This year has been a bit of a blur for me in many ways. A lot has been going on and as a result it seems as though a blink of an eye in Springtime has turned into cold late November nights.

We are still enjoying our coffee, though we have found ourselves unable to get past one in particular, and there is a very real possibility that it is going to reduce the number of different coffees we get to taste this year as our craving – no it is an addiction – continues. Not since La Manuela up to and including the 2006-07 crop have we consumed so much of one coffee.

The coffee that I am waxing lyrical about is my current favourite by some distance, Finca Los Amates Bourbon (available at £4.50 a bag from www.hasbean.co.uk), which came eleventh in the 2009 El Salvadorian Cup of Excellence competition.

This is the typical thick, gloopy type espresso that I so love, except the sweetness typical of the style presents slightly differently to the usual milk chocolate and caramel tones. Steve describes a “dark chocolate sweetness” in Los Amates, and there certainly are clear tones of dark chocolate present, though it is not sharp dark chocolate as might be expected. Somehow it conveys great sweetness whilst very clearly remaining dark chocolate in flavour. There are even tones of caramel which are quite creamy and are highlighted by the fantastic mouthfeel. The best bit for me though is the undertone of blackcurrant (Steve gets blackberry) and a stunning spiciness that suits Winter evenings. With a lovely balanced finish and long lasting aftertaste, it is hard to move on from this coffee.

We may not always go for the latest trend in coffees in a big way, and there is always a tendancy for us to lean toward the chocolate caramel tones that I seem to witter on about endlessly, but with the huge selection of beans available in the UK these days it is easy for a real gem to be underrated. If a coffee doesn’t have a particularly unusual facet it has to stand alongside many other world class beans with similar attributes and it becomes easy to merely group them as types. Well Los Amates really stands out as a classic of its style. My advice is don’t miss out on this one.

Just a short note for those looking for Too Much Coffee. There is a slight issue with the TMC server this morning which is being addressed. Normal service will be resumed shortly, meanwhile please keep an eye here for any updates.

Our apologies for the inconvenience.

Update:  It is all sorted out now. The site is back up and running. Once again, apologies for the temporary outage.

For the past three days a remarkably large number of geeky coffee types have been staring at their computer screens whilst Lawrence Brown and his camera pals streamed live coverage of the UKBC finals to the internet for all to enjoy. And enjoy it we did!

Daft shenanigans prevailed on the accompanying web chat with some well known coffee names from around the globe dropping in and out as time zones, work commitments, alcohol consumption and just plain nodding off allowed. It was, in short, a good time with a great bunch of people who I am sure could not have had more fun if the same group had all spectated at the finals themselves …… and in all honesty, we could not have been so silly without being thoroughly told off!

The big news to come  from the web chat, and Steve Penk said it was no secret so I’m going to mention it here, is that the World Barista Championship is coming to London in 2010. Very exciting times.

There is much commentary and discussion about the UKBC competition itself on TMC (www.toomuchcoffee.co.uk). The standard was very good this year with solid presentations all round.

Thanks to Lawrence, individual performance videos can be viewed on demand at www.viddler.com/explore/ukbc/videos/

Huge congratulations to a very worthy and extremely popular champion, Gwilym Davies, who runs two coffee carts in London and is one of the nicest people in coffee. Gwilym, wearing his trademark flat cap and waistcoat (see photo on the right, shamelessly stolen from the official UKBC flikr stream) looked assured at all times, also taking the honours for best espresso and best signature drink.

Gwilym is the latest in a line of champions to be coached by the venerable Square Mile Coffee Roasters of London (www.squaremilecoffee.com), following the successes of two time UKBC and WBC 2007 winner James Hoffmann, former Irish Champion and current WBC holder Stephen Morrissey, and former World Cup Tasting Champion Anette Moldvaer.

TMC member Gwilym will go on to represent the UK later this year in the WBC being held in Atlanta, along with fellow TMC regular Colin Harmon, who was recently crowned Irish national champion.

Maxine Beardsmore of The Bottle Kiln in Derbyshire was UKBC runner-up and also won the coveted best cappuccino award. In third was another popular TMC member, and these days an independant entry in the competition, Tristan Stephenson.

Well done to everyone who took part and thank you to all concerned behind the scenes for three excellent days of coffee fun. Good luck to both Gwilym and Colin in Atlanta -  both are real contenders for the title.

In my usual slack style, February has managed to roll round before I finally completed the ‘Favourite 5′ list from 2008. Actually, it wasn’t easy and I kept changing my mind. That is a good thing though, if not for the timeline of the list, it certainly says much for the healthy state of the speciality coffee scene in the UK. Anyway, the list is now complete and appears in the ‘Favourite 5′ menu at the top of the page.

Also woefully late, thank you for the prod with a rather pointy stick Beany, is the result of the roaster naming competition. Thank you for the suggestions. They were all very good and it was not easy to decide on a winner. The entries from both Marcy and Technojock were excellent, however, in deference to Matt’s roasting prowess and fond memories of a chaff filled Whirley Pop session in our kitchen some years back now – that yielded both smoke and an excellent roast – plus and not least because his suggestion was a really good choice of name, the winner is:

Espressomattic, a.k.a. BreakoBoy, the king of the Whirley Pop with the name ‘Bernie’.

Congratulations mate and again thank you to everyone who took part. Matt wins the bag of homeroast that I said could not be sent overseas, though we will try to find a way if it’s at all possible.

Well that’s it for now. A massively belated wish to everyone for a very peaceful 2009.

Am I the only person that thinks HB Steve is a natural presenter?  Seriously, it’s no mean feat to remain informative whilst flowing in front of the camera. For those of you not yet acquainted with his brilliantly innovative new video blog initiative, have a little peep at www.inmymug.com – you won’t regret it,and you may even spot the odd discount code for some of Has Bean’s finest coffees!

Many months ago, I mentioned the Pinhalense that we were fortunate enough to acquire from a friend the previous summer. Not wanting to do things by half, or indeed fearful of not doing justice to the machine itself, we waitied patiently until a proper space could be made available as its permanent home.

Well the good news is that everything is now up and running thanks to some very kind help from a relative. It’s real seat of the pants roasting and extremely enjoyable. Interestingly, it seems easier to regulate the temperature of roasts with the Pinhalense situated beneath proper ventilation than it did whilst temporarily housed in the same space, though only a couple of roasts took place in that scenario and it could just be a case of becoming more familiar.

Also sorted out now is a proper cooling method for the beans which, although being ‘dumped’ at the correct time, were continuing to roast on despite the best efforts to stunt the roast. We are not fans of spritzing, so a rather ‘Heath Robinson’ contraption was built under the kind direction of TMC’s own roast database wizard ‘GreenBean’ who had already undertaken the process himself.

At a cost of some £65, thirty of which was for an engineering works to drill a single but perfect hole through stainless steel, the resultant finely tuned instrument looks a little like something one might see on a Wallace & Gromit film, but boy oh boy does it work!  The roast is stunted in under ten seconds, ambient temperature is reached in a mere twenty seconds and the beans are cold in around fifty seconds. Superb.

So our grateful  thanks to ‘GreenBean’ and all the gang at TMC, with a special mention for ‘Motoman’ who has also constructed a similar cooler and came up with some excellent ideas.

No doubt there will be more roasting tales over the coming months, but in the meantime the roaster needs a name. So here is the acid test for the blog, I may end up very depressed here if it becomes clear that no-one is reading, so a little competition is in order. A bag of the finest beans we can muster – roasted on said Pinhalense – shall be the prize to the person who comes up with the best name for our two-barrelled, gas-fired friend.

Beans will only be sent to UK addresses, though everyone is welcome to enter. We reserve the right to choose a name other than that which wins the competition, though I can’t see that happening. The closing date is 24th December 2008, the judges decision is final and the winning entry will be announced on New Year’s Day. Good luck!

The all too small speciality coffee world that many of us inhabit was rocked yesterday with the shock news that fellow enthusiast Danny McNulty had passed in the early hours of the morning.

It is always a surprise when someone dies suddenly, but even more so when they are apparently healthy, quite young – Danny was forty-nine – and a larger than life character. It seems that Danny had not been feeling too well and had been to hospital for tests. From accounts on alt.coffee, he went downhill quite quickly. That is all I know. It certainly made me think about how precious yet frail life is and how important it is to make the most of every sweet moment.

I came across Danny’s fabulously eclectic and informative website (www.danny.mcnulty.btinternet.co.uk/about.html) very early on in my coffee journey, long before finding TMC and other places that I now frequent. His espresso area was full of useful information about pulling shots, grinding correctly and all sorts about equipment. I have been pointing newcomers to coffee towards Danny’s pages ever since as his style of sharing information made so many hirtherto befuddling things very clear to me when I was at that stage of my development.

Danny’s Aladdin’s cave of a site also yielded the extemely entertaining story of his exploits in starting up a ‘commercial’ mobile coffee trailer near his Portsmouth home, which at first appeared to be as much for fun as anything, but subsequently became a very successful venture. That was Danny, up to all sorts and always having an adventure. He certainly seemed to live life to the full.

Like many online coffee folk, I never met Danny personally, but I did email him to say thank you for the information on his site and a very pleasent conversation ensued. He was clearly a very nice and very patient man, whom many felt as if they knew like a friend through his online persona. Danny was a member of TMC and an infrequent poster, though when he did pop-in, everyone seemed to know him.

For a while, Danny was the UK distributor of Monsooned Malabar. A few of my TMC compartiots bought from him now and then, all spoke highly.

In a small way, Danny was the ‘Alistair Cooke’ of the UK coffee world, regularly penning extremely funny pieces regaling readers of alt.coffee with his adventures in the coffee trailer, entitled “Sitting in a Field”. A search on alt.coffee will yield years worth of these classic little pieces that remind me very much of ‘Letter from America’. If you have not read them, they are well worth seeking out. Danny’s charm and wit shine through readily, as does his obvious consideration for his fellow beings. These are his lasting legacy to this, our little coffee world, which is today poorer for Danny’s loss.

God bless you Danny, rest peacefully. You will be missed by so many different people in lots of different ways. Thank you from those of us to whom you gave guidance either directly or through your website.

Our thoughts are with Danny’s loved ones.

News of a fantastic new coffee site that has sprung to life in recent weeks, www.coffee101.co.uk

Steve Leighton of Has Bean Coffee (www.hasbean.co.uk) has launched a completely free tutorial site that offers ten daily email ‘lessons’ intended to help newbies and experienced coffee people alike. As always, Steve gives much of himself and offers readers huge amounts of information drawn from his vast experience in the coffee industry.

The content offers an excellent overview of coffee history, information about where coffee comes from, how it is processed and types of roast amongst many other things. I just wish something like this had been about when I first got into coffee. It dispels many myths for people just starting out with the hobby and is invaluable for that reason alone. As someone with a little more experience, I found the course offered me focus by making so much knowledge available in one place and filling in a few gaps as well.

Well worth a look, totally free and containing some discount codes for Has Bean, I would advise everyone from the newest of the new to industry old hands to sign up and enjoy the fruits of Steve’s amazing know-how.

This ladies and gentlemen is “Tea Thing”! It is a sample that was given to Scott at Happy Donkey (www.happydonkey.co.uk) and passed to us to have a look at. There are no instruction and Scott was told that there are only three or so in the country at the moment. It has been played around with and thus far we cannot decide for sure whether it is meant to produce a cup/mug or a tea pot full at a time. We will shortly post the test results, but in the mean time, if anyone has any thoughts, please be forthcoming.

Good news, the rather lovely Costa Rican that Scott from Happy Donkey (www.happydonkey.co.uk) kindly allowed us to sample in February has now been added to his intentory. We have tried a bag or two of this medium roast coffee from the new stock and it remains every bit as lovely as the original sample. From our tasting log, “Lovely smooth sweet coffee with a good thick body. Nice honeycomb, frutiness with honey tones. Another very nice Costa Rican indeed”. And that says it all really, well worth trying. Good on Scott too, he is one of very few commercial bean suppliers that cares more about quality than bottom line. He selects his coffees very carefully and turns most around within a month – a week is not unusual for his top end blends. It would be nice to see other commercial suppliers emulating the gourmet market by keeping things high quality and as fresh as possible.

Talking of the gourmet market, roasting demi-god Steve over at Has Bean (www.hasbean.co.uk) has just put this year’s Ethiopian Harrar crop up on his site. I’ve heard from a couple of people that this year some of the beans are particulary good, though beware not all Harrars are equal, so make sure you buy from a source you know and trust. Steve describes this one as “Intense, with a complex taste of fruit, wine and chocolate”. We Harrar fans all know that if the crop is good and the preparation is right it can be the biggest blueberry bomb you can imagine. If you haven’t tried it, now is the time!

Following further visits from Canadian relatives, we sampled two more bags of Intelligentsia goodies last month. Having largely enjoyed the “Kid O”, I was very much looking forward to sampling the equally legendary “Black Cat Espresso Blend”. Now this was an odd one for me. I know and try to account for the North American general preference towards darker roasted coffees, but I still struggle to enjoy anything when the flavour of the roast is present in more than the slightest of hints. The “Black Cat” started with nice front end fruit, quite specifically cherry, acidity. It was well balanced with dark chocolate and cocoa, yet there was a nice sweetness present as well and it lingered nicely. However, throughout the cup, I could taste roast. Not loads, but more than I was comfortable with, though others may be fine with it. I wonder whether the roast level is necessary in order to achieve the fine balance of flavours or it is simply a preference? Either way, I like the flavours, but not the taste of roast. Nevertheless, this was “Black Cat” and I was very pleased to try it.

The final bag of Chicago’s finest was the formidably named “El Diablo Dark Roast”. Perhaps an anomaly, although without doubt dark, I felt this blend suffered less than the “Black Cat” with unwanted (surely they are unwanted?) roast tones in it’s flavour profile. A direct trade coffee, “El Diablo” is not so much a devil as a bit of a big-hearted tough guy. Dark, with lots of good citrus and cherry front end acidity, the flavour suddenly mellowed off to leave a rather nice, somewhat mild coffee with wonderfully balanced floral and chocolate tones. I liked this one quite a lot. Any roast tones present seemed to fade as the the balance changed to something altogether smoother following the kick-start. Less well known than “Kid O” or “Black Cat”, and rather like “Los Delirios”, this one shines in it’s own right, demonstrating that the whole of Intelligentsia’s catalogue is well worth trying if you get the chance. Our thanks to Peter for making the samplings possible.