Photo by Christian Harder.

One of the most striking aspects of Detroit’s economic decline has been the neglect and decay of some of its most historic buildings. Michigan Central Station, once an emblem of the city’s automotive industry, has been left to rot—its shell a magnet for graffiti artists and urban explorers. The opulent grandeur of the Michigan Theatre, in its heyday a 4,000-seat movie palace which played host to Doris Day, the Marx Brothers, and Louis Armstrong, is now a parking garage. Other landmarks, like the Detroit Museum of Art, are simply gone.

But some, like the historic Wurlitzer building on Broadway in the city’s downtown, are being slowly brought back to life. The Siren Hotel, a newly opened restoration of the Wurlitzer by the design development firm ASH NYC, aims to continue the regeneration of Detroit’s once-bustling downtown. The hotel boasts 106 rooms, seven restaurants and bars, a barbershop, and in the lobby, a sleek cafe by Bay City, Michigan native Populace Coffee Roasters.

Although finishing touches are still being made (the lobby staircase was being painted during a recent visit) the hotel feels very much alive and bustling. Walking through the front door today is to step into the past. The lobby is grand and opulent, with antique furniture, huge ornate mirrors, chandeliers, and marble touches throughout.

On the right hand side as you enter is a marble topped check-in desk flanked by enormous tropical plants, and opposite is Populace Coffee’s beautifully appointed bar. The lobby doubles as the cafe’s seating area, with an eclectic collection of plush vintage armchairs and sofas allowing guests and visitors alike to sit and soak up the ambiance.

Andrew Heppner founded Populace in his hometown in 2010, after getting his start in specialty coffee in California at Intelligentsia’s Venice cafe. Originally a wholesale roaster, with just Heppner and now-co-owner Dave Daniele running the entire show, Populace opened a retail location in Bay City last October, and currently employs a staff of 12 between the roastery and its two cafes. Even still, Heppner spends a lot of time traveling between his home base and Detroit, making sure that everything is running smoothly at the Wurlitzer.

The coffee bar has been designed to blend into the old-world elegance of the hotel. For espresso, Populace employs a two-group La Marzocco Linea EE with support from Mahlkönig Peak and GH2 grinders. Drip coffee is supplied by FETCO batch brew, while a Chemex option also exists for those wanting to linger and share. The menu is succinct but comprehensive.

This is not, however, just another hotel cafe. For Heppner, the intent has always been to attract customers from the surrounding neighborhood in addition to hotel guests.

“Our goal is really to attach the neighborhood as much as possible,” he says. “Because there are a surprising amount of people that live in this immediate area.”

As of a week into operation, Heppner says that about three quarters of Populace’s customers have been non-guests. Being located in such a unique setting definitely helps; as he puts it: “It’s nice that it’s pretty in here.”

Populace’s involvement with The Siren Hotel goes back 18 months, and since then Heppner has watched the renovations unfold with anticipation.

Photo by Christian Harder.

“For me, it was such a big deal to open, and to be a part of this project,” he says. In preparation, he visited The Dean Hotel in Providence, Rhode Island, also designed by ASH NYC. “I just fell in love with their design, their attention to detail.”

For the wider coffee industry, it’s these creative partnerships—like a collaboration between a pioneering hotel restoration and one of Michigan’s outstanding coffee roasters—that will allow the state’s maturing coffee scene to progress still further. If you’re a coffee lover visiting Detroit in the near future, this is the place to stay.

Fionn Pooler is a journalist based in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and the publisher of The Pourover. Read more Fionn Pooler on Sprudge.

All photos by the author unless otherwise noted.

The post Inside Populace Coffee In Detroit’s Siren Hotel appeared first on Sprudge.

Source: Coffee News

Soooooo yesterday we reported to you on a rash of mysterious letters received by coffee roasting companies in and around the city of Portland, including well-known local Oregon roasters like Roseline Coffee, Heart Roasters, Stumptown Coffee Roasters, and Dapper & Wise Coffee. We called the story “A Portland Coffee Mystery.”

We were wrong.

In a still-ongoing and frankly captivating torrent of outreach, we have heard many dozens of coffee companies nationwide who have received similar or identical letters to the ones first published here on Sprudge. From Alaska to Florida you emailed us, commented on this rollicking Instagram post, and slid into our DMs. In the last 24 hours we’ve received 16 copies of identical or near-identical letters, all sent from the same return address—an apartment complex in Las Vegas—to roasters large and small, new and old, all across the United States.

Below is a collection of these confirmed letters you’ve sent us over the last day. We’re sharing these with usage approved by each individual recipient. At this time we are continuing with our policy of redacting out the letter sender’s full name and address.

Clearly this goes far beyond the Willamette Valley and its environs, and is instead a coordinated effort targeting coffee companies nationwide. We’ve received so many contacts and claims of receivership, and we’re working now to track down and confirm these as best we can.

For now, here’s a national map of where we’ve received reports, some of which date back as far as 2016—40 in total so far and counting, which you can peruse geographically in this handy map.



Here’s a quick rundown of what we know so far, or at least what we think we know:

1. Some person or persons has been sending dozens of handwritten letters to coffee roasters across the United States, complaining about “stale” product and requesting “replacement” coffees be sent to an address in Las Vegas.

2. Letters have been received as recently as Monday, July 23rd 2018.

3. The oldest letters received date back as far as 2016, as confirmed by Madcap Coffee Company of Grand Rapids, who also received letters in 2017 and 2018.

4. The letters all bear the same return address in Las Vegas, and are written on behalf of the same name: Daniel G. (we are not releasing Daniel’s last name at this time).

5. The letters all bear identical handwriting, formatting, spelling errors, reiteration of receiver address, demand for a “prompt explanation,” and sign-off as “Sincerely.”

6. The letters are devoid of any kind of electronic footprint and include no email address, social media information, phone number, or other means of contact beyond a return address.

7. All different kinds of roasters have received these letters: established brands as well as newcomers, small town roasters and big city companies, brands with multiple locations as well as owner-operator mom n’ pops, spots we’ve featured on Sprudge a dozen times and folks we’re delighted to be hearing of for the first time this week, in admittedly odd circumstances.

There’s much more going on behind the scenes that we can’t share with you just yet, including several leads we’re following regarding the address and purported letter writer—and let us assure you that the more we learn, the creepier and freakier and less cut and dry this all appears to be. Look for much more from us on this mystery in the coming days, including—by repeat and popular request—a special podcast presentation of the facts and theories and fan cult nicknames surrounding the mysterious case of Daniel G.

In the meantime, if you know anything more about the sending of these letters, please get in touch with us. If you have received a letter nigh-identical to the one above, get in touch with us. And most important: if you work in coffee and have received similar letters over the last decade—handwritten on lined paper but with different messaging, and from a different city in Nevada—please, please reach out as it relates to a major set of clues we’re tracking in this case. Anonymity guaranteed and no sources or images used without express consent.

Of course if you happen to be Daniel G. and you’d like to say hello—please feel free. We want to hear your side of the story and also to better understand what you mean by “stale” coffee, because it is unclear. You have our utmost cooperation.

info@sprudge.com

1-888-55-SPRUDGE

@Sprudge on Instagram 

The post Letters From Daniel: Coffee Scene Investigation appeared first on Sprudge.

Source: Coffee News

Gender inequity is a problem every facet of the coffee supply chain faces. From farm level to importing to the cafe, the difference in both representation and pay between men and women (to speak nothing of issues gender-fluid individuals experience) are significant. But the Partnership for Gender Equity (PGE)—an initiative created by the Coffee Quality Institute—has recently released a new tool called Project Methodology to “enable industry allies to more effectively engage in gender equity.”

Officially released at World of Coffee in Amsterdam at the end of June, Project Methodology is technically the third tool from the PGE with such an aim, but could also be described as more of a synergy of the first two: the Common Measurement Framework (CMF) and the Engagement Guide. Created thanks to funding from the Sustainable Agriculture, Food, and Environment (SAFE) Platform of the InterAmerican Development Bank, the Project Methodology “details explanations that support companies, development organizations, and other supply chain partners as they design, plan, launch, and monitor a project at a household, community, and producer-organization level,” per the press release.

Per the press release, the PGE plans to roll out this initiative in eight to 12 different field level projects across multiple origins, impacting an estimated 25,000 households and 100,000 individuals. They will then “track the impact and compare results, with the intention to demonstrate the impact of integrating gender equity approaches to sustainability in the coffee value chain.

For more information about the Project Methodology tool, visit the Partnership for Gender Equity’s official website. And for those interested in receiving a copy, a request can be submitted here.

Zac Cadwalader is the news editor at Sprudge Media Network and a staff writer based in Dallas. Read more Zac Cadwalader on Sprudge.

Top image via the Partnership for Gender Equity.

The post The Partnership For Gender Equity Releases New Project Methodology Tool appeared first on Sprudge.

Source: Coffee News

25

The streets around the Saint Lazare train station churn with a current of hurried office workers, wandering tourists, delivery trucks, and city buses. In the shadow of the austere Église de la Sainte-Trinité church, Hanoi Corner is a little haven of calm welcoming passersby for lunch or an afternoon cup of tea. 

The cafe, specializing in Vietnamese filter coffee, Vietnamese tea, and street food staples like banh mi sandwiches, is Nguyen Nam and Nguyen Linh’s love letter to their Vietnamese-French heritage.

“I wanted to create a Vietnamese coffee shop, but I didn’t want to just serve a good cup of coffee,” Nam says. “I wanted to take customers on a voyage to discover Vietnamese culture.”

Nam is Vietnamese, but grew up in France; his wife, Linh, came to France from Vietnam to study. For Nam, a former IT project manager, coffee is an opportunity to stop and enjoy the moment. In Vietnam, he says, coffee is never taken to go.

“Coffee made with a Vietnamese filter takes time,” Nam says. “It’s coffee that invites you to sit down and share it with someone.”

Though Vietnam is a major coffee producer, the quality of the beans, mostly Robusta, is generally considered inferior to those produced in other regions. But as interest in coffee grows, so has the demand for locally grown Arabica and lighter roasted beans. Cafe culture is developing in new and exciting ways in Vietnam, particularly in cities in the south, where a number of cafes are taking a specialty coffee approach that includes different extraction methods and a special attention to provenance. Hanoi Corner tries to capture the diversity of this movement for a French audience, sourcing both darker-roasted beans as well as more modern interpretations from The Workshop, a specialty roaster in Ho Chi Minh City.

“There’s this side of Vietnam that many French people aren’t aware of. We wanted to show traditional coffee, specialty coffee, and what’s happening in between,” Nam says. In addition to offering straight up Vietnamese filter coffee, the couple also prepares a beverage with iced coconut milk, as well as egg coffee, which is topped with whipped egg yolk and condensed milk. Nam admits that purists might be put off by the idea of coconut and coffee mingling, but also insists that different occasions call for different coffees.

“I love eating at gourmet restaurants, but that doesn’t stop me from enjoying comfort food now and then,” he says.

For Linh, it was important that teas also appear on their menu. A staple beverage in Vietnam, green tea is consumed in the morning, after meals, during ceremonies, and with family. In addition to two native green tea varieties and three native black teas, the cafe serves a lotus-infused green tea produced within the traditional Vietnamese style, with no artificial flavors—for this drink, green tea leaves are infused six times with lotus flowers harvested from the West Lake area in Vietnam. All teas are procured from small producers who work with local communities in Vietnam’s mountainous tea-growing regions.

“Our work here in Paris has to give something back to Vietnam, it can’t just be about making money,” Linh says.

Nam’s decision to exclusively serve coffee brewed with the Vietnamese Phin filter is unique in Paris, and even more so because he has developed a specialty-inspired brewing method specific to the filter.

“I wanted to work with the beans and filter from Vietnam, and the methods I learned in France,” he explains. When he first began learning about extraction methods, he found the Vietnamese filter often presented as a quaint element of local culture rather than a serious way to make a good cup of coffee. So, initially he concentrated on learning V60 techniques.

But there were things about the V60 that bothered him, namely a nagging sense of irregularity, no matter how precise his measurements were. “The Vietnamese filter is even simpler than the V60, which meant I could concentrate on precision of grind, temperature, and ratio,” Nam says. He spent a year poring over books and adapting V60 techniques to the filter, eventually refining a brewing process that produces coffee with a flavor and mouthfeel somewhere between an espresso and a filter brew.

Nam’s hard work paid off earlier this year when he won the Réseau Barista de France Brewing Contest with his method. In the past, he’s been reluctant to enter competitions that don’t include blind tasting, because he’s sensed some condescension within the specialty coffee community toward the Vietnamese filter.

“In my experience, people have had preconceived ideas about my coffee before they even taste it. They’ll say, ‘It’s not bad,’ but they don’t dare say it’s good,” he says. The blind tasting was an opportunity. “To show people that it’s possible to make a modern, relevant cup of coffee with a Vietnamese filter. It’s not just a quaint bit of folklore to play on nostalgia about Vietnam.”

The couple takes the same approach to food as they do coffee, using Linh’s family recipes to create banh mi sandwiches, bo bun bowls, and manioc desserts that break with a nostalgic or static approach to Vietnamese cuisine.

“We want to show there’s another face of Vietnam than what you find in the restaurants in the 13th arrondissement. There’s nothing wrong with them, but they were opened by people who came after the war with an older vision of Vietnam,” explains Linh.

“But we can show something new, with good pastries, tea, cake, a good banh mi—a blend of French and Vietnamese culture, based on traditional recipes.”

The slow evolution of Vietnamese cuisine in Paris may arise in part from the stigma Nam says many Vietnamese families attach to working in the food industry. Growing up, for example, Nam says his parents emphasized the importance of higher education and getting a well-paid job in a company, and his decision to open a cafe left them perplexed.

“There’s a level of fear in saying you work in the food industry, it implies that you’ve failed in your studies, in your life,” he explains. “But I went to school, I worked and eventually I realized I had nothing to prove to anyone.”

After just three months in operation, Hanoi Corner landed a Time Out mention as one of the best places to seek out Vietnamese food in Paris. It may be a sign that the city is ready for what the new generation of Vietnamese creators have to offer.

“It’s funny because the French brought coffee to Vietnam and now we’re bringing Vietnamese coffee to France. The circle is complete,” Nam says.

Kate Robinson (@KateOnTheLoose) is a freelance journalist based in Paris. Read more Kate Robinson on Sprudge. 

The post Vietnamese Coffee Comes Full-circle At Hanoi Corner In Paris appeared first on Sprudge.

Source: Coffee News

There’s a mystery afoot in the city of Portland, Oregon.

A coffee mystery, you see, implying commercial grift most foul. It began in the most analog and innocent of ways: a letter in the post. An act laden with historical significance, today the daily mail is mostly the domain of bills and Super Shopper circulars, but the news we receive each day from the mail carrier still has the capacity to shock, delight, and even disturb.

So it was on an otherwise boring, sun-drenched summer Tuesday on the banks of the Willamette River, when local coffee roaster Zach Perkins went to check the mail at his place of employment, Roseline Coffee. He received a letter that day that would change his life forever.

It comes from a very real address in a non-descript apartment complex in Las Vegas, authored by one Daniel G. (last name withheld for legal reasons). The letter asserts the following:

Here is a scan of the letter—we’ve edited out the sender’s address and last name for privacy reasons:

“We thought it was a scam off the bat because we had no record of him within our system,” Perkins tells Sprudge. And so, in the chummy, familial vibe the Portland coffee scene somehow maintains despite the competition that undergirds all forms of late capitalism, Perkins reached out to a few fellow roasters directly, and posted copies of his letter to social media.

A malestrom ensued.

It turns out that nigh-identical letters were received over the last calendar year by Heart Roasters, Nossa Familia, and Dapper & Wise Coffee Roasters. [Ed. note: this is a partial list of brands contacted and confirmed at press time.] A similar style of contact from the same name and address took place back in September of 2017, hitting Stumptown Coffee Roasters. Even more shocking, an in-person version of the “stale coffee complaint” was made by a guest at a company that shall remain nameless until we can attain formal verification.

Here’s a copy of the nigh-identical letter received in 2017 by Heart:

“We keep tight records on all of our orders, and we had nothing for this name or address,” says Heart Roasters Director of Wholesale Ryan Cross. “It’s a scam.”

A scam indeed! And so now let’s throw open the flood gates to you, dear reader. Have you been contacted by a mysterious Daniel G. of Nevada, seeking recompense for allegedly “stale” coffee? Did he send you letters in the same oddly perfect, hand-written style? And WTF is stale coffee, anyway? Do they mean too far off roast (which is itself a point of significant disagreement)? Are they talking about the dreaded “baggy” term sometimes applied to green coffee that is imagined to be past crop, but is actually a set of flavor associations with broad possible diagnosis?

Moreover, did you send this person coffee in response to their query? Or did your scam senses tingle, like the above recipients? Did you take photos of these letters, and will you send them to us so that we may run more of them?

Perhaps most importantly: Are you Daniel G. reading this right now? Would you be willing to share your side of the story, and perhaps help define what “stale” means because we really aren’t sure?

Get in touch.

The post Letters From Daniel: A Portland Coffee Mystery appeared first on Sprudge.

Source: Coffee News

Summer is the time for music festivals. Even with this year’s particular brand of sun-based brutality, summer is still the time to get outside, maybe enjoy a few coldies, and have fun enjoying some musical stylings while soaking in the vitamin D. And Tacoma’s Live Loud Music & Arts Festival taking place this Saturday, July 28th is upping the intrigue (for the coffee-going public at least) with the addition of LattePalooza, a throwdown hosted by Dillanos Coffee Roasters and Anthem Coffee Company, happening smack dab in the middle of the festival.

A one-day festival, Live Loud is as much arts as it is music. The day kicks off with a merchant market featuring over 50 local makers as well as a live art community mural being created in real time. Then it’s time for the latte art. Baristas will face off for pour-based dominance, with the winner taking home a brand new Nuova Simonelli Oscar espresso machine. Second and third place finishers will take home and camping brew kit and a training and tour of Dillanos, respectively.

After the crema has settled and the winner announced, the proverbial stage will give way back to the literal stage, where Grammy nominated hip hop artist Q Dot will close down the day’s festivities with songs from his new album being released at the event as well as a “limited coffee line to coincide with the long anticipated new album,” per the Dillano’s press release.

For those looking to compete at LattePalooza, the sign-up fee is $10 and includes a shirt and beer ticket. Sign up begins at noon with the competition kicking off promptly at 6:00pm. For more information, visit the Live Loud Music & Arts Festival’s and LattePalooza’s Facebook event pages.

Zac Cadwalader is the news editor at Sprudge Media Network and a staff writer based in Dallas. Read more Zac Cadwalader on Sprudge.

Top image via Dillanos Coffee Roasters.

The post Tacoma: LattePalooza Throws Down At The Live Loud Music & Arts Festival appeared first on Sprudge.

Source: Coffee News

Charlotte has to be one of the low-key most exciting coffee city in the United States right now. Somehow, the city at the epicenter of Counter Culture‘s orbit has managed to fly under the radar, but make no mistake about it, the CLT has firmly put its name on the map. And this is due in large part to the small, independent companies that are really pushing the city’s coffee scene forward. In the last year alone, shops like Comic Girl Coffee (profiled here on Sprudge) and Trade & Lore in the Salud Cervecería are providing unique spaces and experiences for customers, and doing so on their own terms.

And there’s a new name to add to this list: Undercurrent Coffee. With Onyx Coffee Lab as their primary roaster, Undercurrent is creating a community-forward cafe, but one that highlights the stories of the myriad craftspeople involved in all their goods. Fresh, seasonal, and delicious, everything coming from Undercurrent has a story, and it’s one they will gladly tell. So let’s let them do just that, shall we?

As told to Sprudge by Diana Mnatsakanyan-Sapp.

For those who aren’t familiar, will you tell us about your company?

Undercurrent Coffee is a new business with its first cafe located in the Plaza Midwood neighborhood in Charlotte, North Carolina. It was a company founded by the husband and wife duo Todd and Erin Huber, two Plaza Midwood residents and coffee enthusiasts who saw a need for a comfortable community gathering space in their neighborhood. Undercurrent is a coffee business highlighted by our love for our community, made unique by our ingredient-focused, seasonally-rotating food and beverage offerings, and brought to life by our enthusiastic, knowledgable, and approachable team.

Can you tell us a bit about the new space?

2012 Commonwealth is a 2,000-square-foot cafe situated in the heart of Plaza Midwood, a diverse and eclectic neighborhood one mile northeast of downtown Charlotte. The shop was designed with cool tones, an influx of natural light, and communal seating to yield a comfortable and calming spot for our guests to enjoy. The cafe is comprised of a large coffee bar with extensive tile work, eye-catching shelving, and 42 plush seats, ranging from chairs to couches, throughout the dining area.
Outdoor seating for 12 to 15 people is provided in front of the cafe, allowing Undercurrent’s guests to enjoy the shade provided by a large neighboring oak tree, and to blend into the bustling neighborhood of which it is a part.

Within the cafe is a coffee education lab, a 200-square-foot classroom in the back of the building where Undercurrent’s Director of Operations, Diana Mnatsakanyan-Sapp, will lead a variety of public coffee education classes, as well as professionally-focused SCA Barista and Brewing certification courses.

What’s your approach to coffee?

We really care about accessibility, with a back-to-basics approach in our beverage program that highlights the ingredients we use and the craftspeople we work with. We take pride in partnering with vendors who pursue excellence—our primary roaster is Onyx Coffee Lab (I doubt I have to tell you how extraordinary they are!), we have rotating monthly guest roasters featured from around the country, our milk comes from a stellar local dairy farm called Homeland Creamery, our syrups are made in-house using ingredients from regional Southeastern farms… I could go on, but you get the picture. In everything we do, we strive to make the handiwork of the many creatives, farmers, producers, and businesses we work with the star of the show, while still letting folks enjoy the drinks they know and love.

Any machines, coffees, special equipment lined up?

In our main bar we’re using a custom Kees van der Westen Spirit Duette and two Nuova Simonelli Mythos Clima Pros for our espresso service. We utilize Kalita Waves for our pour-over menu, and grind coffee on a Mahlkönig EK-43 for those and for our batch brews in a Curtis G4 ThermoPro.
In our coffee education lab we’re working with a La Larzocco Linea EE, a Mythos Clima Pro, a Mahlkonig EK-43, and a Curtis G4 ThermoPro. We’ve got at least a half dozen different manual brew options for folks to play around with in our classes and a lot of fun coffee tools to help educate our baristas, our community, and ourselves better on the science and craft of coffee.

What’s your hopeful target opening date/month?

We opened in late March 2018!

Are you working with craftspeople, architects, and/or creatives that you’d like to mention?

Erin Huber, the brains behind the aesthetics of Undercurrent, aimed to work with as many local craftspeople as possible when we built out this cafe. The team behind Cluck helped us design the space and were our architects. Katie Schindler and her team at Fine Grit made all of the stunning custom tabletops and shelving units, and helped us with all of our cabinetry finishes. The folks of 26 Industries welded the large steel columns throughout the cafe. Frank Hyatt and the team behind Pacific Builders took on the construction project and lead us to a successful completion. Local designer Hollie Burgess of Beautiful Idiot Clothing sewed custom aprons for our staff. Plaid Penguin was instrumental in creating our branding, website design, and helping us pick out the unique finishes that created a cohesive look for us.

Thank you!

No, thank YOU!

The Build-Outs Of Summer is an annual series on Sprudge. Live the thrill of the build all summer long in our Build-Outs feature hub.

Photos by Jayme Marie Johnson. 

The post Build-Outs Of Summer: Undercurrent Coffee In Charlotte, NC appeared first on Sprudge.

Source: Coffee News

Barista competitions: they’re cool and all, but really pretty expensive, right? Money is a major barrier of entry for many coffee competitors, with the average barista spending thousands on their entry fees, coffees, and related expenses, to say nothing of hiring a trainer or coach.

But what if there were an all-expense-paid barista competition training program built around providing education and resources to competitors from marginalized communities? Meet Glitter Cat Barista Bootcamp, the new creation of founder T. Ben Fischer, 2018 US Barista Championships runner up. This new event launches in Philadelphia October 23rd-25th 2018 featuring courses taught by Laila Ghambari (2014 USBC Champion), Pete Licata (2013 World Barista Champion), Lem Butler (2015 USBC Champion), and Erika Vonie (2017 New York Coffee Masters champion). They’ve got a spiffy new Instagram and official website you can check out now.

GCBB is an “a new kind of training focusing on building up yourself and what makes you tick to do well in barista competitions,” focused on creating an environment for trainees where money is not a barrier to entry. Here’s more about the event’s mission statement from the official GCCB website:

This all seems like a strongly good idea, and so we simply had to learn more. Sprudge spoke with Fischer from Philadelphia.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Hey T. Ben Fischer—thanks for speaking with us. Why do think a project like this is important right now?

There is so much talent out in the world that we have yet to see simply because of lack of access to training and materials. This can be due to a multitude of reasons: racial bias, gender-bias, queerphobia, discrimination against people with disabilities…the list is endless. Looking back at the past few years of competitions we see a lot of men, specifically white men, including myself. How can we grow as an industry competitively, personally, and professionally without giving people from all cultures and communities a platform to speak? Moving forward from the 2018 competition season I knew that I needed to have an active role in finding a way to help change what the average barista competitor looks like.

Who is the project for?

This project is for people who self-identify as a member of a marginalized or vulnerable community. Glitter Cat leaves this open to interpretation of the person applying for a spot. A few communities to name are those coming from racial/ethnic minorities, LGBTQ+, women, people with disabilities. Basically, straight white cis men need not apply.

Why “Glitter Cat”—can you share with us any more about the event’s name?

Bear with me…I am an openly gay man, but in getting to this point, I was met with a lot of hatred and push-back. Thankfully I had a mom, sisters, and a few close friends who carried me through the coming out process. The years following continued to be difficult as I grew into my self and came to know who I was (a never ending process really). It was not until this past year that I truly started accepting myself for who I am and who I want to be. It was not until I accepted my quirks and oddities that I made finals for the first time at USBC 2018 after five years of competing. Being true to who we are is the only way to truly succeed. Holly Bastin, one of my coaches this year, gave me a pin before nationals that read: “More Glitter, Less Bitter” and that tag line really stuck with me. In short: Glitter Cat represents how fabulous I hope to be, an acknowledgment to others to be their 100% true self, and an encouragement to those who cannot be themselves to keep pushing forward.

Why is free education important?

Most of us baristas can barely afford to pay rent and eat, let alone focus on developing our professional careers! I have eaten so many bags of rice and cans of beans wishing I could attend a Q Grader course or Barista Camp, but simply could not afford the entry frees or accommodations. I hope to deconstruct one of the biggest barriers to training, and that is, often, money.

Thank you. 

Glitter Cat Barista Bootcamp is now actively accepting applications, as well as seeking sponsorship inquiries. Visit the official GCBB website for more details, and follow them on Instagram for updates.

Jordan Michelman is a co-founder and editor at Sprudge Media Network. Read more Jordan Michelman on Sprudge.

The post Glitter Cat Barista Bootcamp: A New Free Program For Barista Competition Training appeared first on Sprudge.

Source: Coffee News

In New York City, you shouldn’t be surprised by any kind of business that exists here. Don’t blink an eye at whatever sort of cafe hybrid you may stumble upon, whether it’s a nail salon that serves lattes or a surf shop that brews single origins exclusively. However, when video games and coffee collide, it may be worth taking a closer look—like at Waypoint, the city’s first eSports specialty cafe.

Electronic sports, otherwise known as eSports, have been around longer than most people realize. While their popularity has climbed exponentially in the last decade, the act of competitive virtual gaming started as early as 1972, when Stanford University hosted tournament rounds of the game Spacewar. In the ‘90s, the rise of the internet paved the way for battle-oriented PC games like League of Legends and the iconic Massively-Multiplayer Online game World of Warcraft. They gave users across the world a chance to connect and compete, with companies like Nintendo and Blockbuster sponsoring tournaments with lavish prizes like Ferraris and huge cash jackpots. The creation of World Cyber Games and the Electronic Sports World Cup in the 2000s set the tone for serious gaming, and the establishment of Major League Gaming in 2002 made them one of the biggest gaming leagues in history. Today, eSports arenas exist all over the world in addition to countless LAN centers (gamer talk for eSports play centers), and prize money easily dips into the millions.

Your typical, somewhat sterile experience at a LAN center includes a too-comfortable computer desk chair, two massive computer monitors, and library-carrel-style dividers between gamers. With plain walls, neon lighting, and over-ear headphones, no distractions come between you and the game. Even food can be limited to heated automatic vending machines, when you have a quick few seconds in between battle rounds to inhale some Top Ramen before returning to your station. How fun does this sound to you?

For those looking to game with better breaktime options, and even those simply in need of a good coffee, NYC’s Waypoint Cafe upgrades the LAN center experience significantly. Their solid, front-facing coffee bar not only improves the quality of the gaming experience, it also offers a gathering place for the gaming community and beyond.

Luigino Gigante behind the bar at Waypoint

Waypoint opened just this past fall on the Lower East Side, a business built by former game and hardware reviewer Luigino Gigante. While Gigante comes from a heavy gaming background, he also grew up in a family of restaurant owners. Gigante’s coffee interests came out of a mixed, caffeinated family upbringing, along with a preference for cold brew over Red Bull during finals weeks in college.

“I’m Italian and Puerto Rican, so I come from two very different schools of thought [about] coffee,” Gigante explains. “On my father’s side, it’s just straight espresso, and my mother’s side is very light, sweet, different pour-over types of coffee,” he says.

After noticing how unsuccessful LAN centers around him were, Gigante opened Waypoint, drawing inspiration from Uncommons Cafe, a similar nook in Greenwich Village that combines coffee with board games. Waypoint’s location is also intentional.

“A lot of people don’t know this but the Lower East Side has a lot of history in gaming, actually,” Gigante says, noting its proximity to Chinatown Fair, which was for a long time one of the oldest remaining traditional arcades on the East Coast. Chinatown Fair was “not like a Dave and Buster’s style of arcade,” Gigante insists. (Though it has since closed and reopened, with an unfortunately less traditional flavor.) 

The Lower East Side was already a place where a lot of PC, fighting, and arcade games were already played. Waypoint seeks to pay homage to the neighborhood, as well as become a community space for gamers again.

And while some multi-purpose businesses tend to focus on one feature over another, Waypoint is committed to both the art of gaming and specialty coffee. Serving Black Cat espresso from Intelligentsia on a La Marzocco Linea Classic and controlled drip brews from BUNN, plus cold brew from local roasters Death Wish, the cafe takes its coffee game seriously and its décor playfully. A plethora of plushies and action figures rest on the shelves of pastries and in between bags of coffee, and drink specials incorporate video game themes with them, i.e. the “star seeker sour” and “mur-lox” bagel.

Gamers can also expect to get a snack that surpasses your average heated vending machine. The full cafe menu includes salads and hearty chicken and mozzarella sandwiches, while pastries are a mix of goods made in-house and from Amy’s Bread.

The LAN center itself, however, maintains the average complexion of dividers and massive monitors. While the front serves as a social space, take a few steps back to the dungeon of computers, where users can access their own gaming accounts via ggLeap. The fun begins with classic, reputable games like League of Legends, DOTA (Gigante’s personal favorite), Minecraft, and World of Warcraft. Waypoint also hosts events and tourneys to truly test your skills. And don’t worry, just because this is a cafe doesn’t mean you’re getting kicked out by 7:00pm. Waypoint stays open till 10:00pm during the week and 2:00am on the weekends, which means even non-gamers can get a late-night caffeine fix.

In a crowd of freelance workers, gamers, and coffee enthusiasts, Waypoint has truly brought together an odd yet fun mix of people.

“There were a few kind of gaming communities that were flung out and spread and now they’re all starting to come here. It’s fun meeting new people,” Gigante says—even if it’s IRL.

Katrina Yentch is a Sprudge contributor based in New York City. Read more Katrina Yentch on Sprudge.

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Source: Coffee News

Remember those old Folgers commercials where a person is roused pleasantly from their slumber by the smell of coffee? They’d walk downstairs in their lovely New England home, already bright eyed and bushy tailed, to find a fresh brewed pot of Folgers, and they’d look serenely out their bay windows while gripping a hot cup of coffee with two hands. Turns out, those commercials may have been onto something. New research shows that smelling a coffee-like scent will make you better at math.

According to Newsweek, a new study published in the Journal of Environmental Psychology by researchers at the Stevens Institute of Technology in New Jersey found that persons exposed to a coffee-like smell performed better on the math portion of the Graduate Management Aptitude Test (GMAT), the entrance exam of sorts for business school.

To reach this result, the researchers administered a 10-question GMAT algebra test to 100 undergraduate business students. One group took the test in a room with a coffee aroma pumped in, the other without. According to the article, “those who got a whiff of coffee seemed to experience a boost in mental function and scored significantly higher on the test.”

Researchers believe at least part of the reason for the improved performance from the coffee-like smell—which contained no caffeine whatsoever—has to do with the placebo effect:

The article goes on to note that in a follow-up survey, “the participants believed that they would feel more alert in the presence of a coffee scent and that exposure to this smell would increase their analytical reasoning.”

So while it may be claimed that the best part of waking up is Folgers in your cup, this new research seems to show that it is the smell emanating from the cup that is the best part of waking up. But that doesn’t quite have the same ring to it, now does it.

Zac Cadwalader is the news editor at Sprudge Media Network and a staff writer based in Dallas. Read more Zac Cadwalader on Sprudge.

The post Wake Up And Smell The Coffee (And Be Better At Math) appeared first on Sprudge.

Source: Coffee News