I have been meaning to outline the Uber Project’s plans for 2010. I feel compelled to get it done before February descends upon us all and leaves us mired in 2010 proper. This post will hopefully answer a few frequently posed queries and force me to set out some deliverables for the project this year.
UBER BOILER IS LAUNCHED – REALLY
I apologise if this bit is somewhat salesy, but people are continuously asking me if the Uber Boiler is available, despite the post about the official…
I posted recently about the Gold Cup Research Group. I have now completed the scoping document for this research which has been given the nod by the SCAE Education Committee. Some difficult times lay ahead re. funding and objectivity. Exciting none the less.
You can download the research project structure here. Comments are very very welcome.
I am the programme leader for the SCAE Gold Cup. I got involved in 2006 and co-wrote the brewing presentation which was launched in Antwerp in 2007. I have continued to learn more and more at each course I run.
I now head up the Gold Cup Research Group (GCRG), which has set out a very ambitious task to re-confirm the basis for the Gold Cup Programme for today’s coffee world.
This re-confirmation is overdue, as the Gold Cup standard is derived from scientific analysis which…
There is a real disconnect between the objectivity of brewing parameters, which can can be controlled and the resultant subjectivity of taste which can at best have frames of reference using cupping forms and cupping vocabulary.
I’m not a ‘greenie’ and don’t purport to know anything of significance about origin and processing of coffee. I know enough to know I am consciously incompetent about the effects of origin and processing on the final cup.After the origin/processing bits are over, I’m a…
We launched the Uber Boiler in Host in Milan, Italy this week. I will post separately about the UberProject’s experience at the show and how the machine was received. For now, let me update you on what we have changed/improved, following everybody’s feedback since UberProject went live: FOOTPRINT – With the universal desire for a narrower unit,we have combined all user information into one display in front of the operator, reducing counter-top width to 250mm. CALIBRATION – Calibration of temperature settings is now driven from…
The Uberproject has been keen to play with grinders and grind profiles since its inception. I did postearlier on this topic in April 2009. At Caffe Culture in London in May while working on the Uber Bar, I met with Luca Caneve from Ditting, which is where the 805( aka Mahlkoning Tanzania) is built, with Georg Lauridsen from Mahlkönig and James from Square Mile. My idea was to get the grinder gurus and the coffee guru and the nerdy middleman (me)…
It’s got to be said, brewed coffee in Europe is in pretty bad shape.
An anecdotal look at the issue. Three recent occurrences to ponder:
1. Caffe Culture – London, UK. May 2009.
James Hoffmann, as star an attraction as one could have as lecturer, commands an audience of 4, that’s four, at a lecture on brewed coffee. He had a full house of 50 at an earlier Espresso lecture.
Following the Uberproject’s progress and the interest therein always brings me back to people enthusiastic about coffee for coffee’s sake and learning about this black stuff.
These enthusiasts are generally those who have no angle other than the pursuit of knowledge as they have no clear commercial agenda.
My own immersion into this world of nerdy coffee heads can be traced back to my visit to the WBC in Seattle 2005 and more pointedly when I helped run the inaugural SCAE European Team Coffee Challenge (ETCC) in Dublin in 2006.
This is a little film made of that event and it is interesting to see a few national and world barista champs rearing their heads before their ascendancy to world domination.
There has been a lot of really great feedback from the coffee community about what the barista would like in an Uber Boiler to accompany existing features – variable flow rate, variable dispersion, temperature volume presets et al. However, I don’t want to forget about tea. I find it quite extraordinary to find that Joe (and Paddy) Soap, from UK and Ireland, know for the most part less about tea than they do about coffee. Astonishing from nations one and…
Since we let the US Barista community have a play with the Uber Boiler at the WBC Bar in Atlanta less than three weeks ago, the UberProject now has to turn its gaze to dear ol’ Blighty, as the UK Coffee Community’s annual shindig, Caffe Culture , gets under way on May 20th, less than two weeks from now.
Marco has a 5m x 3m space in Caffe Culture (Booth E41) and we have taken a decision which may be just plain silly. Rather…
