For those heading out to Singapore National Barista Championships, running alongside Tea & Coffee World Cup Asia today and tomorrow, you can skip the lengthy one hour wait I had to endure just by bringing along your business card, which will substitute as your name tag. I, unfortunately am a lowly barista trainer and wouldn’t warrant a card at my hotel. And for those who are signing up for classes like roasting or cupping, please queue up in the SPECIAL EVENTS queue. I queued in the VISITORS queue and was told to re-queue after queuing for an hour. Are you kidding?

The number one highlight of this entire event will be mentioned in the next post after this one. I’ve only watched 3 performances yesterday, the remaining time spent trolling the numerous booths. The first was last year’s Champion from Oriole Cafe, Keith Loh. Keith was using single origin Kenyan Gethumbwini, which is also one of my favourite and first roasts, also a favourite of jimseven who utilised it and won World Barista Championship 2007. Winey, blackcurrants, I can just taste it. I have a video of Keith’s performance which I will edit later tonight. I had the privilege of tasting the alpha stage of his signature drink during this past Chinese New Year in February. His signature drink is named Gethumbwini Sunrise. Keith’s main goal here is to redefine the taste of espresso by removing the undissolved solids in the cup and replacing these with his own custom oils/fragrances. He achieves this by filtering out the “undesired” parts of the espresso with Hario v60′s and then adding chilled water (looks like 2:1) and finally spraying some lemon oils into the cup and rubbing the oils onto the rim of the cup.

Speaking of jimseven, this signature drink reminds me of jimseven’s first video blog, which caused somewhat of an outrage in espressodom. It led me to 2 experiments, which you can read about in the following links.

Espresso sans Crema Test

Americano sans Crema Test

For the balls (sorry, for lack of better words) Keith has, he truly deserves the brand spanking new machine (the actual number one highlight of SNBC 2011). He’s gone and redefined espresso as we know it. Take out the defining blackcurrants in Gethumbwini, add in the lemons. It should renamed Getlemonbwini. An extremely risky effort, which I’ve been telling him since February, but I really hope he wins this year and gets to take this performance to a world stage. Unnerving, mind-blowing.

The 2nd performance I watched was Suhaida from Marina Mandarin Hotel. She used a blend of Costa Rica SHB and Sumatra Mandheling, and her signature was supposed to use a reduction of honey and figs, but her equipment broke down, and she quickly changed her signature on the fly to a pourover over honey and figs. She’s inspired me to enter into the race next year. During her interview with Victor Mah, the president of Singapore Coffee Association, Suhaida mentioned that the state of hotel coffee is improving. I’m definitely heading to Marina Mandarin for a sip. Her colleagues were extremely supportive, ranging from the GM to the F&B Directors and the staff.

The 3rd performance looked to be another contender for the Final 6. Ryan Tan from Papa Palheta. He’s a Singaporean working in one of the cafes in Australia. His signature was a reduction of fruits and nuts?? But it was his performance that was eye-catching. He had attention to every detail and was cleaning up as he went along. Impeccable! It was a pleasure watching him perform his routine.

CUPPACHOICE INTERNATIONAL PTE LTD has been given the honour and responsibility to organise and run a Barista Challenge on behalf of MITR PHOL THAILAND and MAXWILL (ASIA) PTE LTD, in conjunction with MITR PHOL SUGAR Trade Show 2010.

The Trade Show will be held from the 4th to 6th June and the Barista Challenge will be the main focus from the 5th and finals on the 6th of June on the 4th June from 11 am to 7 pm and on the 5th June from 11 am to 7 pm.

The main event is MITR PHOL BARISTA CHALLENGE and the side event, MITR PHOL LATTE ART THROWDOWN.

Come join us in this carnival, after all, it is also the GREAT SINGAPORE SALE and there is no better place to be than in Orchard Road.

MITR PHOL BARISTA CHALLENGE 2010 (in running order)

1. Jackie (Jolly Frog Bistro Bar)

2. Terence (Boomarang Express)

3. Noribsham (Cuppachoice Café & Academy)

4. Natasha (1 Caramel Café)

5. Mustaffa (1 Caramel Café)

6. Fadhly (Cuppachoice Café & Academy)

7. Jason (Starbucks Coffee)

8. Cessna (Café Cartel)

9. Arfian (30 Mls Coffee Bar)

10. Nizam (30 Mls Coffee Bar)

11. Andy (Starbucks Coffee)

12. Main Pavan (Jones The Grocer)

NESTLE LATTE ART CHALLENGE

1. Arfian (30 Mls Coffee Bar)

2. Alif (Jones The Grocer)

3. Fadzli (Jones The Grocer)

4. Noribsham (CuppaChoice Café & Academy)

5. Art (Jones The Grocer)

6. Terence (Boomarang Express)

7. Fadhly (Cuppachoice Café & Academy)

8. Jackie (Jolly Frog Bistro Bar)

9. Andy (Starbucks Coffee)

10. Nizam (30 Mls Coffee Bar)

11. Jason (Starbucks Coffee)

12. Cessna (Café Cartel)

13. Han Bing (Café Cartel)

[excerpted from Facebook]

—————————————————————————

PANEL OF JUDGES

The judges have been announced to be the following:

Alex Chong- Sensory Judge (Master Roaster & MD of CuppaChoice)

Colin Loh – Sensory Judge (CGSG Founding Member, espresso.colinloh.com)

Adrian Toh – Sensory Judge (Nestle Professional Representative)

Zaccheus Leck – Sensory Judge (Maxwill Representative Coffee Lover)

Steve Cairns – Technical Judge (CGSG Founding Member)

Cheryl Lee – Technical Judge (2 time Malaysia Barista Champion)

John Ting – Latte Art Judge (Singapore National Barista Champion 2008,2009, WBC 2009 Ranked #21, Barista@Oriole Cafe)

Competition Blend

The blend used for the competition is a 60% Kenya AA / 40% Ethiopia Sidamo roasted by CuppaChoice to Mid-Dark.

Personal Notes:

I went to scout the location today. While my previous post mentioned that the barista challenge was to be held at Takashimaya, it is in actual fact being held at the outdoors Civic Plaza. The area allocated for the MITR PHOL Barista Challenge is super-huge, as compared to the area we are so used to during the Singapore National Barista Championships. The SNBC 2010 area was about one-tenth the size of MITR PHOL BC. The stage area is just behind the fountain at Ngee Ann City. I hope to update this blog post with photos tomorrow.

I was going to announce this event much earlier on, but I’m glad I was busy and couldn’t do so. After a few revisions from CuppaChoice, here’s their final draft. SNBC 2010 #3 Suhaimie, if there are any changes…. Please let me know.

CuppaChoice International is organising their #3 Barista Challenge @ Takashimaya Departmental Store THE CIVIC PLAZA, Ngee Ann City from the 4th to 6th 5th June 2010 in conjunction with Asia’s Number 1 sugar manufacturer, MITR PHOL (who is running a )TRADESHOW from 4th to 6th June. Competition will thus be named, MITR PHOL BARISTA CHALLENGE 2010. More than $2,000 worth of cash and prizes are to be won. Interested baristi, please email #3 at suhaimie@cuppachoice.com for details (and obviously some well-wishes if you want to get on #3′s good side and win at least a door prize) today.

There are 2 competitions being contested. The main one, MITR PHOL BARISTA CHALLENGE requires a participation fee of $30 per Barista and the side challenge, Nestle Latte Art Free Pour requires a fee of $10. CuppaChoice will be collecting the funds on behalf of MITR PHOL and these funds will be added to the prize money.

Please confirm the challenges in which you and/or your representative(s) will be participating in. Please write a cheque payable to CUPPACHOICE PTE LTD and mail it to

CUPPACHOICE ACADEMY
3 Temple Street
Singapore 058556

BY 22nd OF MAY 2010.

For more details & well wishes, please email #3 at suhaimie@cuppachoice.com.

This Barista Challenge has garnered a huge interest and CuppaChoice has increased the slots from 10 to 12 Baristi for the main challenge. Latte Art has no capped limit on participation.

John pours latte art in front of judges.

The familiar “tap tap tap”, dosing coffee grounds into the portafilter

John pours water for the technical judges.

John explains his signature drink, “Summer Blossom”.

John calls “Time,” signaling the end of his performance and is being
interviewed by James Hoffmann.

John thanks everyone for their support, especially the ones cooped
up in Singapore, watching his performance at an ungodly hour.

James Hoffmann.