How To

Inside a coffee roast

Dr. Monika Fekete explores the evolution of a coffee bean under an electron microscope and uncovers how roast levels affect grinding.

Watching green beans turn into aromatic roasted coffee is something of a magical experience. Read more

The dos and don’ts of opening a café

Mocopan Coffee’s Kyle Rutten on opening a café, and why it’s more important than ever to understand your market and stand out from the crowd.

The modern café market is a very dynamic one. While there are many simple yet successful cafés operating today, it’s not as easy as it once was to get people through the door. Once upon a time a simple window sign that read “coffee” with a large lurking coffee machine in the background was all you needed to attract a crowd. Today it’s about more than just the caffeine kick. Customers want the story, the flavour, and the trust that the person making their coffee is excellent at it, and a great environment to experience it in. We want it all. Read more

Bitter sweet symphony: What causes bitterness in coffee and how to avoid it

Mocopan Coffee’s Babin Gurung on what causes bitterness in coffee and how to avoid it.

As a barista, one of the most common complaints you get from customers is that their coffee tastes bitter or burnt. As happy as you are to remake the coffee, you need to know what’s causing the problem, otherwise you’ll be serving the same bad-tasting coffee. Read more

Little Red Riding Hood latte art by Jibbi Little

What great latte art you have. All the better to drink you with.
Jibbi Little presents her take on a classic fable.

The story of Little Red Riding Hood always stuck with me as a child.

Jibbi Little of Jibbijug is the 2019 ASCA Pauls Professional Australian Latte Art Champion.

Most people know the basics: a young girl goes to visit her grandmother, takes a shortcut through the woods, and encounters the Big Bad Wolf. She tells the hungry canine where she’s going, who beats her there and impersonates her grandmother. In most versions of the story, the wolf then eats Little Red Riding Hood.

The moral for children is to not talk to strangers, though I see a second lesson hidden in the beginning. Whether on a trip to a relative or learning a skill like latte art, shortcuts are rarely the best way to go about things and often don’t pay off in the long run.

Hard work does, however, and it took me to the World Latte Art Championship earlier this year. But that didn’t happen overnight. It was a long journey and Little Red Riding Hood reminded me why not to take the easy route.

Inspired by this classic fable, I presented this design at the 2019 Central Region Latte Art Championship, and it provided the base for the Mary Poppins pattern I took to the national and world championships.

Though the pattern looks complex, it’s actually made using several simple techniques. The true difficulty in this design lies in achieving the correct size and spacing to land that visual appeal.

If the rosettas making the hair are uneven, or the long drag forming the hood is too thin, the pattern simply won’t look right. Because these are easy mistakes to make, it can also be tough to repeat the design time after time.

The easiest way to master this pattern – like many things in life – is to practice, stay on the correct path, and don’t mistake a wolf for your grandmother.

This article appears in the October 2019 edition of BeanScene Magazine. Subscribe HERE.

Jibbi Little’s Little Red Riding Hood

Step 1

Build your base with the handle at two o’clock.

Step 2

At eight o’clock, drag two small loops to form a hollow heart pointing towards the centre of the cup.

Little Red Riding Hood

Step 3

Pour an eight-leaf rosetta from the centre of the cup to the bottom and pull through.

Little Red Riding Hood

Step 4

Pour a second rosetta from the centre of the cup to 10 o’clock.

Little Red Riding Hood

Step 5

From here, drag a line across the top of the cup curving in around two o’clock and ending with a small spiral. This should resemble a question mark.

Little Red Riding Hood

Step 6

Pour a figure eight shape in the space between this last line and the rosetta.

Little Red Riding Hood

Step 7

On other side of rosetta, from the point you started the question mark, drag a short line ending with a curve at nine o’clock, then another from here to the point of the heart.

Step 8

Finish with a small drop for the eye.

To DIY or not to DIY

After seeing too many backyard repairs performed incorrectly or dangerously, Maurizio Marcocci of Service Sphere stresses when do-it-yourself maintenance is acceptable and when it’s not.

With the rise in popularity of commercial and home coffee machines, the team at Service Sphere has seen an immense spike in backyarders attempting repairs and end users having a go themselves. Read more

How temperature effects coffee machine performance

Dr Monika Fekete looks at temperature-dependent variables and their consequences on grinder and espresso machine performance.

On a chilly winter morning, hot cup of coffee in hand, I’m once again thinking about the many ways temperature has influenced the liquid I’m drinking. Read more

What makes a coffee strong?

Mocopan Coffee’s Babin Gurung on what coffee strength means and how to achieve it.

During my barista hustling days, customers often told me they liked their coffee strong. I had no problem adjusting to customers’ needs, but found many people had different ideas of what “strong” meant. Some of the things strength commonly referred to was more caffeine, darker roast, or sometimes, just bitter coffee. These ideas aren’t necessarily wrong, but here in the coffee world, when we say “strong”, we mean the strength of flavours contained in an espresso. Read more

Fantastic Mr Fox latte art by Jibbi Little

Jibbi Little shares her fantastic take on a Roald Dahl classic that’s more cunning than any canine and quirkier than a Wes Anderson movie.

One of my favourite books as a child was Fantastic Mr Fox. Many people are familiar with Wes Anderson’s animated film, but it actually began as a novel by Roald Dahl.

Jibbi Little of Jibbijug is the 2019 ASCA Pauls Professional Australian Latte Art Champion.

The book tells the story of an intelligent fox that steals food from a wealthy farmer to support his family. As I child, I connected with this story and it taught me the importance of family.

When I began conceptualising the patterns I would use this competition season – from the regional to world stage – I decided early on that I would use the stories I loved as a child as inspiration for my designs. Fantastic Mr Fox was one of the first books that came to mind, both because of its influence on me as a child, and the countless ways it could be brought to life.

At each subsequent competition, I finetuned the design, working in different features, techniques, and levels of detail based on the time constraints and my ability to pour consistently. This pattern is the one I presented at the Australian Specialty Coffee Association Pauls Professional 2019 Australian Latte Art Championship in February at the Melbourne International Coffee Expo. For me, it finds a good middle ground between the repeatability of the regional version and complexity of my World Latte Art Championship (WLAC) design. This pattern is perfect for aspiring baristas to attempt to recreate in their own cafés.

Unfortunately, my WLAC journey was cut short in the semi-finals where I placed 11th out of 41 competitors. My experience taught me the value of preparation, knowing the rules and regulations, and – similar to how Fantastic Mr Fox did as a child – the value of my Australian coffee family. Thank you to everyone for their support throughout my WLAC campaign.

This article appears in the August edition of BeanScene Magazine. Subscribe HERE.