UK Barista Championships - Epilogue (Part One)

The following post was written immediately after my performance in the UKBC Scotland Heat. I am posting it now as I did not want to post it whilst the competition was ongoing, out of respect for other competitors. I will follow this post up with more up-to-date commentary.

The UK Barista Championships are still ongoing. Not for me though. Recently I took part in the Glasgow heat and didn't get through to the next stage. So I wish the very best of luck to all those baristas who worked so hard to achieve their much-deserved place in the Semi-Finals. I'd also like to get my thoughts and feelings into a blog post whilst they are still fresh. I'm going to take a week or so to write this post, as I think I need that time to 'decompress' from several months of immersion in preparation for my first attempt at the competition.

My objectives
I am a relative newcomer to coffee. My main objective from entering the competition was to give me a focal point to learn and improve. Having an event as prestigious and 'serious' as the UKBC to work towards has dramatically intensified my learning process. I still have a munro to climb, but if I hadn't entered the UKBC my knowledge and skills would be far below their current levels. I have therefore achieved my main goal, and I am truly thrilled with what I have achieved in a short space of time.

My secondary goal was to come away feeling that I didn't let myself down; that I had done everything within my power to prepare, so that I would not be disappointed with my performance. By and large I think I achieved that too. I may have let the judges down (based upon my scores), but I delivered my script without forgetting words or stumbling, and I delivered all my drinks without spilling anything.  Although there were some material issues with my drinks on the day, the main issue I have with the delivery of my planned performance was timing. I over-ran by 37 seconds. Not good. But apart from that, it went almost according to plan, and that was good from a 'rehearsing' perspective.

"According to plan"
Going according to plan is good if the plan is good. Sadly my gameplan was bad. I took a few calculated risks that, on reflection, perhaps I shouldn't have taken. In addition, there were some factors that I could not plan for in my first year entry, but the experience will benefit me in future years.

1. Order of service.
I decided to serve in the order of Cappuccino, Sig Drink, Espresso. My reasoning was that I wanted the Espresso to be the headline act, and the entire set to build up to it... like a music festival. I also thought there was a practical argument in favour of this: Because I used a three-bean blend and wanted to impart a lot of information about it, it seemed to me that spreading the information across the whole set would give the judges a better chance to understand the espresso components before being served the espresso. 
Both of these decisions were mistakes.
There is a very good reason the most common order of events is Espresso, Cappuccino, Sig Drink. The espresso is the highest scoring drink. Get it right. By serving it last I reduced my chance of getting it right. Why? Time pressure for one. Atmospheric changes affecting the grind for another (there was quite a difference in temperature and humidity between the practise room and the stage). Not yet being as skilled as I need to be is a third.  So my espresso was not as good as it should have been, as good as I feel it has been for months, as it was in the practise room 15 minutes earlier. It was poor, and I take full responsibility for not handling the time and environment better. The sensory judges' scores reflected my shortcomings.

2. Using a three-component blend
I love the blend I used, and so do many people I know.  I am very proud that my roaster allowed me to represent his business, and ashamed that I didn't do a better job of representing it. But using such a blend posed a challenge in comparison with using a single origin. I knew that in advance, and chose to accept that challenge willingly. I found the learning process itself much more interesting and challenging with three beans than it would perhaps have been with a single origin. No regrets whatsoever from a learning point of view.
But from a competitive point of view my decision made my life more difficult than necessary. With three components to describe, there was too much information in my script, and in order to impart it I had to speak too much. This in turn made the judges' job difficult. They could not take all the information in and also assess the drinks concurrently, particularly as I had to speak quickly to fit it all in. And it was also difficult for the judges because of the somewhat disjointed nature of my presentation, where I was speaking about individual espresso components at various points throughout the 15 minutes.
I should have kept it more simple, spoken less, and made it easier for the judges to score me.

3. Terrible aspects of the venue
The Glasgow venue was shocking. No parking, so after getting past the ogre on the sentry gate we unloaded my kit onto the pavement.  My wife then had to disappear whilst I and my stuff waited in the rain for her to find a carpark somewhere else in the city and walk back to help me get things indoors.  We then lugged it four hundred meters around the building and through the university canteen.  A bloody a ridiculous start to proceedings, and one that it seemed every competitor had to endure.

The backstage practise area was miniscule. Not big enough for competitors to adequately get set up and subsequently packed away without adding extra unnecessary stress.

The temperature and humidity backstage were dramatically different from out front. You could feel it when you opened the door. After spending an hour on the practise machine and getting the grind dialed in, it changed hugely out front.  So all those flavour notes the competitors worked hard to pinpoint and extract were lost in a battle against the environment. Next year I will be better prepared for this possibility, of course.

There were also very annoying problems with the microphone/sound system as well as the terrible acoustics in the hall ... there were times when the judges simply could not hear me no matter how clearly or loudly I spoke. When a competitor has spent literally months researching and working on their coffee and writing a presentation that will inform the judges of specific and important facts relating to the competitor's entry, it is a complete slap in the face to be in a position where the judges cannot hear you because of echo and a crackling microphone. I saw other competitors having this problem at both Glasgow and Newcastle. Come on. This is basic stuff.

I will compete next year, but I do not imagine I will do so at that venue.  Please, Matthew Algie, you hosted the Glasgow event... please find a different venue for 2013.


4. Signature Drink Failure
I worked hard on my sig drink. I tried a lot of different ideas and concepts, rejected lots, and eventually found something I was happy to serve. I thought the idea was creative, the preparation was sufficiently complex to demonstrate the research and work undertaken, and I personally thought the components worked well together... at least during rehearsals. The almont nut milk I produced backstage in particular was, I believed, a really innovative creation that tasted good. The ginger syrup I made with natural brown sugar did, I believed, compliment the espresso as planned. Its purpose was to add a complimentary flavour that avoided thinning the espresso.
It bombed with the judges.
I was surprised by the feedback. To be told by one of the judges "we like drinks presented in glass like a cocktail" was one surprise. This seems very prescriptive to me. I had no idea that the signature drink was judged in this way... and indeed I deliberatily steered clear of the 'mixology' approach to the sig drink, as it is not representative of my own tastes in coffee drinking, so I would not choose to put my signature to such a drink. But if this is how the competition works, and how points are awarded, then this lesson has been learned... but it should be made clear in the rules.

However, I could understand and fully accept the sensory comments that were fed back to me. The nut milk, when combined with the espresso, can exhibit a strong alkilinity that can taste 'metallic'.  I had identified that as a risk, and thought I had overcome it by adjusting the proportions of the drink components. On the day I failed to get that part right, it seems. I also had a presentation problem... the nut milk was, at times, difficult to texture perfectly and therefore difficult to pour art with. The nice hearts I was getting in practise turned into milky splodges on the day. My bad!

One piece of feedback is particularly intriguing... in a good way. It was that the judges are not looking for ingredients that just compliment each other and are well explained. The choice of ingredients must be justified on the basis of what they are 'bringing out' from the espresso. It is quite a subtle difference, I think. For example, I explained how the gentle heat of my ginger ingredient bonded onto the sweet spice of the Brazilian component, and I believed that was good. But it wasn't enough... presumably because the ginger did not bring anything out from the espresso.
I fully accept the judges' feedback. I would like to understand it better, and perhaps there will be an opportunity to do so, because I feel like there is a disconnect between the rules and what judges' expectations. If I am to avoid making the same mistakes in future then I need a greater understanding of what the judges are looking for.



......... to be continued in UK Barista Championships - Epilogue (Part Two)