coffee nerd

A quite enjoyable day at work, it was. Today I met our newest barista to open the cafe. While I set  up the kitchen and baked the good, he prepared for his bar test.

To make drinks at the cafe you must pass a bar test. This means you have to prepare a series of drinks that are judged on espresso extraction, steaming/foaming of milk, presentation and speed. It proves to us that you are capable of preparing consistently delicious drinks. It also proves that you've learned something and that you take your job seriously. The entire training process takes about a month to a month in a half and ends at the passing of your bar exam.

The barista who passed today came to us with some previous experience. Today he said, "I want to go back and visit my previous coffee shop and teach them how to make a real macchiato and show them all the things they need to improve on" We then had a great conversation sharing stories about all the horrible things we were taught to do at other shops that completely ruin their coffee.

" We NEVER changed the grind. Actually, I think it was against the rules to change the it!"

"We never capped the coffee or rinsed the carafe between brews. The drip was horrible! No one who worked there drank the coffee... it was too bad!"

"The espresso grinder chamber would be AT LEAST 1/2 full- all of the time. We never ground to order- unless it was a mistake!"

"We had a tower of coffee filters stacked up with grinds in them, just waiting around to be brewed."

"We would re steam milk!"

This coffee nerd banter went on for a long time. It always gets me excited to talk about coffee and I appreciate the opportunity to share that passion with someone. In New York, where I caught what I call, the coffee bug, these conversation were frequent. Most of my friends worked in coffee and unlike here in The Berkshires, being a barista is a pretty cool, hip and honorable job- and baristas are passionate and want to talk shop!

My current goal for the shop is to help build a better, closer coffee community in The Berkshires. I feel that while Im home on maternity leave, that I will be able to create the bones of a Berkshire Barista Guild /Organization. We could sponsor barista events, barista jams, generate barista pride/community, build our coffee knowledge etc.

aaaah.... the possibilities!

Below is a picture of one of the beautiful lattes that our newest barista poured today. We geeked out a bit on ratemyrosetta.com- I think that's what inspired him!