Congratulations Joel May - 3rd place in Canada
This is a quick post to say congratulations to Joel May, one of our barista trainers at Fratello Coffee, for finishing 3rd place over all in the National Canadian Barista Competition. This is a HUGE accomplishment for Joel & Fratello. The competition was very steep this year and to even move on to the Canadian finals was great, let alone the top 3!!
This is Joel's 3rd year in a row finishing in the top 6 in Canada. We hope he is proud, because we sure are!
2010 Prairies Regional Barista Competition
On August 7th, Come and watch as the top baristas in Alberta and Saskatewan compete for a chance to represent the region at the Canadian Barista Competition in Toronto.
Get involved behind the scenes or just come out to cheer on your favoriet baristas.
This is open to all of the public and is being held at:
Fratello Coffee Roasters
4021 - 9th Street SE
Calgary, Alberta
Tickets are available for $5.00 at the door. Entrance also gives you the ability to win the 50/50 draw at the end of the evening.
Bolivian Cup of Excellence Coffee - Cafe Central Lot #6
Fratello just won another Cup of Excellence coffee Lot. The auction just finished and was one of the longest bidding wars I can remember. After it was all said and done, the #1 lot was sold for $35.05/lb (green) which is a new record for Bolivian Specialty Coffees.
This stretched on for almost 7 hours! Fratello chose to puchase Lot # 6 which was also given a Presidental Award. A Presidental Award is given to any coffee which scores over a 90.00 in the Cup of Excellence compitition.
Lot#: 6 Luis Huayhua Chiji - Café Central - Jury Score 90.71
Below is information on the coffee that we will be sharing with all of our friends/clients in the new year.
Luis Huayhua is father of three children. He is married to Zenobia Charca, a coffee producer for over 20 years and winner of the Cup of Excellence 2008. He arrived in Alto Beni from Achacachi in the Bolivian high plains (the altiplano) with her parents when he was 10 years old. Luis learned about coffee production as a child, while working alongside his parents, but he had never processed coffee. For this reason, de-pulping, fermenting, washing and drying there coffee to participate in the competition presented a challenge for him. (more…)
Colombia | Cup of Excellence
I have just returned from Pereira Colombia after judging the 2009 Colombia Cup of Excellence competition. Although tired, I'm thrilled about this experience. It is so exciting going through the cupping process and seeing the award ceremony's on the final day.
The Cup of Excellence competition is the most thorough and competitive screening process a coffee farm will put their coffee through. The goal of COE is to bring out the best coffee a current region has to offer in the current crop year. After the competition is over, the COE award is given to the top farmers who represent the best coffees that this region has to offer. These coffees are then put in front of the world on an on-line auction which rewards these farmers for their focused attention to improving quality coffee, and puts a spot light on this region show-casing their excellence.
Stage one Involves the submission from the farmers current crop of coffee. Of the 512,000 families growing coffee in Colombia, only 374 submissions were sent in this year, which was relatively low do to the fact that Colombia's crop forecast is 30-40% lower than the year before.
All of these coffees are cupped and analyzed in Colombia by local cuppers. All coffee scoring an 84 or higher (out of 100) move on to the second National Cupping jury. The National Cupping Jury is chosen from the pool of local cuppers. They are chosen for their cupping skills in the first stage.
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Honduran Cup of Excellence 2008 - Las Amazonas
Yesterday was the online auction for the 2008 Honduras Cup of Excellence competition, and Fratello Coffee is happy to say, that we have won another Lot of coffee, and are the ONLY Canadian company to win one. This is always an exciting process, and is particularly long, when you are also one of the 26 judges from around the world to actually participate in the competition at origin.
The judging process is a 4 day cupping extravaganza that allows you to taste the best coffees that country has to offer. It starts out with the national cupping jury to taste all the entries and separate all the coffees that score an 84 or higher.
The next event bring the international jury into to rank all of these coffee to pick the final farms that qualify as a Cup of Excellence coffee (again anything over 84). Every coffee gets tasted by each judge from 4 - 12 times and will be scored, and described each time. Very tiring, but very rewarding.
When you walk away from the competition, you have experienced the best of this country as well as had the opprotunity to discover many different micro regions that had never been descovered until this time. (more…)
Brazil Sete Cachoeiras Estate wins first place at SCAA 2008
I wanted to let you all know that the Brazil Sete Cachoeiras Estate - Rainforest Alliance coffee was given an award at the Specialty Coffee Association of America (SCAA) this year to recognize their quality among all the Rainforest Alliance Coffee produced.
When I went out for dinner with Renato Farhat Brito and his father Marcel Renato Brito, the owners of this estate, they had mentioned that when they entered this contest, they entered the exact same Lot of coffee we chose to import.
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