How fortunate we were that World of Coffee was in Nice, the south of France. It was the year of my 60th birthday and we decided to make a celebration of it with friends Beth and Bryan who came along to share in the fun – with a couple of weeks in Paris beforehand and a couple more in the French countryside afterwards.

Collage of beth and bryan

At World of Coffee, our stand attracted the usual stream of international visitors, with plenty of sales now in South America. So we’ll be investigating the possibility of a Spanish translation of the Barista Bible some time in the near future.

Paul at the stand

The Championship Events

With the World Barista and Brewers Cup Championships in Australia earlier this year, the World Latte Art, World Cup Tasters, World Coffee in Good Spirits and the Inaugural Roasting Championships took place in Nice.

Australia’s Champions who competed in either Nice or Melbourne were …

  • Barista – Matt Perger from St Ali
  • Latte Art – Jen Marks from Veneziano Coffee
  • Brewers Cup – Lachlan Ward from Sensory Lab
  • Cup Tasters – Elisha Mauger from Gloria Jeans.

We were there waving the flag for Jen Marks from Veneziano Coffee who competed in Nice. With Craig Simon as coach, she was in good hands and her performance was excellent. We had a good spot up close cheering her on. However, it was the Japanese champion, Hisako Yoshikawa who was the winner.

Collage of Jen marks and craig simon

The World Cup Tasters Championship had 36 participants. The crowd went wild as Lajos Horváth from Hungary won with a perfect score in 6 minutes, something no other competitor in the history of the competition had ever done in a final round. Elisha Maugher, our Australian competitor came 14th in the first round of heats.

The World Coffee in Good Spirits Championship attracted 21 competitors , with Victor Delpierre taking our first place, with a stunning presentation of three different cocktails – ‘Grand Marnier Coffee Margarita’, ‘Irish Coffee’ in which he use agave syrup instead of sugar and ‘Coffee, Cognac and Cigare. The high point was burning apple tree wood infused with orange oil using a smoke gun, to give the effect off a cigar. Australia had no participant in Cup Tasters event.

An exciting new addition to World Coffee Events was the inaugural World Coffee Roasting Championship. In a 3-part event the best roasters from around the world, first of all evaluate (grade) the quality of the green beans provided. They then develop a roasting profile designed to bring out the best in those particular beans. Lastly, they’re assessed on the cup quality of their roasted beans. The winner was Naoki Goto from Japan.

Best Performing Coffee Nation

Accumulating the most points over all the competitions (in Australia earlier in the year and in Nice), the 2013 Best Performing Nation was Japan. Two wins no doubt contributed – Hisako Yoshikawa in World Latte Art and Naoki Goto in the Roasting Championship. Well done Team Japan!

The 2013 champions who took out first place in Nice and Melbourne were …

  • Barista – Pete Licata, USA
  • Brewers Cup – Erin McCarthy, USA.
  • Cup Tasters – Lajos Horváth, Hungary
  • Coffee In Good Spirits – Victor Delpierre, France
  • Latte Art – Hisako Yoshikawa, Japan
  • Cezve/Ibrik – Turgay Yildizli, Turkey
  • Roaster – Naoki Goto, Japan.

Tamper Tantrum

A great way to get to know what’s going on in the coffee industry and to meet those driving its progress, is to hear Colin Harmon from 3FE in Dublin and Steve Leighton from has Bean in the UK, banter with the coffee industry’s ‘celebrities’. Called ‘Tamper Tamtrum’, it’s designed to provoke debate and discussion on the industry’s hot topics. This year, with words like ‘sustainability’, ‘innovation’ and ‘future’ bobbing up, everyone got an insight into where the industry is heading. The Tamper Tamtrum brew bar where a lot of the action took place this year was a great place for us to meet new and old one-a-year coffee friends.

Collage of WOC in Nice

Fine French hospitality

Not surprising since the event was in France, a new feature this year was ‘Zone des Chefs’ – a space dedicated to matching coffee and food. Various Michelin rated chefs from in and around Nice with demonstrations of coffee and food matching – interesting as it was for both sweet and savoury foods.

Extraordinary hospitality accompanied all the social events. The standard was set at the Welcome Reception held at the Chamber of Commerce. Over delicious canapes and cocktails, we reconnected with those we hadn’t seen since the last World of Coffee and established new friends and contacts, notably those from Malongo Coffee who hosted the event.

The next day, we took a drive our into the countryside to do a tour of the Unic factory, Unic being the only French espresso-machine manufacturing company. In great detail, we were shown how espresso machine parts are manufactured, put together and packaged. Look out for a subsequent blog on this visit.

We were honoured to be invited to the fabulous Unic cocktail party – in the grounds of the stunning Villa Massena, a neo-classical Italianate building on the Promenade des Anglais. A museum since 1921, events such as weddings are held there now. With finger food in abundance and champagne flowing freely, the networking got off to a flying start. After the savoury course of delicate treats, was a sumptious cheese one followed by a delicious array of petit fours – all in true French style. We did the coffee origin competition, had our photos taken, listened to a great band, viewed rooms of the villa, watched the latte art ‘smackdown’, and well into the night we left, talking about the best party we’d ever been to.

The SCAE / Coffee Kids beach party on the famous Promenade Des Anglais was a way more casual affair with partygoers in their best beach gear. As the sun set in a blaze of colour across the mighty Mediterranean, enormous atmosphere and networking gained momentum with UK coffee friends such as Elisa Kelly from Coffee Kids, Paul Meikle-Janney from The Coffee Community and Ken Cooper from Pennine Tea and Coffee who was in the running for the loudest shirt.

One highlight at Nice was meeting Marta Dalton a coffee grower from Guatemala, who invited us to a coffee tasting and to visit her family finca (that’s a plantation in English). We tasted her coffees, which were exceptional and promised to visit one day. The time was short, but over a few chats and a dinner, we cemented one of those friendships you know you’ll have forever.

Collage of beach partyThe beach at nice

What a wonderful event World of Coffee 2013 was – from the coffee folk we spent time with to the food we ate and what we learnt about coffee and its amazing industry.