Behind the top-scoring performance of Michael Phillips in finals of the 2010 World Barista Championship, held on the 25th of June at London’s Olympia Exhibition Centre, was a single idea: how can the processing of coffee beans influence a barista’s calibrations?

That may at first seem a snore of a technical question unlikely to electrify the spectator stands. Indeed it was the efficiency and flair of this fluid barista from Intelligentsia Coffee in Chicago – and possibly also his white suspenders – that rocked the Olympia’s great steel and glass ceiling, not dry tales of wet processing. But with his bean-splitting challenge, Phillips was taking the most fundamental responsibility of a barista – brewing and serving a coffee to its best advantage – to a new level. And the judges, sadly the only ones in the arena who got to sample the espressos, cappuccinos and signature espresso drinks prepared in competition, were sufficiently impressed to award the USA its first World Barista Champion.

For his signature drink or, in his case, three signature drinks, Phillips chose three coffees from one terroir, the Coope Dopa Cooperative in Santa María de Dota, Tarrazú, Costa Rica. Same altitude, same microclimate, same bean varietals. The lone distinction? How three different farmers from a single cooperative chose to process these beans and how this in turn dictated subtle differences in the ways Phillips chose to roast, grind and dose them for espresso.

Three customised espressos inspired three exotic signature recipes, requiring Phillips to prepare an astonishing total of 12 glasses (three drinks for each of the tasting judges) in a short time frame. A daunting task to be sure, especially as the high level of difficulty in his program up to that point had already been lost on many in attendance, myself included. To grind the three coffees to their optimal fineness and therefore extraction, Phillips found himself one grinder short.

“He had to think outside the box”, barista Tim Styles of London’s Penny University explained to me. “He only had two grinders. So what did he do? He brought in an extra hopper.”

After his presentation in the finals I asked Phillips if he found it stressful to change grinder hoppers midway through a pressure-packed presentation performed while three technical judges poked their heads and clipboards in his tight workspace.

“Piece of cake”, responded Phillips, less with swagger than levity. Thing is it was a big deal. From close in I could see his hands trembling as he poured liquids into glasses. I could almost feel his exhales of relief when his time was up and attention turned to the Greek finalist Stefanos Domatiotis.

Changing coffees. Switching hoppers. Altering grinds. Adjusting doses. “Was all that necessary”?, I asked Phillips, minutes before the results were announced . “If that didn’t need to be done”, he reasoned “then they wouldn’t need me to do it”.

Spoken like a true barista.
podium (l to r): Scottie Callaghan, Australia, 3rd
Michael Phillips, USA, 1st
Raul Rodas, Guatemala, 2nd

In Milan, the caffè marocchino – essentially a mini-cappuccino dusted with cocoa– has risen to the height of fashion and stayed there. The cortado, the Spanish take on a espresso “cut” with a small quantity of milk, has been assimilated at coffee bars on both sides of the Atlantic. And in San Francisco, the Gibraltar – a mini-latte served in a paneled glass – is a local cult coffee with a growing and now transatlantic following. The gospel of Gibraltar has spread to seminal coffee shops in LA (Intelligentsia) and New York (Café Grumpy), and to Climpson & Sons in London. It’s the coffee of choice at the newest of London’s great independent coffee shops, Dose Espresso, on Long Lane at Smithfield Market. 

The Gibraltar was conceived as a lark and named as something of an inside joke by the esteemed Bay Area (California) roaster Blue Bottle Coffee. Prior to the January 2005 opening of his first coffee kiosk in San Francisco’s Hayes Valley district, owner James Freeman began using the distinctive but cheap glasses he’d bought at a restaurant supply store for his improvised R & D. This research entailed pulling shots of various blends and roasts in the 4 1/2-ounce glasses, topping some with steamed milk and offering samples to the hopefully grateful employees at Dark Garden, a corset shop down the street. These young women knew a good shape when they saw one and quickly developed a fondness for the little lattes and the cute glasses with octagonal paneled bottoms and smooth, rounded tops. The coffee needed a name and barista/roaster Steve Ford, then a colleague of Freeman’s, found inspiration on the packaging for those glasses. Forget Gibraltar the rock, the city or the strait. This “Gibraltar” is

a registered name for a line of tumblers by the American glassware manufacturer Libbey. It is perhaps fortunate Blue Bottle did not buy similar glasses from a popular French manufacturer, otherwise its coffee invention might have taken the name Duralex, which sounds like the brand of a male contraceptive.

Although Blue Bottle has served Gibraltars by the thousands, Freeman has resisted any temptation to put it on his menu. The word-of-mouth status has been seen as part of its allure. Other cafés, like San Francisco’s Ritual Coffee Roasters, where Ford is now head roaster (but not the boss), have felt no compunction about listing it in bold letters alongside their espressos, lattes and cappuccinos. So how does Ford feel, now that his Gibraltar may be destined for the Oxford English Dictionary?

I’ve never really talked about the Gibraltar for publication, partly because I think it was very much of a time and place – that being the Bay Area circa 2005. The fact that I’m talking about it now is mostly because I’ve given up on the original idea. There WAS something special about it back then. Now, it’s just another drink on the menu to me, and like so many cappuccinos, generally prepared poorly or just wrong. Every year people ask about it, so I can track how far the idea has gone, but the fact that it’s all the way in the UK and I have no idea how it got there is disappointing. And not to be too melodramatic, but I feel like the soul of the drink has been lost. It used to be something unique, and now it’s just another piece of fucking latte art.

Any bitterness felt by Freeman is less of the dark-roast variety. He likes the Gibraltar’s appeal as a transitional coffee for latte drinkers ready for something shorter and stronger. (The Gibraltar has less milk than a standard latte but the same amount of espresso.) He’s pleased that it’s served in a glass (though not all cafés use the exact same glass) and therefore can’t be ordered to go. It’s a stick-around coffee which, according to Freeman, fosters cultural experience, the urban use of spaces, and sustainability (no paper to toss out). He’s nevertheless uncomfortable taking or sharing credit for the unintended consequences: “The moral of the story?” asks Freeman. “Be careful what you joke about.”