The Golden Bean Roasting Competition returned to Queensland this year. It was our third Golden Bean and my first time judging. Nervous that I may not do justice to someone’s beans, I teamed up with Lorna Shaikh from HA Bennett who cups coffee all day as her job. Needless to say, I learnt a lot from Lorna over 3 days. Meanwhile Paul teamed up with Andrew Hetzel, a coffee consultant from Hawaii who was one of the guest speakers for the event. So Paul learnt a lot too.
In between tastings, I had a little peep in what’s known as ‘the engine room’ at Golden Bean competitions. It’s where several professional baristas prepare the beverages for judging. With well over 1,000 entries each judged by two people, that’s possibly 2,500 coffees or more to be made. Before each new entry is put in the grinder, it’s cleaned out thoroughly to prevent contamination with flavours from previous beans. The baristas are focussed on ensuring each beverage is presented to the judges as best it can be.
Beer degustation dinner
The social event to top off all social events at Golden Bean 2012 was the impressive beer and food matching dinner. Showcasing Sunshine Coast produce, each course was matched with a different James Squire beer, including the dessert, which came with a coffee beer. The menu was truly inspired and beautifully presented – one of the best we’d ever experienced.
We started with a local king prawn served Thai style with mango, followed by prosciutto-wrapped quail, poached pear and a local blue cheese, followed by sticky plum, pork belly with local pineapple and ginger, followed by a braised beef rib with beetroot jam and marsala sauce. The finale was a chocolate and macadamia dessert with berries and a chocolate sauce.
Afterwards, we enjoyed a talk from Dr. Chuck Hahn, who founded Hahn Brewing and the James Squire range. We were to learn that James Squire was among Australia’s first convicts, arriving on the First Fleet in 1788.
The story was told of a particularly notorious character in the early colony, who got away with misdemeanours others were hung for, surviving only because he was the only one who knew how to brew beer. Some years later, as a free man, he had accumulated sufficient land to grow Australia’s first hops and start his own brewery. He was to become a highly respected and much-loved citizen and when he died in 1822, his funeral was the biggest ever held in the colony in over 40 years. He was buried in a cemetery that’s now under Sydney’s Central Station.
This story makes sense of the interesting titles of the James Squire range, being One Fifty Lashes, Four Wives, The Swindler and Hop Thief. And I think we may have tried them all that night!
Syphon demonstration
With alternative brewing methods taking off, and syphon coffee into its second year of the Golden Bean competition, there were demonstrations of the syphon method throughout the program. You’d be forgiven for thinking it’s a science experiment of some kind, but the procedure of making coffee using this delicate glass device has its beginnings in Berlin, during the 1830s.
Known as a vacuum pot in the past, water is placed in the lower section and ground coffee beans in the upper. As the liquid contained in the bottom one is heated, increased steam pressure forces the water into the upper section. Then after the coffee is brewed and the heat source is removed, the steam pressure is reduced causing the coffee (without the coffee grounds) to be sucked back down to the lower section.
There have been many different variations of the syphon over 200 years or so, with well-known brands such as Bodum from Denmark and Hario from Japan, leading the way with current developments.
The competition
Filter coffee, another alternative brewing method, along with 2 home roaster categories were added to the Golden Bean in 2012, bringing the number of competition categories to 12. The winners were …
The overall winner was Andy Freeman from CoffeeSnobs. The Freeman family had 2 reasons to celebrate with Zed Freeman, Andy’s 11-year-old son, winning the Home Roaster (milk-based) award, setting this little guy on a path to follow in his father’s footsteps!
The Gold Medal winners were …
- Espresso – Veneziano Coffee
- Milk Based – Proud Mary Coffee
- Australian – La Savoir
- Organic – Barossa Coffee Roasters
- Single Origin – Ducale Coffee
- Decaffeinated – Dimattina Coffee / Pioneer Coffee
- Filter – La Savoir
- Syphon – Coffex Coffee
- Chain Store / Franchise Espresso – Three Beans
- Chain Store / Franchise Milk Based – Michel’s Patisserie
- Home Roaster Espresso – Habib Maarbani
- Home Roaster Milk Based – Zed Freeman
The winners of the Reg Barber trophies were …
- Overall Winner – Andy Freeman from CoffeeSnobs
- Overall Franchise/Chain winner – Nashi by Veneziano Coffee
Cafetto Hall of Fame
Each year, an award is offered to a roaster who has made a lifelong contribution to the Australian coffee industry. The 2012 winner was Giancarlo Giusti from Melbourne, who started Grinders Coffee soon after he migrated to Australia in 1960. The story goes that he purchased his original roaster, the red one that still sits in the original Lygon Street store today, for less than one pound. He’s now retired, having sold his business to Coca-Cola Amatil in 2005, but Giancarlo still wanders up and down Lygon Street occasionally as he has done for decades. The brand Giancarlo with the motto ‘Coffee is my Life’ was recently created in his honour.