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[title]Having been involved in the coffee industry since he was 15 years old, Colombian Sebastian Farias knows more than a thing or two about the progress of global coffee trends. Today, he spends most of his time shuttling between Australia and Malaysia as the business development manager of Cottle Coffee in Melbourne and KL, where he is involved in growing the brand of the family-owned roastery, spotting new business opportunities, and developing new coffee products like the Coventry Blend and Colombia La Esperanza, which won Silver and Bronze respectively at the Golden Beans 2017.
It’s well accepted that Melbourne is one of the coffee capitals of the world. What is it about its coffee culture that sets it apart from others, and exportable to the world?
It’s all about the craft and dedication – Melbournians are very conscious of sourcing their beans and take a lot of pride in doing things the very best that they can. And importantly, they have the volume of coffee consumption that unfortunately Malaysia lacks. Larger volumes equal more practise, of doing the same thing over and over again until it becomes perfect. Over in Melbourne, we’d be spending our Mondays to Fridays, 8am to 5pm roasting beans non-stop; but over here we’d get enough roasted beans for a whole month in one day.
What makes the Melbourne coffee scene different from Sydney’s?
The Sydney coffee scene is growing extremely fast – they stepped up and picked up on what Melbourne was doing, but they weren’t enjoying the craft that we have. Also, I believe, it’s because of the demographic: Melbourne has a lot of Greek and Italians who arrived after the World War, and they brought along their coffee culture; while in Sydney there’s another type of demographic that’s more Asian, whose coffee culture was not as well developed.
The past few years have seen several types of non-espresso brewing trends emerge like the siphon, pour-overs, cold-drip and nitro-coffee. What do you think is the next step in coffee innovation?
Coffee has been around for thousands of years, but the modern espresso machine came about during the ‘50s and ‘60s, and that’s when it started booming. For such a young industry, there’s plenty of room for improvement. Now, when we’re talking about the next new thing, it’s all about pressure profiling – where we’re able to break the extraction process in timed segments and input certain pressures per segment. So in a 30-second coffee extraction, for instance, I can divide it into two, three or five cycles, and the flavour that comes out is amazing.
But while the way we produce coffee at the final step is going to keep improving, we’re also we’re looking backwards – at old techniques that are applied in other industries like wine-making that we can apply in coffee production. Three years ago we had [barista] Sasa Sestic practising his carbonic maceration technique (a red wine-making process that converts sugar in grapes into ethanol, without yeast to produce fruity red wines), which won him the World Barista Championship in 2015. Coffee producers in Colombia are also playing with new techniques of fermentation – all of that innovation is bringing in different coffee products into the market.
Finally, what are the qualities that separate a good barista from a great one?
Oh, that question could get me in trouble! I’ve got many young baristas coming up to me with an impressive list of courses, but I can tell within three minutes if that person can make a good cup of coffee. There are many things to say, but the most important thing is that a good barista should always be knowledgeable and at the top of his game, but always hungry to learn more.
Visit cottlecoffee.com.my to find out more about Cottle Coffee in Malaysia.
Note: Cottle Coffee in Malaysia has moved to 3 Jalan PJU 3/38, Sunway Damansara Technology Park, PJ. It's no longer a café, but the public can visit the roastery to buy roasted coffee beans, as well as attend cupping workshops that are held from time to time.