The Specialty Coffee Industry is a fervent community. Employees and participants from all companies love sharing information and enthusiasm about our trade. One of the best examples of this community is a Barista Jam. An event where professional coffee geeks and freaks gather for the purpose of expanding their knowledge of coffee, it’s preparation and the tools used to do so. Barefoot Coffee Roasters hosted such an event at their Santa Clara café in late September. ‘The Bay Area Sprodown #2’ was on open house for all Northern California coffee professionals to gather and share.

Barista’s from all over the Bay Area introduced themselves before key sponsors had their chance to shine. Robert Brewer, of Straus Family Dairies, was the first coaxed to step up to the mic. Robert explained Strauss’ mission to communicate with the coffee industry making sure our needs are met concerning the flavor profile of the second most utilized liquid in our industry, milk. The crowd was joyous in their response the history of Strauss as ice cream makers and the math given of 2 acres of land for each cow. Like Barefoot’s credo “Serious Coffee, Happy People”, Strauss Dairies believes in “Serious Milk, Happy Cows”.

Next at the mic, John Laird, from Pacific Bay Coffee Roasters, Chris Baca, of Ritual Coffee Roasters, and Paul O’Day of Barefoot Coffee Roasters shared their approach on the art of Dosing and Tamping. The two agreed that consistency is the only true factor since the individual approach to tamping can be hugely variable. It was interesting that three different coffee professionals had such varying tamping styles and used very different tampers and leveling techniques.

Once introductions and discussions were finished, the crowd was let loose. The frenzy began with Scott, Barefoot’s Jam promoter, gathering raffle entries for the Reg Barber Commemorative Breast Cancer Tamp, “Pretty in Pink”, that was on display with a dizzying array of tampers. Reg Barber, Espresso Parts NW and Great Infusions supplied every Tamp imaginable to prove that there is a size and style for every size and style Barista. There was a veritable wall of tampers of every color, style, and shape imaginable. All told there were over 35 different tampers on hand for Baristas to try out.

And coffee fans if you are going to be in the Santa Cruz area and want to go to a great home Barista then get yourself over to Great Infusions Saturday October 6th from 3:00 to 5:00 pm. Click here for more info and to register. The cost is $15 per person and all the proceeds go to CoffeeKids! The illustrious Team Barefoot Barista man Scott Guglielmino will be teaching home Baristas how to pull great shots on four different home espresso machine setups. There will be great coffee flowing everywhere so get there!

So coffee freak fans come on out to Temple Fine Coffee in Sacramento, CA Saturday October 6th from 12 pm to 6 pm. There will be espresso and coffee pouring from the sky like diamonds! The Temple crew will be rocking the house in force. There will be info and opportunity to sign up for the Barista Guild Of America and plenty of jam space. A sparky little group of coffee freaks from Barefoot Coffee will be there to party like it was meant to be partied. We will be bringing a few fun coffee surprises as well so get your butt over there!

This Friday, we welcome Cello Joe and his fluctuating band of breakbeat-dixie-classical-hop! Check him out at http://www.myspace.com/cellojoe!

Then, on Saturday, a tsunami of conscientious djs engulf the ‘Foot! Raven Odin has gathered together a group of Gamerean proportions, including Deraj the Scatterbrain, MC Numerous, BenFlowz, BDeezy, and Sedrick the MC. Raven’s myspace is http://www.myspace.com/ravinodin, and all the other acts are in his “top friends,” so you can find them easy. These djs aim to show you that there’s more to rapping than girls and money. Like, for instance, the creation of the universe.

As always, shows start at 8pm!

Barefoot is showing strong all over the Bay Area. Most of the south bay and peninsula Whole Foods stores are supporting great coffee and sustainability by providing Barefoot Coffee to their customers. The stores are selling extremely well due to the awesome support of the many Barefoot fans out there who love great coffee. Most Whole Foods are stocking 4-6 of our award winning coffees. But they need to hear from you and see your support. So if you like the Barefoot coffee leave a message with a Whole Foods team member about how much you love the coffee. And let them know that you would like to be able to bag it fresh from the bulk bins as well. That allows them to fight the good fight against corporate mediocrity.

Barefoot coffee is available at these Bay Area Whole Foods:

1. Cupertino, CA
2. Los Altos, CA
3. Los Gatos, CA
4. Redwood City, CA
5. San Francisco, CA SOMA
6. San Mateo, CA
7. San Francisco, CA Potrero Hill

So stop by and vote with your dollars for great coffee today!

So Yelp.com is a great place to find great food and drink and services. Great reviews by actual customers. We use it all the time to find new places to go for dinner and more.

But Barefoot just received what we believe is our dream review.

Review on Yelp : by Ramdog I.

We got only 2 stars but does it get any better than this review:

“Sorry, but the employee working on the Sunday that I went was WAY too serious about the coffee. It was actually comical that someone would take it so seriously… I will stick to Peets.”

 So apparently Barefoot is so serious about coffee that Peets seems like clown parade. Here at Barefoot we idolize Peets for setting the tone of coffee excellence and think they are the absolute best corporate chain around. So it is a weird honor to be called too serious about coffee (which is not possible to be too serious).

Thanks to our friend Ramdog (enjoy the apparently whimsical Peets) and Yelp.

p.s. this will be on a Barefoot tshirt within the next month so get ready to sport it.

BAY AREA ‘SPRO DOWN #2!

Barefoot Coffee Roasters is going to be hosting a Barista Jam this up and coming September 20th! It’s gonna be one amazing adventure into the world of SOS (single origin shots silly) , tamping, rubbing elbows with the pros and whoas and showin’ off what you got!

If you are or have a professional Barista with a lot of potential, or you just want to improve some techniques, this is a great way to hang out with Baristas from all over the bay and support the Barista community. Should be full of surprises! Come down and join the espresso revolution!

Just a TEASER there will be about 25 different tampers to play with in the infamous tamp-off.

Coffee luminaries will be waxing poetic baby!

September 20th 2007
5pm to 10pm
5237 Stevens Creek Blvd
Santa Clara 95051

email: monica -@- barefootcoffeeroasters.com