The Reformatory caffeine Lab
CAFE NAME : The Reformatory caffeine Lab
ADDERESS : 7b/17-51 Foveaux St, Surry Hills NSW 2010
SPECIALTY : 4Machine 6 Grinder 'La Marzocco Manual GB5, Strada, Synesso Hydra MVP, Steampunk, Mythos one, Mazzer, EG1, EK 43,
'15 Different Coffee bean'
'Sydney Just one tried bean +90 company'
'OWNER: 2016 AUS NSW/ACT REGIONAL Brewers Cup Championship
1st Place'
'NO BREAKFAST, NO LUNCH MENU, ONLY SERVE COFFEE'
G’day!
This is
Mountain, residing in Australia while traveling worldwide by busking, with my
country’s traditional costume. Currently an editor of Black Water Issue (AUS);
a.k.a.
@RS_S.C
The topics to be introduced in the column will be:
- What is the “specialty” in Australia?
- What are the ways you now show to the others of your own “specialty” at your café?
- How are you controlling your specialty? And what coffee-related materials are you using?
But before
this, let me introduce some of the cultures of Australian coffee industry.
The local
stores in Australia open at 6:00 a.m. and closes at around 4 p.m.
In the mornings, people start with coffee from nearby stores. In the afternoons, people have lunch with coffee. So it results about roughly 3 to 4 cups of coffee, drank by the local people.
Additionally, most local cafes in Australia works with official, professional Kitchen to provide an absolute quality meal together with coffee. The local shops seems to decide a space of meal and coffee combinations, instead of dessert and coffee. Therefore, most local shops provide ‘Table Service’ and seek professions in ‘Floor Staff’ and ‘Chef’ along with ‘Barista’.
-Later explanations will be coming up referring to
the interview done.- Q. Why did
you choose “The Reformatory Caffeine Lab” as your shop name?
A: I chose
this name for our customers to heal or make rehabilitations in daily lives
through a cup of coffee. This picture above shows
places to order, drink, and take away the coffees. The present
settings of coffee materials are Brewing Bar; (from the left of the picture)
hand-drip materials, Steam Punk (refer BWI) four grinders: EK 43, Mythos One,
Mazzer Robur, La Marzzoco, Strada, Menule 3GP, La Marzzoco GB5; two
grinders: Mazzer Robur, Mazzer Elect. This is
“Acaia Perl” linked to Acaia Luna, the trend icon of these days in specialty
coffee industry, and Steam Punk. These two contains design, performance, and
convenience. Bonovita
Drip Pot, which can set temperatures; two Acaia Perl; screen linked to Steam
Punk; Steam Punk Above
machine is called Steam Punk, a brewing machine. When
I was pre-surveying about The Reformatory Caffeine Lab, I wondered, “Is the
shop using not a hand-drip, which could have possibilities of changes in
consistency, but a Steam Punk to extract a definite amount?” Q. Are you
using the Steam Punk to control the possible changes that could be made by
hand-drip? A: It’s not
actually for the use just to control the possible changes. What we
want is unique extraction because in my opinion, there are too many coffee
imitations not just in Australia but all over the world. So we use
the Steam Punk also for experimentations for our coffee. 95% of our
customers still prefer hand-drip though they know we have various hand-drip
materials and Steam Punk. Maybe it’s
because they haven’t experienced much about the Steam Punk coffee. If someone
asks me, “Mountain, what would you say in just one word if you would like to
express the Australian Specialty?” I would say, “The
Consistency.” There are
many specialty shops even in Korea, also baristas who put efforts in their
coffees’ consistency. But I realized that I was missing lots of things about
consistent extraction when I was in Korea. Then, I had
a chance to know deeper about coffee through a specialty shop in Australia. There I
found the technique, consistency, showmanship, and professionalism which gave
me a shock and inspirations. The next
journal will be introductions of this shop to the BW issue readers. Q. What is
your set of mind in importance of good coffee? A: The most
important thing that must be always reminded is ‘consistency’ in making a great
coffee. Even though you have a good grinder and machine, there will be a
different extraction if dosing isn’t fixed. Also, it will bring different
extraction from what the barista has wanted if there won’t be accurate tamping.
So I think it’s better to maintain one’s own way in techniques. But I think
it is impossible to have 100$ of consistency when we include all these
grinding, dosing, packing, and tamping. Therefore,
the best way and the basic way is to reduce the possibilities of inconsistency
to the least. Most
importantly, it is to use best beans, use best machines which could process
consistent extraction, use a consistent grinder, and maintain a very consistent
technique of your own.
The
combination of Bonavita Electronic Scale + Drip (on the Brewing Bar) (from the
left) - EK 43 for
filter coffee - Mythos One
for Single origin and Special coffee - Mazzer
Rover for Seasonal Blends - Mazzer
Electronic for House Blends
- EG-1, to be
set-up next month, for espresso Q. Are there any special reason/s in using the two grinders, Single
Origin Bean and Mythos One? A: This grinders are able to control the temperature of beans through
heater. But we do not use this function for now. We run this grinders depending
on the weather, cold or hot. We run this grinder for espresso purposes. The reason to this is that
it contains the maintenance of consistent quality at its best. For example, if we make 20 cups of espresso at one time, it makes only
about 0.2g of error.
It always keeps the best quality at our shop so we use this with a
very high satisfaction. Q. Any
special reason for choosing La Marzocco GB 5? A: GB5 is
for milk-based coffee and take-away purposes because GB5 is easy to set the
volumetric and keeps accurate extractions which also runs best qualities of its
purposes.
GB5 is a
machine that we depend against, and trust. La
Marzocco’s Strada, manual custom for black coffees with Mythos One. The shop is
planning to run Synesso Hydra MVP for black coffee, by the thought that this
machine works better than Strada.
First, he
Reformatory Caffeine Lab adopts new beans and experiments on Thursdays, roasts
on Fridays. This shop has average of 10 to 15 different types of beans and
still continues on experiments for unique coffee of their own. Secondly,
they run 3 kinds of Gesha products, and 3 kinds of America’s 90+ Coffee Company
menu (specialty bean) which costs about $15 per cup.
Among all
café in Sydney, The Reformatory Caffeine Lab is the only specialty coffee shop
having trades with 90+ Company. (All these
shots are different beans. Just that I took shots in the same positions) (Barista
LEE, co-worker with Simon working at The Reformatory Caffeine Lab) (Very unique
and delicious taste of coffee dropped by Simon) Q. Simon,
how do you see the coffee culture in Australia? A: I would
like to say the coffee culture in Australia is excellent both to baristas and
tasters. Both
baristas and tasters are outstanding in its qualities of coffee and they put
hard efforts in roasting better coffee out to the world. They
compete for the best and this is the reason that makes Australian Specialty
Coffee Industry better, widely well-known, including all machines and materials.
After the
interview, Simon has invited me to The Reformatory Caffeine Lab’s roastery
toom, the laboratory, located at another location.
I wonder,
my next article would be The Reformatory Caffeine Lab’s heart, the laboratory. Q. Thank
you so much for your cooperation to the interview. For the last question,
please give and advice some tips and other more things to the Korean Baristas
who wants to work inside the Australian Coffee Industry. -ORIGINAL- A : I've
been involved in coffee for many many years and I was born in a coffee farm. I lived in
a coffee farm for 19 years. I think the key to success is to be passionate and
love what you do. If you love
what you do and is passionate, it will make a good combinations between you and
the coffee. One thing that I would like to recomment is to
take many experimentations, just don't concentrate in one roasting profile in
serving coffees, play with the coffees and do know a lot of recipe in coffees. Then you
will be discovering slowly and slowly. Make various ways to discover then you
will be innovating your own color of coffee. If you have done an innovation,
the tasters will be attracted to it. Be a good listener to work with good
coffees. Be consistent and try to be an innovator. Practice different things. Maybe one
day, you will finally discover something of your own. You will be very proud of
it. You may do either bad or good things with the coffee but you'll never know.
Experimenting is best thing in coffee. The coffee industry is very competitive
to try to achieve not common things but of your own. Every hundred meters, there are coffee shops. The
standard of coffee in Australia is very high. It has a
pride. If you don't do something different, it will be tough because there are
a lot of people making and doing coffee out there. There are people who do
great job and people who are trained to experiment different types of coffees.
To be part of the industry, have a good team, work with good people. People
that have the attitude to learn and teach together. You can succeed with all
these. I would like to talk about the art or the
presentation of the coffee. Obviously, coffees with good presentation and good
art looks awesome. But the taste might change the taste. A lot of oriented
people think about how the coffee should be seen. It is not that I do not agree
with that but these people need to concentrate more on the taste before the
presentation. I would
like to recommend more on the taste, the extraction, than making a pattern.
When you have your recipe and when you achieve your own taste, that is the time
you do the rest of the stuff. It will be much better than the common taste. This is
something that I do not agree in terms of flavor. The people
with art has professional skill and are very technical people. For me this is a
skill but sometimes they confuse the quality and flavor. I have, I
make a coffee that has no amazing visual but I have a good coffee that inspires
tasters. As you can see,
the baristas in Australia are crazy and most of them are Asians. If you have a
look, the best baristas in Australia include Asians. You are new in the coffee
industry, just starting. You guys are skillful and you guys are
passionate in coffee. You guys are not just like "Oh, let's just make
coffees" so I think you guys over there, can have a lot of advantage when
it comes to difference in working and dedications. It is just the moment and
timing. The coffee culture is outrangely growing. For the last three years or
five years, you couldn't drink coffees easily. All people are doing amazing
jobs because they have passion. It is the same in Australia.
It is just a matter of time. This place is
growing crazy. But I think you guys are going in a right direction. "Welcome to Australia" This
article has been completed by many helps. (Coffee: Ji
Eun Baek; English: Misol Chong, Yoo Seon; Corrections: Min Jae Kang, and Korean
baristas who has given information about this café) If there
are any more questions or informations you would like to know more about,
please don’t hesitate to message to my Instagram:
@RS_S.C Facebook: RiverSan Hope to
write the next article with you, readers. Thank you!
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