I am very appreciative to Joe & Dough Coffee Appreciation Session. As a coffee drinker who love her coffee, it is a great opportunity to find out what the Science and the Arts behind the science so as to appreciate my cup of joe better.

 

At this very session, Adrian the Head Barista of Joe & Dough walked me through the process for a sound understanding of the end to end for making a good cup of espresso.

 

 

Joe & Dough Coffee Appreciation Session

 

Coffee Blend

 

At Joe & Dough, they use a quattro blend consisting of Ethiopia, Colombia, Brazil and Sumatra. The reason for doing so is that they wanted to create a cuppa whereby it suit majority of coffee drinkers. Since some prefer it nutty, while others more acidity and so on. According to Adrian, the characteristics of Colombian is chocolaty, Brazil is nutty, Ethiopia is fruity while Sumatra is with spice hint. As such the blend will create a more balance and rounded cup where each and everyone get to savour their preferred flavour note.

 

 

Joe & Dough house blend was named Joe 1914 as it is inspired by Josephus Daniel who banned alcohol on board in 1941. As a result the navy men consumed coffee and named their coffee as “mugs of Joe”.

 

 

 

Joe & Dough uses a local roastery based in Singapore to roast their beans. This ensure freshness of their coffee bean supply.

 

 

Brewing Espresso

 

Grinding

Once we have the coffee bean, first step to the cup of cuppa is to grind the coffee beans to powder form. This must be just about to prepare the espresso. Otherwise will lose the coffee flavour.

 

 

Tamping

Next, it tamping. This step is to compress the coffee powder and ensure that it is leveled. Barista has to stand adjacent to the table holding the tamper like a door knob with thumb free. Lower the tamper with arms shaped as a 7, using the body weight to compress the coffee powder.

 

 

Extracting

Proceed with extraction of coffee. The espresso is extracted at 9 bar of pressure with water passing through to extract the coffee. The changes changes from dark brown to golden brown and finally yellow.

 

 

Once done, you will notice the golden brown layer known as a crema. This is an indication that freshly ground coffee was used. This is unique to the espresso based coffee. You won’t notice this in drip coffee. Based on the explanation from the Head Barista, as gas is produce in coffee after roasting, together with the pressure and water, the gas is gathered and crema is formed.

 

 

Steaming

Parallelly while extracting the coffee, proceed with steaming milk. The proceed is described as ariation or stretching. The objective of this process is to create micro foam. The milk must remain fluid and not stiff. An the milk is also likely to be reflective.

 

 

Purged the steam to avoid moisture. Then lower the wand about 1 cm into the milk and to the side. Pull the trigger to start steaming to 62ºC to 65ºC. Per Adrian, if you could only touch the side of the pitcher for only 3s, that is about the right temperate.

 

And if lots of big bubbles appear on the surface, stamp the pitcher on the table a few times.

 

Latte Art

Lastly, is the most interesting step among all, pouring latte art.

 

 

My task was to pour a circle and I successfully completed the training. According to Adrian, for a beginner, it was well done. Based on his experience, lots of his barista who went through training by him, couldn’t get the circle at first attempt. To get the first heart, most required to pour about 200 cups.

 

Besides create latte art via the pouring method, the other is inkling. Barista will use a sharp pointer with milk as the ink to draw on the surface.

 

 

NAHMJ Verdict

 

Each and every step has to be done with precision and with speed to avoid customer waiting for too long. We see that it isn’t easy to be a barista. It takes long training and hardwork to as good as Adrian.

 

Lastly, NAHMJ would like to take the opportunity to thank all barista out there painstakingly pouring cups after cups of cuppa. At the same time, we would like to thank Joe & Dough and Adrian for showing us the knowledge. After the Joe & Dough Coffee Appreciation Session, we appreciate our cup of joe better.

 

 

 

Joe & Dough @ Leisure Park Kallang

5 Stadium Walk #01-12 Singapore 397693
Tel: +65 6348 2848

Website: http://www.joeanddough.com/
FB: https://www.facebook.com/Joendough/?fref=ts

 

Opening Hours

 

Daily  0800 to 2200

 

Getting There

 

By MRT:

• Circle line – Stadium

 

By Bus:

• alight at Singapore Indoor Stadium along Stadium Crescent   11