Five Senses Coffee Blog

Bali – It’s good to be back!

The 2011 harvest trip is officially underway! The WA contingent were first to arrive and our new favourite “saffa”, Charles Stewart was quickly anointed “coffee captain” and proceeded to smash out some Clever brews to an appreciative and dangerously under caffeinated crew!

The main project for the trip is to build a nursery at Tri Karya, an isolated farmer group in Bedugul. It will be particularly challenging as transport in and out is by scooter only and will make bringing in people and supplies tricky! Watch this space for our progress.

In true Bali style our wish for a photographer has materialised in the form of our second favourite “saffa” Abbey Rands. It’s her magical Bali shot you see below. Can’t wait to see her images from the farms.

Welcome to the team Abbey! The crew have scattered for massages and yoga sessions before our first team dinner tonight.

Its great to be back!

Bali Crew - 2011

Some work from Abbey the photographer

Cheers to MV Beer

Every now and again I stumble upon a piece of marketing genius. You have to check this out, its brilliant. Make sure you hang in there until the end: www.mvbeer.com.

To the crew at MV beer, I tips my lid to your marketing people and extend a warm welcome from the Five Senses family. Beer for coffee swap perhaps?

Classic Bali

I met the farmers from Bedugul very briefly last year and they offered me possibly the most motley, defect ridden coffee sample I’ve ever seen! The actual township of Bedugul straddles two lakes and is very scenic in the brief periods it’s not totally enshrouded in cloud! We set off from Ubud to revisit the farmers on a brief respite from the persistent rain. We met them at a tiny, ramshackle roadside warung. The old lady who runs it would have been a beauty in her day. I could imagine her topless in one of the old black and white photos you see from the 40’s and 50’s. Her husband is around 90 and maybe showing some signs of dementia but is happy and full of energy. He speaks fluent Japanese from the occupation of Bali during Second World War. She is his 5th wife. After years of hard work he can’t relax and digs holes just to keep him himself busy.

A squad of scooters arrived to pick us up from the warung and ferry us into the Subak (co-op) headquarters. The track is narrow and incredibly hilly and it was an exhilarating ride in. The farmers were waiting for us in the hut and we sat around and chatted for an hour or so, the whole group chiming in as we tried to get a feel for what they need. Bali is a very democratic society, with lots of consultation on any decisions affecting the community. Whilst there is a designated leader who is treated with lots of respect, everyone is free to offer their opinion. The farmers are way behind our groups in Kintamani but are very keen to try to work with us and get things on track. This will be a long term project and we will start by building a nursery for them on the June harvest trip so we can get the right varietal (S795) planted from day one. There is around 30 hectares of land available to plant out in coffee which would be a huge undertaking but very exciting. I’m also curious about having cloves as the intercropped shade tree and whether that will have any impact on a flavour. Possibly a slightly romantic notion!

We concluded the meeting after making some plans and prepared to leave. It started to rain as the scooters ferried us back to the main road. My friend Iwa had to jump off the back of the scooter and run up the steepest hill as the bike he was on didn’t have the power to pull 2 people up the steep incline. He had one hand trying to keep his pants up and the other holding a large palm leaf over his head as an improvised umbrella. Hilarious! By the time we got back to the main road it was pouring and we sheltered under the eaves of the warung. A couple with a small baby all on one scooter pulled up to shelter from the rain. It was quickly decided the wife and baby should come with us and we would drop them in Singaraja. It was so natural and happened with almost no communication. Classic Bali! The baby was pretty upset and the mother pulled out a swollen breast (the world’s best packaging solution, right there!) and began to feed him. He settled down to feed but kept one big brown eye on me the whole time. I started by stroking his finger and hand and after a while he curled his little fingers around mine and squeezed my hand. After lots of cajoling and playing he eventually reached out to me and jumped over and we played for the rest of the journey as he bounced on my lap. We dropped them at their place in Singaraja and continued on our journey.

The weather turned bad quickly and we drove home in heavy rain. It started to clear as we got closer to Ubud and I hung my head out the window like an inquisitive puppy and filled my lungs and heart with Bali as it whizzed past. Can’t wait for June!

The student becomes the teacher!

It was a wonderful day for our endeavours in Bali as our favourite barista Komang Budiana took charge of his first barista class at the prestigious Legian Hotel. Komang was one of the baristas we previously brought to Perth for some intensive training and we quickly recognised he was an absolute natural. His ability to pick up new skills is phenomenal and he would be a great barista in any country. To say I was proud was something of an understatement! After a slightly nervous start, Komang took firm control and did a great job, wowing them with his silky skills and amazing latte art.

We left a very pumped up and enthused group of baristas at the Legian and headed over to see our friends at Sea Circus, where Komang jumped behind the machine to coach Gede and Taree. With a mouth full of braces and lots of enthusiasm, Taree quickly won us over – she is destined to be a gun barista. There even seemed to be a little more than just professional interest in the student-teacher relationship. Watch this space!

Off to Bedugul today to meet with a very isolated and slightly lost group of farmers. The plan is to build them a nursery during our annual harvest trip in June so they can get free access to the S795 coffee seedlings that are a critical component of growing great coffee in Kintamani. This is a relationship in its infancy, but armed with the learning’s and experience of our last four years, I’m confident we can get them on track and in charge of their own destiny.

Bali continues to amaze and enchant me on every trip. Glad we can give something back.

Coffee is a Way of Life

On meeting Sunalini Menon, the founder of Coffeelab in India and a tireless champion of Indian coffees it’s impossible not to be impressed by her intellect and broad coffee knowledge. My friend and colleague Jenny Murray recently sent me this quote from Sunalini’s Wikipedia listing. Inspirational, beautiful, evocative, it’s got it all. Should be compulsory reading for anyone in the specialty coffee industry.

Sunalini has this to say on coffee “Coffee is a Way of Life … not just life, but a life which is aromatic, meaningful, rewarding, and passionate. Aromatic with its unique flavour and taste, meaningful as you connect and make friends for life across the world, rewarding when the farmer is not only able to upgrade the quality of his produce but is able to market the same successfully, and passionate when the “coffee aroma therapy” not only rejuvenates you, but also rekindles life for farmers and consumers across the globe. Every day I wake up and look at coffee, to find something beautiful. It certainly is all about expecting the unexpected.

Sunalini Menonm, the founder of Coffeelab

Roy the Boy!

Ok folks. Put your baseball cap on sideways, crank up the Tupac and channel a little LA “tude. It’s time to get your Roy Choi on! Equal parts poet, philosopher and chef, Roy has lit up the Melbourne Food and Wine show with his fresh approach and amazing food. Roy mixes the Korean food of his childhood with years as a top class chef and stuffs it all in taco. More a rolling block party than a traditional restaurant Roys food trucks hit the streets of LA, connecting to his audience via twitter to alert them to the locations of his five trucks and how long the wait will be. 80,000 followers and still growing! The trucks are called Kogi which is Korean for meat.

Roy is intimately wired to the streets of LA, using food as a vehicle to unite people of his much loved hometown. This is street food of the highest order. With affordable prices and accessible food Roy is starting the food revolution from the bottom up! Evangelical and super passionate, Roy could come across a little “try hard” if he wasn’t so damn committed and uncompromising. I am a believer!

Ok, enough about Roy. The punters continued to flock to the 5 Senses stand for coffee and the feedback was overwhelmingly positive. The brand recognition for 5 Senses amongst a sophisticated and discerning group was a quite staggering and another reminder of the great job that the Melbourne 5 Senses posse are doing.

I can’t help but think it’s time for someone from the specialty coffee industry to run a coffee specific master class next year. Benny, time to polish up the public speaking skills!

Celebrity Chef and LA icon: Roy Choi

It’s a little bit fancy

Back in Melbourne to help our brave local boys keep the foodies caffeinated during the annual Melbourne Food and Wine Master Class series. The venue is the Langham in the Southbank complex and its perfect for the event. Lots of chandeliers, marble and beautiful fabrics.

For the foodie tragics out there we made coffee for some of the industries royalty including Maggie Beer, Roy Choi, Stephanie Alexander and our W.A queen of wholefoods, Jude Blureau. With the Uber and lots of filter options we’re doing our bit to try educate the foodies that coffee can be every bit as exciting and complex as food or wine.

Ok, gotta go, here comes Nigella!

Expect great coffee from Indonesia

Well the first Indonesian coffee comp is all over. In classic indo style it was a bit disorganised but full of character! The coffees were solid with out being spectacular with the highest coffee just getting over the 85 point mark that would have made it eligible in a COE format. Wendy de Jong from Tonys coffee was the bully on the auction floor and picked up several nice lots with Andrew Fords (from MTC) being her main sparring partner. We had a crack at a couple of really clean Java lots but unfortunately the reserve price wasn’t reached and we walked away empty handed. The revelation of the event was the Kopi Luwak entries. Most of the highly pointed coffees were presented by “Mr Luwak”, Kasimoto from Maharaja coffee in Jakarta. He is passionate about wild harvested Luwak and we will see if we can get an interview with him for our website. Next year will be bigger and better and we will make sure we bring the best lots back to Australia!

Indiana Jen heads to Rwanda!

For anyone who doesn’t know, the Cup of Excellence programme is like the AFL grand final and Boxing Day test match all rolled into one! So it goes without saying that we were pretty proud when our very own Jen Murray was the only Australian selected to serve on the judging panel for the 2010 Cup of Excellence event in Rwanda.

Jen has endured a heavy duty barrage of shots and inoculations to get her ready for the trip, which has left her immune system a bit shaken up. Not exactly the perfect preparation for a trip to Africa but I’m sure Jen’s ‘never say die’ attitude and bottomless supply of chutzpah will get her through.

The judging panel represents the specialty coffee world’s dream team, with Tom Owens from Sweet Maria’s, Annette Moldavaer from Square Mile and Indian legend Sunalini Menon all suiting up.

Jen assures us that she will diligently blog her escapades so watch this space as Jen slurps and sips her way through Rwanda’s best coffees. That’s every day, right Jen?!

Indiana Jen

We’ve got worms!

The worms have finally arrived at Ulian Murni! After some particularly dirty work to get the worm farm established (you’d really need a scratch and sniff computer monitor to get the full experience) we now have some worms actively breaking down the discarded coffee pulp. It’ll take a while for the worm population to build to the levels where they’re getting through large volumes of pulp. Worms eat about half their weight in food every day and their digestive tracts enrich the compost with elevated levels of nutrients. The resultant compost will be spread back under the coffee trees and is set to be one of the key factors in our initiative to assist the farmers to return to fully organic agriculture.

We've got worms!