Coffee champions and how to brew a flavourful cup
Summary
Gear up for improved bean-to-cup experiences as the India International Coffee Festival launches national level competitions for baristas and brewersSpeciality coffee has come a long way since the pandemic. While homebrewers polished the art of pourovers at home, cafés sought top notch bean-to-cup experiences. The ultimate measure indicating the growth of Indian coffee is national level competitions for industry insiders. One such platform is the India International Coffee Festival (IICF) that launched this year and the preliminary rounds span north, west and south India. The final will be hosted in Bengaluru in December. To recognise different skillsets, IICF has two distinct competitions--National Barista Championship (NBC) and National Brewers Cup (NBrC). A barista prepares and serves coffee, whereas a brewer focuses solely on brewing to hit the right flavour notes.
The preliminary round for west India, comprising Mumbai, Pune, Goa, Ahmedabad and Surat, was held in Mumbai last weekend. NBC saw participants create three drinks, one espresso, one milk-based beverage with coffee and one signature drink in 15 minutes. NBrC had participants using manual coffee brewing equipment such as the funnel-shaped V60 drip coffee and French Press with a time limit of 10 minutes each.
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Nahid Khan, who won the Mumbai prelims in the NBC category, works as a roaster with Blue Tokai Coffee and says the competition was fierce. Dhriti Gandhi, who has been a barista for almost two years and currently works at Reserved Roastery in Surat, says such championships are eye-openers in more ways than one. “Apart from meeting new people and understanding how the industry works, I also saw how creative coffee mocktails can be and how professional people in the industry are," she says.
Since the pandemic, awareness and knowledge about beans has shot up. Baristas today have to answer questions about coffee estates, varietals, the roasting process, extraction, temperature and more from coffee enthusiasts.
Amritanshu Prasad, assistant manager, Third Wave Coffee says, “Consumers are much more aware and understand that making good coffee requires skill, knowledge, education and passion. If you’re a barista, you need to make sure that your coffee is consistently good, if not the best because the customer is far more educated than before."
While achieving the status of national champions is a new milestone for baristas and brewers in India, competitions such as these also give them a chance to interact with and learn from industry insiders. Gandhi reflects on her time in the Mumbai prelims: “When we make coffee, we treat it as art with a little bit of science, but I saw how others treated coffee the other way around to make a good cup."
For DM Purnesh, President of the non-profit organisation Specialty Coffee Association of India, the current events are a stepping stone to scaling the coffee industry by adding different coffee competitions, apart from NBC and NBrC. “The skills of our baristas are on par with anyone in the world but we’ve not been able to convey our country’s speciality coffee knowledge on the global stage. This is changing thanks to social media and growing technological exchange. With an aim to bridge the knowledge gap, we are looking to introduce more championships from the following year where baristas and home brewers can represent us on a global platform," he says. From next year onwards, the winner of NBrC will participate in international coffee showdowns and the NBC champion will represent India at World Barista Championship in Milan.
Best home brewing tips
Baristas who participated at the NBC in Mumbai share their favourite hacks to make the best cup of coffee at home.
• Nahid Khan, Roastery Manager, Blue Tokai Coffee, “Select your coffee carefully. I recommend picking Arabica coffee from Riverdale Estate, Harley Estate and Ratnagiri Estate. Don’t skip on practice--you can’t make great coffee from the first day."
• Mahesh Katre, Barista Trainer, Subko Specialty Coffee, “I would suggest brewing with a French Press because it’s difficult to go wrong if you follow the right steps. Just make sure you have coarse grind coffee and the temperature of the water is 90°C. Brew for four-five minutes."
• Amritanshu Prasad, Assistant Manager, Third Wave Coffee, “First and foremost, don’t try to replicate what’s happening in a café because you don’t have a coffee machine worth ₹7 lakhs. Instead, focus on buying the right equipment designed for home use. The one I recommend every home brewer to use is called V60 to make pour over coffee. With the right recipe, you can get a well balanced cup."
Priyanko Sarkar is a Mumbai-based writer covering the F&B industry.