Coffee – Page 8 – Abstract Gourmet

Velvet Espresso

The latest in the line of sexy new cafes run by people who know their stuff has hit the CBD. Velvet Espresso on King St is now open for business and pouring a fine brew indeed. I dropped by for lunch with Ben (W.A Barista Academy honcho and pin up boy for the Perth coffee scene) this week to check out the place and see how it all stacked up.

Justin Kenny, owner and barista of Velvet has a good track record in the Perth cafe scene. He owned Fix Espresso back in the days when it was actually making good coffee, and gained a reputation as a man who knows his stuff, quiety going about his work and impressing with the results.

Velvet Espresso is an excellent addition to the King St set. It’s relaxed but stylish, with lush dark wood tones on the tables and a Florence Broadhurst print on the walls. It looks the part, but what is more important… it tastes the part.
The King St area is currently dominated by cafes that earnt their reputations a long time ago (King St Cafe), and who now have fallen away into what I term espresso mediocrity (Cino to Go, Etro). They might look fancy, but the quality in the cup is a long way from ideal. Velvet changes all that.

Justin is using a great locally roasted ‘5 Senses’ blend. It’s full bodied and robust, with a bit of edge to it, and a slightly spicey aftertaste. It’s what I’d call a great drinking coffee, and it works well in a short cup as well as in milk. The shots are pulled quite short to get the best elements of the flavour, without the lingering bitterness that so often destroys a shot of espresso. What’s more important though, is that it’s all a work in progress for Justin. He’s still refining his blend to get the exact flavour and style of espresso that he wants. A concept that I’m sure is completely alien to the majority of cafe owners in this city, who are happy with whatever Vittoria or Segafredo or “Insert Generic Italian Sounding Crap Coffee Brand Here” gives them.

They’re also serving some very tasty sandwiches and rolls, and Justin’s mum’s friands (that she bakes fresh each morning) are bordering on levels of tastiness to rival some of *my* mum’s baking (well, close anyway :) ).

If you work in the CBD, go and check out Velvet Espresso. It won’t disappoint.

Velvet Espresso
5/172 St George’s Tce (Enter on King St)
Perth

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Latte Art Pro Style

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I dropped into Epic again yesterday and learnt an important lesson. If you hang around long enough talking to the barista’s you get handed all sorts of great coffee to try :)

I happened to come in while Megan (W.A Latte Art Champion this year) was going through the motions of making and perfecting every drink on the menu… just for practice (!) My latte art skills are quite obviously lacking compared to this… but perhaps one day I’ll be able to pull a few of them out. The coffee again was great.

Epic Espresso

Last Friday I headed down with great anticipation to see the latest addition to Perth’s burgeoning gourmet coffee scene, Epic Espresso. Epic is the vision of former “Core Espresso” owner, and all round coffee obsessive Corey Diamond.

The place looks nice. Sexy fit-out with wood tones and funky furniture throughout, and some crazy machinery sitting on the bar. To start with is the 2 x 3 group Synesso Cyncra’s… the top of the line in commercial espresso at the moment, and a small feat of engineering brilliance. I had the pleasure of playing around on one of them recently at the Perth Food & Wine Festival, and they are sweet. Next on the list is the sizable stack of Mazzer grinders. There are three Mazzer Roburs (two of them running off three-phase power, and another from regular power), and a Mazzer Mini (on the first day) for Decaf, that has since been replaced by a Mazzer Super Jolly. All that gear alone would cost more than I’d like to think… let alone the heavy duty ceramic cups, stylish new tea infusers, and an array of milk steaming jugs that could equip a small army (of milk steaming soldiers).

Needless to say, Corey is not one for doing things halfheartedly. Epic is his vision for raising the standard of coffee in Perth, and from what I’ve seen it’s done that already.

Stepping into the shop on opening day I was greeted by the lovely baristi, and asked what to order. I thought i’d better start with a flat white and work my way on from there. All of epics coffees come with a double shot as standard, they have a policy of sending all their flat whites out with latte art on top, so mine was presented with a lovely rosetta. Aside from looking great though… it tasted phenomenal. The espresso cut through the milk nicely and although I’m pretty bad at describing flavours it had a definitely chocolaty after taste… If you’re one of those 2 sugars in your coffee by default people… it may be a good place to start getting out of that habit.

Next I tried a double ristretto shot of the Capricorn Estate Singe Origin. Epic dedicated one of its grinders solely to single origin espresso (which is funnily enough, coffee beans that are sourced entirely from one place, and not blended). This week/month (?) It’s an Australian grown coffee, and a good one at that. A lot of single origins don’t stand up on their own as espressos, and there is much debate about whether they should be used for espresso at all… but I think it’s great to have the ability to try and taste different coffees, and to help educate people into not thinking of coffee as just a bitter black liquid you have to pour sugar into for your morning caffeine hit. It’s by tasting single origins that you get to see the vast array of flavours that are possible.

So next on to the hot chocolate. This is made with molten Belgian chocolate which is ladelled into a small steaming jug. Then milk is added and it’s steamed together to a nice thick consistency. Then poured out and extra molten chocolate poured over the top. No need for tacky marshmallows or the like…this is luxury in a cup… without the sickly sweet tasty that most hot chocolates suffer from… sure to be a hit.

Finally, when I thought i was finished, and had a nice little buzz going from all the coffee (4 shots so far), Corey suggests I try the piccolo latte… which he thinks works really nicely with the espresso blend they’re using (another 5 Senses blend).
He was right… deep rich espresso and steamed milk… A great way to get the flavour of the coffee and the sweetness of the milk in one package.

All in all, 6 shots of coffee, and the happy satisfaction of knowing there is somewhere I can count on to get great coffee when my Silvia (Rancilio) decides to give me hassles. Looking forward to heading back soon and keeping them honest… but I expect lots of good things to come.

Epic Espresso
Outtram St (turn left off Hay St, just down from Miss Mauds)
West Perth

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Catching Up on Coffee

Yes, I know… I’ve been neglecting this blog terribly. So here are a few posts to keep the faithful going. A little old school latte art action, intermingled with some fancy new photography courtesy of the new camera.

First off, some new arrivals to my roasting efforts. A bag of Ethiopian Harrar, and a bag of Colombian Valle del Cauca Supremo (which is the photo above).

The harrar is sweet fruity bean, along the lines of the Yirgacheffe, but without as much of the winey aftertaste. The Valle del Cauca is a big full bodied coffee, and they accidently made a very tasty little espresso blend for me.

Other things to note of late is that my latte art still sucks the big one, although the photos look infinitely prettier.

I need to get my Silvia serviced again because I’ve gone and completely stripped the top of the screw that holds the shower screen in. It seems that its made of a pretty soft metal that expands a lot when it gets hot, and so even though I don’t screw it in tight at all, it’s near impossible to get loose after a while. Hence my mauling it with all manner of stubby screwdrivers and swear words. I will be warily treading back to the coffee machine shop I went to last time, to see if they can get the screw out, and give me a new one, without rorting me out of my life savings.

Watch this space for exciting coffee related photo’s soon.

WA Latte Art Competition

Last Sunday I headed down to the WA Barista Academy to have a chat with Ben and a few of the more discerning baristas and latte artists in Perth about the upcoming WA Latte Art Competition. Once again an AASCA sponsored event, and part of the lead up to the Australian and World Latte Art Competitions to be held later on this year.

The format of the competition is basically as such: You need to make 3 types of 2 identical drinks. One is a latte (flat white / monk head / foamless cappucino), the other is an espresso macchiato (piccolo latte), and the final is a drink of your own creation. Then points are allocated to the taste of the drinks, the quality of the designs, and the similarity between both patterns (so you can prove it wasn’t a fluke the first time), and a bunch of other factors.

So it was a good day, and I got to meet a few more of the cool people that make up the Perth coffee scene, like Clare from the newly opened “Tiger, Tiger” in the city, Corey from Core (soon to be Epic Espresso), Megan from Core, Jeremy (WA Barista Champion), and Dom of “My Favourite Perth Cafes” and “How to Poach an Egg” comments fame on this very website.

After the formal procedings we got into “Barista Jam” mode, and I made a mockery of the Mazzer Robur by adjusting it three times in the wrong direction…before realising what the hell I was doing and finally getting some decent shots after about 20 minutes. Then attempted many poor excuses for latte art that Ben assures me could be good enough to use in the competition, which according to him I have a good chance of performing well in, when you take into account nerves of competitors and the like… but I will need to start churning out something a hell of a lot better than my recent efforts for me to want to take the step and compete.

I’m more of a big fish in a little pond kind of guy…

On the roasting trail again

Well having officially run out of all the beans I’ve been given, it’s back to roasting my own coffee for the time being.
I seem to waver on and off between roasting my own and buying beans from others. I find my own technique doesn’t produce the results as well as the beans I buy from local roasters (well mainly 5 Senses). This could be due to the fact that I’m using an IMEX CR-100. A tiny popcorn popper style roaster that has neither the thermal stability nor the capacity to roast coffee the way it needs to be. If you’re not a purist though, it does a reasonable job, and I am officially the hardest person to please with my own efforts.

The upside to it though, is that I have full control over how my coffee turns out, and can take all the credit when I make someone a delicious espresso or latte on my silvia (espresso machine) :)

So here’s a quick video I pulled together of me roasting some coffee at home. It’s not particularly exciting, but some of you who have never seen what green coffee looks like before may find it interesting.

The coffee blend I used was:

Indian Tiger Mountain A – 60%
PNG Sirehini – 30%
Costa Rican Tarrazu – 10 %

Sorry for the crappy audio/blair witch cameratography/random merengue tracks playing in the background.

You wouldn’t believe how much I laughed when I put those titles and credits on the video. Apologies to anyone who has multimedia skills… Making dodgy videos is just too easy these days.

Tag: Coffee