonstrating his passion!



Here he is again - man the guy is all focus!



David Makin - multiple award winning champion - I mean, the guy is a machine!


The judges hard at it!



I'll take my 'big' camera with me tomorrow and get some 'real' shots!

Pat

shanti bhagwan -urban chai temple!

Well... its been a while since my last post for a number of reasons.

Firstly, my 'new' (read: less than 12 months old) Toshiba Tecra laptop died a vainglorious death - faulty hard drive

In the end it was faster and more convenient for me to pay for the repair of the laptop and for the information retrieval myself, rather than wait for weeks on end to get the job done through the 'official' repair channels

Oh well never mind too bad...

At least I've got a working machine again!

Secondly, as I've alluded to in previous posts and as the title of this thread suggests, I've opened my new cafe @ Melbourne Uni - and YES that IS the actual name of the of the cafe above and NO its not a joke!

Still going through a steep learning curve with the new coffee machine: an impressive 3 group Expobar G10 with multiple boilers: one large one just for steam and hot water usage, and a dedicated boiler for each group head offering excellent temperature stability, and the ability to 'dial in' the ideal temperature for each group head to complement the 'sweet spot' of which ever coffee you are using

In my case its a single origin Honduras Copan variety from Jasper coffee, and yes, true to form its both Fair Trade and organic...

New store looks great considering that we haven't had much to work with

Have brushed it up (read cleaned it up) quite a bit after the previous operators exited

Still waiting on finance to come through though, and am looking forward to embracing the renovation process to make the store functional, attractive, and uniquely my own

Managed to hire a wonderful new manager for the store within the first week of trading, so fingers crossed it all works out, and she lasts the distance... so far so good!

Had a very low key opening, and I plan on keeping it that way until such time as systems, procedures, and equipment are all in place

Still, we made 200 coffees last Thursday, which is great for our second week of trade, and I expect that number will continue to increase as we pick up our game a bit

So watch this space and I'll endeavor to keep you informed of our progress

Home roasting has necessarily been put on the back burner for now as other priorities assert themselves

Still... it is coming up to winter, and I've got 5kg of Yirgacheffe and Columbian Peaberry to work my way through

Uh oh... i can feel a roast coming on!

Cheers,

Pat

a couple of pics...

notice the lovely colour change from green to a more generous yellow? This is when all the action starts to take place, and first crack is not too far away...

Here's a photo of my latest batch, which is 70 per cent Tanzanian Kilimanjaro and 30 per cent Guatemalan Cinco Estrellas - the colours in the photo don't really do it justice as the roast is much more even than it appears here...

Ostensibly this photo has little to do with coffee, but it's my munchky-moo, Kalani Moana, aged 21 months, helping me to sort the beans post roast - Kalani is so dedicated that she started polishing each bean individually!

eliminate the variables

Well... I'm finally happy top say that after a fair amount of trail and error I appear to be on target and back on track in this mysterious and sometimes frustrating business of home roasting!

I decided to vary the mix a little by increasing the pre-heat temperature of my gene cafe, and by decreasing the roast temperature to 200C

But all this did was produce an uneven roast with some beans slightly toasty, and others slightly under-done, leaving a whole lot of messy chaff still clinging to the cooked beans

And when you're using Tanzanian Kilimanjaro beans to start off with - this can be a very expensive mistake!

All was not totally lost, actually, I hand massaged the beans to remove excess chaff, and I found that they came up much better as an espresso 8 days post-roast, as opposed to the standard 3-5 days which I'm used to

On a more positive note I've resorted to what works and I'm pretty much sticking to this formula from now on, and I've seen my most encouraging result to date with a new batch roast of Guatemalan Cinco Estrellas, which I roasted up today

Sticking to my previously successful formula of 180C pre-roast temperature, and a roast temp of 230C - I'm seeing much more even colouration, with less residual chaffing

I think this is slightly helped by marginally increasing the amount of green beans that I'm using which, I believe, adds to increased temperature stability during the roast

Now I know the Gene Cafe is designed for 300g of green beans each roast, which subsequently lose weight but increase in volume with roasting, but I've avoided weighing the beans and have instead opted for two even 1/2 scoops of beans with the measure provided

By increasing this amount to two slightly heaped spoons, however, I appear to have achieved better than previous results - which may or may not be a function of the Guatemalan beans that I have just started using.

I guess time will tell...

This is probably academic to a lot of folks but you can taste the difference in the cup big time, and to me that's what it's all about at the end of the day:

A fantastic product and a repeatable result that produces great tasting coffee time and time again.

The Guatemalan Cinco Estrellas beans were also quite a bit smaller than other beans I've been using, such as many of those from PNG, so I intervened in the roast time and stopped it short at 16min (as opposed to the 'standard' 17min which seems to work well with many larger beans) - as this is when second crack started to kick in.

Although it was two mins into the cooling down cycle that second crack kicked in good and proper; which is the lovely result that I am always looking for, as the beans tend to continue cooking during the cooling down cycle, so you want to manually stop the roast at first sign of second crack

I'll endeavor to upload some photos to give you'll a better look at what I'm talking about

I've also got some video footage that I'm reluctant to use because from memory I mis-pronounce the name of the beans during my commentary... but stuff it I think I'll up-load it anyway to see what it looks like!

you can not escape your destiny!

On a recent trip to the Sunshine Coast I was surprised to find some of the black gold growing right there in the back of my parent-in-law's house in peaceful Diddillibah!

Apparently the plant is well established and has been there for around 30 years and it's still yielding a considerable crop.

When I asked the out-laws approximately how much fruit appears on the plant they replied easily a good couple of kilos per season - which is enough for a home roast in my books!

So I've asked them to hang onto the good stuff next time (apparently they had just disposed of a good deal of fruit which had dropped off) - and I see what I can do next time I'm up to erect a hasty corretto device.

Going off on a tangent a bit I was so generally disappointed with the coffee on the coast when I went out,( except for a few noteworthy exceptions) - as my previous blog no doubt makes clear - that I invested in one of those 6 cup Vittoria stove top devices that you see in the supermarket, not for the tiny sample of coffee that came with it (but I drank that too - what the hey...), but because it allowed me to make my own coffee when I wanted, where I wanted, just so long as there was an available element of some kind and a water supply nearby!

I was also pleased to hear that the outlaws thought my own home roast which I bought up from Melbourne in fair quantity to be 'superior’ to the esteemed Douwe Egberts - which is there tipple of choice.

This is strong praise indeed considering that they are Dutch...

this is what a $4 coffee looks like in qld

I tentatively ordered a strong cap in Montville on the Sunshine coast, not because I usually drink caps but because I thought it would be harder to stuff it up.

So after parting with $3.50 of my hard earned dosh for the coffee, plus an extra $0.50 for the additional 'shot' - this is what I got! Hot insipid dishwater not fit for human consumption.

I left my coffee as you see it - largely untouched and unremarked upon even when the table was cleared, which is a bit on the nose when you're parting with four large.

Oh well... for this kind of money there's definitely room for improvement and room at the top of the coffee chain for those willing to give it a go

And I know that there are some good operators in Qld because I've visited a few - It's a bit of a walk down memory lane, drinking coffee in Qld, as most places still serve it the same way Melbournians were drinking coffee 20 yrs ago.

Good luck to them - it makes the good guys look gooder (is that a word?)