Arizona Coffee

Perry Czopp reminds us about the upcoming #throwdownphoenix on June 7th at Phoenix Ale Brewery.

Just a reminder about the latte art competition coming up in just 3 weeks! Not only will the beer be flowing right from the brewery itself; social station will be setting up a photo booth for our guests, arbitrary arts will be hosting an art show on the walls, live music will be in the background, a fourth bar will be brewing drinks for our sponsors, and food trucks will be slinging coffee inspired dishes in the parking lot. The throwdown event has truly transformed into a cultural melting pot. We have an official title sponsorship by Village Coffee Roasters. Very excited to be using their espresso!

You had me at coffee, but then you threw in the food trucks slinging coffee inspired dishes?

Perry Czopp has announced his next coffee-training date which will be held on Saturday, May 18 starting at 8:30 am.

Czopp will share his coffee knowledge on the roasting process and the importance it has in the cup you make at home or buy at the café. Guests will get to sample different roasts to learn about tastes and flavors, and participate in roasting experiments. All the while noshing on bites from the award-winning restaurant, Crêpe Bar.

Perry Czopp, a valley coffee professional who hosts a regular weekend coffee crawl, is announcing the first in a new series of coffee training courses called Knowledge Series.

He describes it like this:

I will be offering a two hour course at Crepe-Bar starting at 8:30am next weekend. The focus and hands on portion will be on alternative brew methods like chemex, v60, and aeropress. I will touch on everything from how to choose coffee to brew all the way to the 2,000 hours of work it takes from seedling to cup. Lots of question and answer so I see it being conversational as well as fun. Of course lots to drink, win, and eat! Pre-register at thecoffeechop.com for $45 or pay $52 at the door.

The 2013 South West Regional Barista Competition is being held this weekend in Santa Cruz, CA. There are a bunch of people from Arizona heading out and so we wish them the best!

You’ll be able to watch the competitions event via this Livestream page.

Tonight at Citizen Espresso Bar is a little celebration of 1-year — They’re calling it their ‘Holding It Down for 1 Year’ party. You can view the line up on their event page.

Citizen Espresso Bar
4700 N Central Ave
Phoenix, AZ 85012
Phone: (602) 265-5652

It sounds like things are coming together for the #throwdownphoenix event on January 25th – that’s this Friday night. The event begins at 8 pm and baristas are encouraged to RSVP to compete. The event is free to attend for the public, and Crepe Bar will be serving up dinner as well (for that, you have to pay).

Location: Crepe Bar
7520 S. Rural
Tempe, AZ 85283

Starts at 8 pm.

I must say, they’re doing a great job promoting this event. There’s a video, and a contest on Instagram. Oh, and while I am mentioning it you can follow Arizona Coffee on Instagram here.

Speaking of Instagram, are you on it? If so, share your handle in the comments and I’ll follow you back! The organizer of this event, Perry Czopp, is prolific on Instagram. Most of his photos relate to coffee, so check out his page.

January 25th at 8 pm. Open to the public. Free to compete. 1 hour practice round for baristas at 7pm. Complimentary education, coffee, and food. More details in my previous post.

Check out this fantastic video featuring 4 valley coffee professionals. The video was produced by Perry Czopp. They’re promoting the upcoming and third annual Latte Throw Down to take place on January 25, 2013 at 7 pm. The location will be Crepe Bar.

About the video, Perry says: “We briefly discuss latte art competitions, a coffee that we like, and how we prefer to brew it.”

The video includes commentary by: Perry Czopp (The Coffee Chop), Seth Mills (Cartel Coffee Lab), Shelby Moore (Crêpe Bar), and Bill Kennedy.

There is a hashtag for the event: #throwdownphoenix and you might spot one of these flyers at your favorite coffee shop.

Tonight at 8 pm at Black Cat Coffeehouse. Hosted by Perry Czopp and free to attend, and $5 to compete.

On Saturday, December 1st from 11am to 2pm the good folks at Lost Dutchman Coffee Roasters are hosting a free coffee tasting. At 2pm they will be holding a raffle (tickets for purchase) with all proceeds going to a good cause. Victor Kessler, the owner and coffee roaster, sent me some information I’m sharing below. Looks like a great event!

Coffee Tasting December 1st for local customers of Lost Dutchman Coffee Roasters: The amazing new Brazen Brewer will be highlighted along with a raffle for a Chemex Brewer, Hario Brewers, and of course some coffee. The brewers all come with a pack a filters.

Some of the key features to the Brazen include: precise temperature control. Easy programming of a pre-wetting cycle, and very, very even shower head distribution over the coffee grinds typically only seen in high-end commercial brewers. The machine even self calibrates for different brewing altutudes.

At this event, folks can see the Brazen in operation to help decide for themselves if the machine lives up to its reputation along with sampling a selection of some of our best coffees including our seasonal Holiday Blend.

100% of the proceeds from the raffle will go to our favorite charity, Sunshine Acres Children’s Home. This is our way of giving back to the community. The tasting will be Dec 1st from 11am-2pm, with the raffle for the prizes commencing at 2:00pm sharp. For complete trasparency, a representative of Sunshine Acres will be on hand to collect the raffle donations.

Click here for driving directions.

The Lost Dutchman Coffee Roastery
1920 E 3rd Street
Ste 9
Tempe, AZ 85281
Phone: (623) 217-1304

This Saturday in Tucson is an awesome looking event: Tucson Coffee Crawl.

The event is described as an “an event that guides the curiously caffeinated through some of Tucson’s best cafes while hosting demonstrations that educate crawlers about proper coffee roasting and brewing techniques.” Sounds awesome, right?

When: Saturday, November 10, 2012 beginning at 9 am (see schedule)

I emailed the organizers and understand there are more than 120 people RSVPd at this time. The event is first-come-first-serve, and even though so many people have responded, they are encouraging everybody to come out. They’ll have multiple “cuppings, comparative tastings, home-brewing demos, roasting demos” during the event. Laura Adams, the organizer, says that the “entire crawl is bikeable, and most of the crawl is walkable.”

They have a lot of information up on Facebook and their web site, but here is a list of coffee shops they are visiting:

• Cartel Coffee Lab
• Sparkroot
• Yellow Brick Coffee
• Exo Roast Co.
• Caffe Luce
• Raging Sage Coffee
• Adventure Coffee Roasting

If you go, be sure to let them know you heard about it on Arizona Coffee. The Arizona Daily Star also has a story on the event.

Press Coffee Roasters will be holding a coffee education weekend this November. They’ve attracted an all-star lineup of speakers. If you’re serious about coffee, or make a living in the coffee business, this is a must-see event!

Here’s some of the information about the event, which Press Coffee is planning to host annually.

A Closer Look Into Coffee: An Educational Weekend

There will be eleven 45-minute courses on a variety of coffee subjects led by some of our local and regional industry leaders.

Cost through November 1:
$15/class ($45 for unlimited)
BGA/SCAA/RG Members: $10/class ($30 for unlimited)

Day Of Registration:
$25/class ($75 for unlimited)
BGA/SCAA/RG Members: $20/Class ($50 for unlimited)

Friday, November 2nd

Roasting 101: Kathi Zollman
11:00-11:45

Water Chemistry: Jen Macias
12:00-12:45

Technical Machinery: Mitch Montgomery
1:00-1:45

Advanced Brewing – Infusions:
Seth Mills and Alex Mason

Roasting Theory: Paul Haworth
3:00-3:45

Saturday, November 3rd

Iced Coffee: Dan Suh
9:00-9:45

Seed to Cup: Jason Silverschlag
10:00-10:45

Coffee Pairings: Steve Kraus
11:00-11:45

Advanced Brewing – Drip:
Nanda Ibanez
12:00-12:45

Espresso Extraction:
Seth Mills and Alex Mason
1:00-1:45

Advanced Tasting: Juliet Han
2:00-2:45

BGA LEVEL 1 CERT
2:30-5:30

You can register for each course individually on the Press Coffee web site.

Here’s the poster for the latte art throwdown being held at Terra Java on September 14, 2012. The sprodown is at 5 pm, and the latte art competition begins at 7 pm.

We haven’t had a barista throwdown in a while, but it sounds like a couple of people are planning one in September. Perry Czopp, a barista at Urban Beans, is organizing a sprodown / latte art contest to be held at Terra Java.

Perry writes:

Thanks for your interest in this public event. It will be held at Terra Java on 38th St. and Indian School on September 14. Beginning at 5pm there will be a sprodown. A sprodown is a competition to see which barista pulls the best espresso. This requires bringing your own coffee and speaking about it in front of the judges for 2-5 minutes. If any baristas are interested please contact Perry@thecoffeechop.com. I am looking for 4 or 6 baristas to sprodown and there is no fee to compete in this event.

From 6pm-7pm there will be a warm up round for latte art competitors to practice on the machine. For latte art competitors the entrance fee is $5. There will be a first heat where each competitor will have 3 minutes to pour and the top 8 pours will move on to a head to head match. There will be prizes for the top two baristas of each competition.

There will be a flyer soon to follow. Most importantly of all is the goal of this event which is to bring the phoenix coffee industry together, unified to raise the standards and have fun!!

Please let me know if there are any other questions!

I’ve spoken to a few people from AZ who are all headed up to Oregon this weekend for the SCAA show.

The two main attractions are the SCAA’s 24th Annual Exposition and Symposium and the United States Barista Championship.

Who’s going? It sounds like a lot of fun – lots of people to meet and see.