#the summer set and state champs all in one day bro :(

[timeless-hollywood-classics]

Rose Joan Blondell (August 30, 1906 – December 25, 1979) was an American actress who performed in film and television for half a century.

She began her career in vaudeville. After winning a beauty pageant, Blondell embarked upon a film career. She established herself as a Pre-Code staple of Warner Bros. Pictures in wisecracking, sexy roles, and appeared in more than 100 films and television productions. She was most active in film during the 1930s and early 1940s, and during that time she co-starred with Glenda Farrell in nine films, in which the duo portrayed gold diggers. Blondell continued acting on film and television for the rest of her life, often in small, supporting roles. She was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her performance in The Blue Veil (1951).

Near the end of her life, Blondell was nominated for a Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actress for her performance in Opening Night (1977). She was featured in two more films, the blockbuster musical Grease (1978) and Franco Zeffirelli's The Champ (1979), which was released shortly before Blondell's death from leukemia.

Rose Joan Blondell was born in New York to a vaudeville family; she gave her birthdate as August 30, 1909. Her father, Levi Bluestein, a vaudeville comedian known as Ed Blondell, was born in Poland to a Jewish family in 1866. He toured for many years starring in Blondell and Fennessy's stage version of The Katzenjammer Kids. Blondell's mother was Catherine (known as "Kathryn" or "Katie") Caine, born in Brooklyn, Kings County, New York (later Brooklyn, New York City) on April 13, 1884, to Irish-American parents. Joan's younger sister, Gloria Blondell, also an actress, was briefly married to film producer Albert R. Broccoli. The Blondell sisters had a brother, Ed Blondell, Jr.

Joan's cradle was a property trunk as her parents moved from place to place. She made her first appearance on stage at the age of four months when she was carried on in a cradle as the daughter of Peggy Astaire in The Greatest Love. Her family comprised a vaudeville troupe, the "Bouncing Blondells".

Joan had spent a year in Honolulu (1914–15) and six years in Australia and had seen much of the world by the time her family, who had been on tour, settled in Dallas, Texas, when she was a teenager. Under the name Rosebud Blondell, she won the 1926 Miss Dallas pageant, was a finalist in an early version of the Miss Universe pageant in May 1926, and placed fourth for Miss America 1926 in Atlantic City, New Jersey, in September of that same year. She attended Santa Monica High School, where she acted in school plays and worked as an editor on the yearbook staff. While there (and after high school), she gave her name as Rosebud Blondell, such as when she attended North Texas State Teacher’s College (1926–1927), now the University of North Texas in Denton, where her mother was a local stage actress.

Around 1927, she returned to New York, worked as a fashion model, a circus hand, a clerk in a store, joined a stock company to become an actress, and performed on Broadway. In 1930, she starred with James Cagney in Penny Arcade on Broadway. Penny Arcade lasted only three weeks, but Al Jolson saw it and bought the rights to the play for $20,000. He then sold the rights to Warner Bros., with the proviso that Blondell and Cagney be cast in the film version, named Sinners' Holiday (1930). Placed under contract by Warner Bros., she moved to Hollywood, where studio boss Jack L. Warner wanted her to change her name to "Inez Holmes", 34 but Blondell refused. She began to appear in short subjects and was named as one of the WAMPAS Baby Stars in 1931.

Blondell was paired several more times with James Cagney in films, including The Public Enemy (1931), and she was one-half of a gold-digging duo with Glenda Farrell in nine films. During the Great Depression, Blondell was one of the highest-paid individuals in the United States. Her stirring rendition of "Remember My Forgotten Man" in the Busby Berkeley production of Gold Diggers of 1933, in which she co-starred with Dick Powell and Ruby Keeler, became an anthem for the frustrations of unemployed people and the government's failed economic policies. In 1937, she starred opposite Errol Flynn in The Perfect Specimen. By the end of the decade, she had made nearly 50 films. She left Warner Bros. in 1939.

In 1943, Blondell returned to Broadway as the star of Mike Todd's short-lived production of The Naked Genius, a comedy written by Gypsy Rose Lee. She was well received in her later films, despite being relegated to character and supporting roles after 1945, when she was billed below the title for the first time in 14 years in Adventure, which starred Clark Gable and Greer Garson. She was also featured prominently in A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1945) and Nightmare Alley (1947). In 1948, she left the screen for three years and concentrated on theater, performing in summer stock and touring with Cole Porter's musical, Something for the Boys. She later reprised her role of Aunt Sissy in the musical version of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn for the national tour and played the nagging mother, Mae Peterson, in the national tour of Bye Bye Birdie.

Blondell returned to Hollywood in 1950. Her performance in her next film, The Blue Veil (1951), earned her an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress in a Supporting Role. She played supporting roles in The Opposite Sex (1956), Desk Set (1957), and Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? (1957). She received considerable acclaim for her performance as Lady Fingers in Norman Jewison's The Cincinnati Kid (1965), garnering a Golden Globe nomination and National Board of Review win for Best Supporting Actress. John Cassavetes cast her as a cynical, aging playwright in his film Opening Night (1977). Blondell was widely seen in two films released not long before her death – Grease (1978), and the remake of The Champ (1979) with Jon Voight and Rick Schroder. She also appeared in two films released after her death – The Glove (1979), and The Woman Inside (1981).

Blondell also guest-starred in various television programs, including three 1963 episodes as the character Aunt Win in the CBS sitcom The Real McCoys, starring Walter Brennan and Richard Crenna.

Also in 1963, Blondell was cast as the widowed Lucy Tutaine in the episode, "The Train and Lucy Tutaine", on the syndicated anthology series, Death Valley Days, hosted by Stanley Andrews. In the story line, Lucy sues a railroad company, against great odds, for causing the death of her cow. Noah Beery Jr., was cast as Abel.

In 1964, she appeared in the episode "What's in the Box?" of The Twilight Zone. She guest-starred in the episode "You're All Right, Ivy" on Jack Palance's circus drama, The Greatest Show on Earth, which aired on ABC in the 1963–64 television season. Her co-stars in the segment were Joe E. Brown and Buster Keaton. In 1965, she was in the running to replace Vivian Vance as Lucille Ball's sidekick on the hit CBS television comedy series The Lucy Show. Unfortunately, after filming her second guest appearance as Joan Brenner (Lucy's new friend from California), Blondell walked off the set right after the episode had completed filming when Ball humiliated her by harshly criticizing her performance in front of the studio audience and technicians.

Blondell continued working on television. In 1968, she guest-starred on the CBS sitcom Family Affair, starring Brian Keith. She replaced Bea Benaderet, who was ill, for one episode on the CBS series Petticoat Junction. In that installment, Blondell played FloraBelle Campbell, a lady visitor to Hooterville, who had once dated Uncle Joe (Edgar Buchanan) and Sam Drucker (Frank Cady). That same year, Blondell co-starred in all 52 episodes of the ABC Western series Here Come the Brides, set in the Pacific Northwest of the 19th century. Her co-stars included singer Bobby Sherman and actor-singer David Soul. Blondell received two consecutive Emmy nominations for outstanding continued performance by an actress in a dramatic series for her role as Lottie Hatfield.

In 1971, she followed Sada Thompson in the off-Broadway hit The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds, with a young Swoosie Kurtz playing one of her daughters.

In 1972, she had an ongoing supporting role in the NBC series Banyon as Peggy Revere, who operated a secretarial school in the same building as Banyon's detective agency. This was a 1930s period action drama starring Robert Forster in the title role. Her students worked in Banyon's office, providing fresh faces for the show weekly. The series was replaced midseason.

Blondell has a motion pictures star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for her contributions to the film industry. Her star is located at 6311 Hollywood Boulevard. In December 2007, the Museum of Modern Art in New York City mounted a retrospective of Blondell's films in connection with a new biography by film professor Matthew Kennedy, and theatrical revival houses such as Film Forum in Manhattan have also projected many of her films recently.

She wrote a novel titled Center Door Fancy (New York: Delacorte Press, 1972), which was a thinly disguised autobiography with veiled references to June Allyson and Dick Powell.

Blondell was married three times, first to cinematographer George Barnes in a private wedding ceremony on January 4, 1933, at the First Presbyterian Church in Phoenix, Arizona. They had one child, Norman Scott Barnes, who became an accomplished producer, director, and television executive known as Norman Powell. Joan and George divorced in 1936.

On September 19, 1936, she married her second husband Dick Powell, an actor, director, and singer. They had a daughter, Ellen Powell, who became a studio hair stylist, and Powell adopted her son by her previous marriage under the name Norman Scott Powell. Blondell and Powell were divorced on July 14, 1944. Blondell was less than friendly with Powell's next wife, June Allyson, although the two women would later appear together in The Opposite Sex (1956).

On July 5, 1947, Blondell married her third husband, producer Mike Todd, whom she divorced in 1950. Her marriage to Todd was an emotional and financial disaster. She once accused him of holding her outside a hotel window by her ankles. He was also a heavy spender who lost hundreds of thousands of dollars gambling (high-stakes bridge was one of his weaknesses) and went through a controversial bankruptcy during their marriage. An often-repeated myth is that Mike Todd left Blondell for Elizabeth Taylor, when in fact, she had left Todd of her own accord years before he met Taylor.

Blondell died of leukemia in Santa Monica, California, on Christmas Day, 1979, with her children and her sister at her bedside. She was cremated and her ashes interred in a columbarium at the Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery in Glendale, California.

[ca1e70-deactivated]

a list of my entirely way too niche headcanons ive actually implemented for everyones imagination:

name options ive used and refuse to retire: david elizabeth strider (sometimes i dont feel like being a douche to others and saying thats not his name), harley davidson strider, and david james strider for the sake of simplicity

im not gonna tell yall the like. oc exes ive given him bc thatll take eighteen years. 

i dont rlly have an explanation on the ghost thing besides the fact he just can? ive occasionally pulled from family ghost stories and experiences bc i somehow got landed with family members who lived in a haunted house for a decade and enjoy scaring me with all the stories (including the time my cousin literally died on the kitchen floor from a bronchial spasm and one of the friends that was over asked my aunt later what was up with the old man she saw in the corner of the room that night - my cousin is fine btw shes just a huge bitch and a third grade teacher and i dont like her)

whether or not hes done drugs is based on absolutely nothing besides how im feeling in that moment. either hes the designated driver and sober friend forever or he got fired from his job after doing a line at work during graveyard with some random customers theres no inbetween (this absolutely happened @ waho. if dave works at waho hes a mess of a person and thats on the diner itself.)

ok look i hc dave w/schizophrenia besides when i was 14 i had a hyperfixation with learning about it and then at 16 was prescribed a medication and had side effects so wack my therapist genuinely thought 14 yr old me was onto something and its a weird way to cope with the idea that lady put in my head that i might “develop it in my twenties” which i turn 20 this year and i havent been able to stop obsessing and panicking over the prospect so PLEASE dont come in my inbox calling me ableist im not out here all harley quinn in suicide squad with the voices ok hes medicated, he goes to therapy, the hard fast delusion that lil cal was nearly sentient and informed bro of every single thing dave did no matter how asinine it was is no longer a debilitatingly affecting him ANYWAYS

i actually use the chicken/egg farming family pretty often just because its hilarious to me to give dave like. an actual mom and dad. hes literally an uncle to like three different kids he just never visits because they make fun of his skinny jeans and he hates one of his (incredibly bare-bones ocs all of them) brothers who threatened to bash his head in with a little league bat after dave broke his star wars lego set apart on accident (but not rlly) so their parents were like “why dont you stay with your brother in the big city for a lil while champ” and then they just never picked him back up? and thats on favoritism 

the other one is that his name is actually david reed and hes the middle child of a family of three who literally live the standard golden retriever white middle class life only they went to disney land or something equally as dumb one year when dave was like 6 and he wandered off so bro literally just went “huh free game” because frankly he was an idiot who thought maybe i should take this kid home because its real dangerous in parking lots and then it was too late to NOT have it seem like a kidnapping and thats why daves never had a summer job, seen his birth certificate, or gone to school. but vaguely remembers what kindergarten was like and having a pet dog and calling someone mom as a kid. 

im not making a bullet point about his sex life headcanons just use your imagination and acknowledge the fact bro essentially worked within the sex industry and i enjoy putting dave through trauma as a catharsis 

i stopped doing this one usually but if he did go to school hes been in percussion since fifth grade and played the drums in his high schools jazz band as well as various edgy teenager garage bands he likes to pretend dont have a youtube presence and that hes absolutely never been shirtless in front of plenty of his classmates because he wore a hoodie to a show like an idiot. idk occasionally ill put him in an actual band he doesnt hate but keeps separate from his lil turntechGodhead internet persona (which i will ALSO touch upon in a sec) until they wind up getting looped into a tour with some bigger named band that has a show in *insert beta kid here*’s city and hes gotta come clean solely so he can visit his online friend. sorry derseasterous thats the one time weve ever run into each other and i made him have a crush on one of his bandmates i was in my anti-daverose phase where i made dave a hoe and also didnt want to admit i still loved the ship all these years later 

i hate it so much but you know the whole vr loli trap voice shit that was popular a while ago? hes fucking baller at it for some reason. he did it as a joke while talking to bro and they both about shat their pants. if im feeling real ambitious, hes got a separate soundcloud solely dedicated to doing dumbass rap covers or making his own but in the voice under the pseudonym elizabeth “beth” davids that he will never admit is his. well, he will, but hes gonna be really fucking embarrassed about it. irony or not.

talking abt seperate soundclouds and stuff ive always had it where turntechGodhead was his like. essentially internet fucking persona facade shit he used because we all had that phase where we wanted memorable urls and stuff but also didnt want to totally ignore the nagging fear of people finding you in real life, until it turned into real life ppl finding you on the internet. so he also has basically an adjacent set of social media under the same name but its just a boring username i havent decided on so everyone he knows irl doesnt mix up with what hes made for himself as TG and the people he knows as TG dont know what highschool he goes to. (this occasionally comes with the territory of ppl on parp being pissed that daves “lying” or “hiding things” from his friends as if he was doing it out of spite instead of just keeping embarrassing tagged photos and videos from football games or when he ate shit at the skatepark from fucking with his “rap career”)

every once in a while i get on a kick where hes just german. like, i just replace houston texas with hamburg germany and have him apply to a university in whatever state is applicable for whoever im chatting with and it goes from there? sometimes he moved when he was little and went through the whole visa thing, sometimes he didnt go through the visa thing, sometimes hes a dual citizen because of family and shit, its all dependent on what suits the situation best. 

one that ive been fucking with for a while but hardly break out (until recently with like 5 roses in the span of one day hell yeah) is that he has a neighbor at the end of the hall who is like a thousand year old witch lady that hes basically adopted as his mother figure in lieu of not having one and shes totally cool with it, especially bc when she kicks the bucket she fully plans on giving dave all her occult stuff so her figure-skating coach and realtor daughter doesnt sell it at a garage sale and lets it all go to waste. she also once brought rose up by name in a conversation without any prompting of her existence which dave didnt realize for days, and then one time cryptically stopped and stared at an empty space in the wall, went “she has potential, you know.” then looked at him sitting on her kitchen counter with a smile “lots of it” and hes thought about that weekly ever since. (it is important to note one of the occult items he leaves her is literally her own personal book of shadows shes been filling out for decades its like a 600 page leatherbound book dave has no idea what its used for but the sheer amount of homemade spells and etc in it is like. gonna murder rose the second this chick gets her hands on it i promise you.)

theres the standard strife shit? im not rlly gonna get into those theyre all basically cookie cutter bullshit. its just standard bro and dave abuse talk. i like to inclulde the whole 24hr live cam up in the apartment that definitely watches dave in every room besides his own and the bathroom, but that quickly delves into the prospect of middle-aged men stalking him online and basically sexually harassing him in his own god damn home by talking about how they can see him just trying to take his shoes off in the living room after getting home and frankly? its not one of my best takes! but once you throw it into the headcanon bin, its there forever. 

he actually really does do something with his photography but not enough to warrant anything exciting, but he has his own branding for it and regularly takes pictures of his friends or anything else he thinks is moderately interesting enough to take pictures of, but those are just thrown into shoeboxes under his bed in favor of posting genuine shots because he wants to keep his image intact and blurry photos of jade smiling in the tree they climbed up together while bec paws at the base of it while whining isnt exactly something he wants the whole world to see.

i also pretty often but him into either paleontology OR i put him down as trying to become a mortician because he thinks handing roadkill once he graduated from museum giftshop specimens to doing his own taxidermy on the side has prepared him enough to perform an occasional autopsy and start embalming real human corpses. (sometimes i put my own desires in and make them his bc i have to project at some point and put him through the same EMT course i dropped out of bc it was one semester and he already has pretty decent first aid skills, but he definitely didnt expect it to be as fucking wild at times as it is, but whats he gonna do? get a job back at waffle house? the company hes working for just offered to pay like half his associates in paramedicine tuition and hes already got all his pre-recs done when he started for paleo. at least its a stable job and hes got the ability to be compassionate in the moment) 

im running out of things that ive done to the poor kid. OH 

hes not a virgin he had a girlfriend all four years of high school (shes also one of his optional and designated exes plz keep up) and their relationship ends in one of two ways: she dies in a car accident a week before their high school graduation, or she stops talking to him entirely a week after their high school graduation until a couple years later she gets into (guess what) a car accident with her current wife/girlfriend and dies which leaves behind their daughter. who just so happens to also be daves daughter. her name is hannah and i love her like my own but no one ever likes her and thats on the conditioning of dirk. does dave end up taking her in? yes. shes awesome and the first time he takes her to the park to like run off some fucking steam she disappears for two minutes and dave is moderately terrified until she comes back holding a dead baby squirrel and thats the moment he realizes huh maybe things really do be genetic.

ok at the bottom of the list im gonna add the couple of times hes been a camboy which usually coincides with the live apartment cam thing and the amount of people in his dms calling him hot or whatever, but typically its more of a started the day he turned 18 and basically dipped around 20 in favor of showing up randomly with no warning to complain about a video game dick in hand because it gives him an outlet that wont annoy his friends bc this is the fifteenth time hes had a lot to say this week about a certain boss battle and also the comments fuel his ego and daddy issues.

the last one wasnt the bottom but literally unless its explicitly proven otherwise every time anyone rps with me there is the underlying fact dave strider was a goalie on his high school lacrosse teams all four years and (shocker another one) definitely had the hots for one of his teammates like major hots like first gay experience hots. like it was painfully obvious that teammate also liked him back hots. like one night at a team sleepover one of the other guys was like can yall just makeout and get it over with were fucking tired and dave really had the balls to be offended and ask what the fuck they were talking about while literally sitting halfway in the mans lap bc for some reason they had to share the same chair. 

he is also guilty until proven innocent of being the worlds biggest loner outside of that sports team and even though hes literally a jock he still opts to eat his lunch alone in the hallway or something like that and has a tendency to leave girls on read, but bc hes got an in with the rest of the jocks hes basically drug around to plenty of parties and since hes conventionally attractive enough and popular in the aloof way that he is, hes got plenty of tagged insta posts and twitter directs and snapchat streaks going. 

THESE WERE ALL NO GAME AND DONT INVOLVE SHIPS BC I LIKE TO KEEP MY OPTIONS OPEN AND THEYRE LITERALLY ALL BASED OFF RPS IVE DONE I HOPE YALL JUDGE ME ACCORDINGLY

[ecotone99]

[RF] Dreams To Escape

Normally, my alarm would start singing at 7:01AM alerting me that it was time to start the routine of high school. I would check my phone for the typical “good morning” text from you before the long walk down my cold hallway into the bathroom. I would turn the shower on, and like clock work my mom would start brewing coffee to bring me out of my morning zombie state. After the thirty minute shower you would send me a second text saying to, “hurry up” and not be late, as I so often was. These messages gave meaning to this monotonous routine, because I knew light was at the end of the tunnel when I would finally see your face at school. Then, after picking out what I thought to be a presentable outfit I would make my way downstairs to the kitchen around 7:45, thus giving me the exact time to make it to school right as the first period bell rang at 8:05. I would grab my coffee and hug my Mother good bye as she give me her usual request to give you a hug from her. I would get to school around 8:01 and wait for you by your locker until you pushed through those two grey doors at 8:04 without fail. I was always bothered by the light illuminating from behind you, as the doors slowly shut, that would cast a shadow upon your face so I could not see you as soon as I wanted.

However, today my alarm clock was screaming at 7:01 and the shower never seemed to reach a temperature to warm my cold skin. The coffee my mother made just ran through my zombified organs failing to bring life to any part of my petrified body. My hug good bye with my mom lacked the tenderness as I noticed she chocked on her usual request for me. When I got to school I walked past your locker, because I knew you would not be coming in those grey doors within the next minute. Light would not shine through the hallways today and I would not be irritated from the shadow covering your gracious face. Today you would not come to school, and I would only see you in the picture frames and slide show that the school had put together for your ceremony this morning.

Everyone’s eyes should have been on the beautiful memorial they had set up for you, the vibrant arrangement of roses surrounded photos of you at your most joyous moments, but instead they were watching me. Every one waiting for me to breakdown, cry, do anything besides remain emotionless. What they do not understand is that you gave me the source of all my emotions. Everything from my happiness and love when I would hear your laugh to the sadness and regret whenever I was the source of your sorrows. I could only feel a void in my chest where all of those feelings used to be. My focus remained on that photo that sat on the table of roses, which captured your freckles perfectly, as the presentation began and the teachers began talking for what would seem like hours about how great of a student you were. I could not seem to listen as my memory of you always expressing your disinterest in their totalitarian mindset overshadowed anything escaping their lips. The irony of these people, who were always reprimanding you for your free thought, are now explaining what a gift you were to have in their classrooms. The school cheerleaders in the front row could be seen sobbing hysterically. I think Amanda, The Captain, how she liked to be addressed by her mindless squad of blondes, acknowledged your existence one day in homeroom while you your fixing your hair with your phones camera. I remember how confused you were when she offered you some eyeliner as if you have ever worn make up since you have attended Patterson High. Well people deal with death differently I guess.

“Bro, let’s get out of here,” Jason whispered, bringing me back from a trance state. He was the only friend I have at this school since you left. We met in the sixth grade when Greg was smashing my face into the summer asphalt for the third time that week. Jason, a significantly larger man, mostly due to being held back twice in kindergarten, grabbed Greg by the shirt and threw him to the ground. I still remember the look on his face as he too knew what the scent of dirt mixed with blood smelled like. Jason and I were essentially inseparable from that point forward.

“Go where? The whole school is in the auditorium and will definitely notice me leaving in the middle of her ceremony,” I whispered back. Just then a video started playing about the dangers of texting and driving. Unreal, using you to initiate fear in kids of something that anyone with a brain realizes, but never seems to care until it’s too late and their phone is flying through the windshield as they collide into a stopped car. They are just diminishing your tragic accident to nothing other than a simplistic human error.

“Just follow me, man,” Jason insisted as he attempted to squeeze under the handrail of the bleachers. I tried to nonchalantly follow, but Jason’s rather large figure made this an infeasible task. I can only assume my fellow peers thought I needed a moment to my self once this horrendous video started playing. We left through the back doors unnoticed by any faculty and continued down the hall. The hall decorated in posters made for you that I had not noticed this morning. “RIP Jazz”, “We miss you dearly.” When the hell did you start going by Jazz? I can only wonder how many likes these attention whores got on social media for posting these when they were finished. People love to use death as a publicity stunt.

“Ok, where are you taking me?” I asked Jason as my heart sank. As I asked this question we had turned down a hallway. Your hallway. The one with locker 42. The locker that I was too afraid to stop by this morning. Sure, on the outside it was as dismal as the rest of them, but once it was opened your vibrant individualism radiated through the hall. It is your locker, or more correctly, was your locker.

“Well, it won’t be long before they clean out Jasmine’s locker for her family, if they haven’t already, and I thought you might want something for yourself,” Jason sincerely explained.

“Thanks bro, but you don’t think I would have done that already if I had known her combo?” I rhetorically asked. You always enjoyed keeping secrets from me insisting it kept the passion in our relationship alive. If I ever needed an explanation you would simply state that once you know everything about a person then there is no element of surprise, and you equated the lack of surprise to the lack of passion.

“Well that’s what these are for my friend,” He smiled as he reached in his coat pocket pulling out a stethoscope. I laughed at the simplicity of his plan.

“I hear a stick of dynamite can work just as well. Do you want me to keep a look out for any coppers?” I asked.

“Well, I would’ve asked but being a white male in the state that you’re in I knew that teachers would be keeping a sharper eye on you than usual.”

Jason knew just how my humor worked, and besides you, he was the only one that could execute a joke with such subtle darkness. I remember being at his Grandmother’s eulogy when he jokingly stated how surprised he was that she had made it to her late 60s while being as promiscuous as Eazy-E. Most likely due to him not accurately gauging the age of his audience nobody laughed, and they just blew it off as an immature coping mechanism. Again, everyone deals with death differently.

“And relax, champ, I watched a couple YouTube videos on it the other night. Hell, you can learn more from there than anything these dense teachers spew at us,” Jason said with a tone of a bad con-artist trying to scalp tickets outside of a sold-out show. As he started to fidget with your lock I kept watch for any faculty members walking around searching for delinquents alike. In reality I was just hoping to see you come around the corner, hair still wet form the shower, your freckles on your cheek that presented your natural beauty, wearing your favorite pair of converse with a simple T-shirt and blue jeans. Then I see your face lighten when you look up from the floor and see me standing by your locker. You say nothing, but give me that smile that could clear up the rainy skies in Seattle.

“And, ya, I’m the shit!” Jason exclaims, snapping me back to reality as I hear the padlock crash down to the floor. In pure astonishment that this oversimple plan worked I reached for the locker handle and the sheer coldness ran revelations through my body as I understood that your hand has not touched this since last Friday. The door slowly creaked open revealing everything remained just the way you left it. The collage of your favorite bands and moments at Patterson High line the door with your favorite picture in the center. The one I gave you the last time I saw you. It was of us laying in the warm sand at our favorite beach on a slightly overcast Tuesday. I remember how red your cheeks were when I gave you this small gesture of my kindness, as you adored my photography. “A perfect fit for a perfect photo,” your words still echoing through my head.

“Are you ok, buddy? Do you need me to give you a minute?” Jason said as I noticed his hand was on my shoulder in an attempt to be comforting.

“Ya, I just haven’t seen her locker since last Friday,” I calmly explained. My eyes moved from the door that froze our happiest moments in time to the cheerless bureaucracy of school textbooks, US History, Literature, and Trigonometry all vertically stacked together. However, sandwiched between the unread Dante’s Inferno, and the cold wall of locker 42, rested a withered black leather notebook that had the word “Dreams” written on the spine. I vaguely remember you talking to me about the joy you recently began experiencing from recording your dreams, but I had hardly gave it a second thought until today. I reluctantly pulled this book from your locker as I did not wish to encroach on your privacy, however, I needed something of yours. A small feather bookmark floated down to the floor inducing the realization that this was the journal you always had your face in between class. This too was another one of your secrets that you kept from me. I hope you don’t mind know given our circumstances.

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[michaelfallcon]

Looking Back At The US Coffee Championships Nashville Qualifying Event

It’s official. The field for the 2019 US Coffee Championships is set. After learning the first 62 competitors to punch their tickets at last month’s Denver Qualifying Event, we now know the other 70 coffee professionals to round out the field for the national stage of competition, taking place in just a few short months in Kansas City, Missouri.

From a list of 200 coffee professionals spread across five competitions—Barista Championship, Brewers Cup, Coffee in Goods Spirits, Cup Tasters, and Roasters Championship—the field was winnowed down by nearly two-thirds to a tight 70. There were names new and old—both in terms of competitor and coffee company represented—but as they so often do, the familiar veteran names often found their way to the tops of the list.

That’s not to say that the first-timers didn’t make a splash in Nashville. There were more than a handful of those new to competition who walked away with some wooden hardware, poised to take their rightful place as one of the wily vets in the 2020 season and beyond.

We’re still two months away from the US Coffee Championships storming the Kansas City Convention Center in March, and you can expect the 130+ coffee professionals making the trip will use those 58 days to ramp up their practice time and fine tune their performances. We’ve witnessed a lot of coffee competition already, but we haven’t seen anything yet. Now is when it gets really real.

But before all the really really realness, let’s take a few minutes to enjoy what transpired over the weekend. Let’s look back at the US Coffee Championships Qualifying Even in Nashville, Tennessee.

SprudgeLive’s coverage of the 2019 US Coffee Champs is made possible by Joe Glo and Mahlkönig. All of SprudgeLive’s 2019 competition coverage is made possible by Acaia, Baratza, Faema, Cafe Imports, and Wilbur Curtis.

Barista Championship

A common thread throughout most of the 10-minute routines at the Barista Championship was a general sense of cool collectedness. Participants stayed within themselves even in the face of the oppressive time constrictions. Even though the competition was split pretty evenly between veterans and rookies, the overarching zeitgeist was one of, “we’ve been here before.” The event felt more academic than ecstatic.

Until it didn’t. Competitors like Adam JacksonBey, Rodrigo Vargas, Anthony Ragler, and the undeniable crowd favorite Sara Gill—”you can call me Mama Mocha”—blew the roof off the Track One events space. Their energy was infectious, riling up the otherwise polite crowd into a frenzy of full-throated yowls and even the occasional post-routine interview bum-rush for a 20+ person 4:20 selfie.

Juan Diaz of Deeply Coffee Co.

Amid all the excitement, after the dust settled there was one clear winner: La Palma y El Tucan. The esteemed Colombian farm produced the coffees used by the top three finalists (who all just so happened to go back-to-back-to-back at the end of Day Two). The only other two competitors to use La Palma in the Nashville Barista competition, Juan Diaz and Shane Hess, also found their way to nationals by taking 14th and 16th, respectively.

It’s about as close to a clean sweep as you can expect from a single producer. But the question remains: can they finish the fight or will they lose out to other competition heavyweights like Hacienda La Papaya and Finca Nuguo, the coffees used by the last three years’ winners? We’ll just have to wait until March to find out.

Dylan Siemens, Onyx Coffee Lab

Samantha Spillman, Dillanos Coffee Roasters

T. Ben Fischer, Elixr Coffee Roasters

Jenna Gotthelf, Counter Culture Coffe

Rodrigo Vargas, Rival Bros Coffee Roasters

Isaiah Sheese, Archetype Coffee

Elisabeth Johnson, Venture Coffee Co

Gisel Alvarez, Monarch

Ryan Wojton, Madcap Coffee Co

Anthony Ragler, Counter Culture Coffee

Kay Cheon, Dune Coffee Roasters

Cris Mendoza, Saint Frank Coffee

Samuel Schaefer, Stovetop Roasters

Juan Diaz, Deeply Coffee Co

Ali Abderrahman, State Street Coffee/La Reunion

Shane Hess, Jubala Coffee

Ben Vollmar, Flatlands Coffee

Rachel Diaz, Flatlands Coffee

Brewers Cup

Much of the talk around Track One (and even extending to Twitter) stemmed from the Brewers Cup, where innovative new brewing techniques found their way onto the stage and into the national round of competition in Kansas City. Most notably, 2017 US Brewers Cup runner-up Chelsea Walker-Watson had the people buzzing with her use of a sous vide bath to help keep her brew at a precise temperature.

Not to be out-innovated, Dune Coffee’s Felix Felix came with his own custom-design brewing device that he made using a 3D printer.

Even amongst the progressive takes on brewing, perhaps the most impressive feet was that of Grace McCutchan, a competitor unknown to the national stage of competition but still able to best seasoned vets Jennifer Hwang, Tyler Duncan, and 2018 US Cup Tasters Champion Ken Selby. She’s become one to watch. Will we have back-to-back newcomers taking it all down at the US Brewers Cup? McCutchan is making an argument.

Grace McCutchan, Red Rooster Coffee Roaster

Jennifer Hwang, Klatch Coffee

Tyler Duncan, Topeca Coffee Roasters

John Kruegler, Blanchard’s Coffee Roasting Co

Ben Martin, Madcap Coffee Co

Kenneth Selby, Vashon Coffee Co

Cody Barnhart, Vienna Coffee Co

Gunnar Lagenhuizen, Dune Coffee Roasters

Chelsey Walker-Watson, Atlas Coffee Importers

Elika Liftee, Onyx Coffee Lab

Skyler Richter, LAMILL

Felix Felix, Dune Coffee Roasters

Coffee In Good Spirits

After a slow start in Denver, the Coffee in Good Spirits competition found stronger footing in Nashville, where the number of competitors over quadrupled. The competition really ramped up for the second leg of the Qualifying Event stage. Fire, smoke, ice, the drinks here in Nashville looked as tasty as they did dramatic.

Though only in its first year on American soil, if Nashville is any indication, Coffee in Good Spirits is going to be around for the long haul.

Kris Wood, Black Fox Coffee Co

Nathanael Mehrens, Stay Golden

Matt Foster, Kaldi’s Coffee Roasting Co

Leo-Charles Salerno, Greater Goods Coffee Roasters

Brodie Lewis, Madcap Coffee Co

Rachel Huffman, Dose Nashville

John Martin, LAMILL

Jen McElroy, Klatch Coffee

Brian Beyke, Quills Coffee

Koji Daremo, The Ruin Daily

Dan Hilburn, Backyard Beans Coffee Co

Joel Cronenberg, Provision Coffee

Lindy Schubring, Greyhouse Coffee & Supply Co

Cup Tasters

In case you needed any convincing that Onyx Coffee Lab is really, really good at coffee competition (and, y’know, their Roasters title, Brewers Cup title, and multiple consecutive Finals appearances in the Barista Championship aren’t enough for you), look no further than the Cup Tasters competition in Nashville. Fielding three Tasters—roughly 1/16th of the total competitors—Onyx nonetheless found all three of those competitors moving on, one in five.

But it would be foolish to make any future predictions at this point. With five competitors correctly identifying all six sets and perpetual finalist Samuel Demisse lurking in the field, this is one is still anyone’s to claim.

Matthew McDaniel, Summit Coffee

Summer Zhang, Onyx Coffee Lab

Aaron Lerner, SkyTop Coffee

Sarah Lambeth, Congregation Coffee Roasters

Brandon Hutchingson, Mission Coffee

Rachel Stanich, Red Fox Coffee Merchants

Bear Soliven, Onyx Coffee Lab

Samuel Demisse, Keffa Coffee Importers

Elisabeth Johnson, Venture Coffee Co

Hyoung Wuk Jung, Loit Café

Jeff Mooney, Folly Coffee Roasters

Jarrett Johnson, Lineage Roasting

Cameron Metzinger, Backyard Beans Coffee Co

Joshua Edens, Onyx Coffee Lab

Helen Choi, Luce Ave Coffee Roasters

Roasters Championship

Roasters Championship competitors found themselves with a unique challenge: how to roast a coffee without knowing a thing about it. That coffee, it turned out, was a natural processed Myanmar, which many competitors found to be quite the sticky wicket. How do you ramp up the sweetness and soften the nuttiness?

Ultimately, it was a nut that the roasters (first) cracked. Having personally tasted multiple roasters’ takes on the coffee—thanks in no small part to the Sprudge Live desk being very, very close to the Roasters Village—I can say that many roasters found that balance. The cups were sweet, not overly heavy, with little to no hint of ferment.

If these coffees are any indication of what’s to come in Kansas City, attendees are in for LOTS of really good coffee.

Amanda Hagenbuch, Rival Bros Coffee Roasters

Jeremy Moore, Bonlife Coffee Roasters

Steve Cuevas, Black Oak Coffee Roasters

Eduardo Choza, Mayorga Organics

José René Martínez, J.René Coffee Roasters

Kenneth Thomas, Umble Coffee Co

Anthony Greatorex, Red Rooster Coffee Roaster

Jason Burkum, Archetype Coffee

Matthew Delarosa, Ironsmith Coffee Roasters

Evan Pollitt, Summitt Coffee

Aaron MacDougall, Broadsheet Coffee Roasters

Eric Stone, Mudhouse Coffee Roasters

Photos for Sprudge and Sprudge Live by Elizabeth Chai and Charlie Burt.

Zac Cadwalader is the managing editor at Sprudge Media Network and a staff writer based in Dallas. Read more Zac Cadwalader on Sprudge.

The post Looking Back At The US Coffee Championships Nashville Qualifying Event appeared first on Sprudge.

Looking Back At The US Coffee Championships Nashville Qualifying Event published first on https://medium.com/@LinLinCoffee

[mrwilliamcharley]

Looking Back At The US Coffee Championships Nashville Qualifying Event

It’s official. The field for the 2019 US Coffee Championships is set. After learning the first 62 competitors to punch their tickets at last month’s Denver Qualifying Event, we now know the other 70 coffee professionals to round out the field for the national stage of competition, taking place in just a few short months in Kansas City, Missouri.

From a list of 200 coffee professionals spread across five competitions—Barista Championship, Brewers Cup, Coffee in Goods Spirits, Cup Tasters, and Roasters Championship—the field was winnowed down by nearly two-thirds to a tight 70. There were names new and old—both in terms of competitor and coffee company represented—but as they so often do, the familiar veteran names often found their way to the tops of the list.

That’s not to say that the first-timers didn’t make a splash in Nashville. There were more than a handful of those new to competition who walked away with some wooden hardware, poised to take their rightful place as one of the wily vets in the 2020 season and beyond.

We’re still two months away from the US Coffee Championships storming the Kansas City Convention Center in March, and you can expect the 130+ coffee professionals making the trip will use those 58 days to ramp up their practice time and fine tune their performances. We’ve witnessed a lot of coffee competition already, but we haven’t seen anything yet. Now is when it gets really real.

But before all the really really realness, let’s take a few minutes to enjoy what transpired over the weekend. Let’s look back at the US Coffee Championships Qualifying Even in Nashville, Tennessee.

SprudgeLive’s coverage of the 2019 US Coffee Champs is made possible by Joe Glo and Mahlkönig. All of SprudgeLive’s 2019 competition coverage is made possible by Acaia, Baratza, Faema, Cafe Imports, and Wilbur Curtis.

Barista Championship

A common thread throughout most of the 10-minute routines at the Barista Championship was a general sense of cool collectedness. Participants stayed within themselves even in the face of the oppressive time constrictions. Even though the competition was split pretty evenly between veterans and rookies, the overarching zeitgeist was one of, “we’ve been here before.” The event felt more academic than ecstatic.

Until it didn’t. Competitors like Adam JacksonBey, Rodrigo Vargas, Anthony Ragler, and the undeniable crowd favorite Sara Gill—”you can call me Mama Mocha”—blew the roof off the Track One events space. Their energy was infectious, riling up the otherwise polite crowd into a frenzy of full-throated yowls and even the occasional post-routine interview bum-rush for a 20+ person 4:20 selfie.

Juan Diaz of Deeply Coffee Co.

Amid all the excitement, after the dust settled there was one clear winner: La Palma y El Tucan. The esteemed Colombian farm produced the coffees used by the top three finalists (who all just so happened to go back-to-back-to-back at the end of Day Two). The only other two competitors to use La Palma in the Nashville Barista competition, Juan Diaz and Shane Hess, also found their way to nationals by taking 14th and 16th, respectively.

It’s about as close to a clean sweep as you can expect from a single producer. But the question remains: can they finish the fight or will they lose out to other competition heavyweights like Hacienda La Papaya and Finca Nuguo, the coffees used by the last three years’ winners? We’ll just have to wait until March to find out.

Dylan Siemens, Onyx Coffee Lab

Samantha Spillman, Dillanos Coffee Roasters

T. Ben Fischer, Elixr Coffee Roasters

Jenna Gotthelf, Counter Culture Coffe

Rodrigo Vargas, Rival Bros Coffee Roasters

Isaiah Sheese, Archetype Coffee

Elisabeth Johnson, Venture Coffee Co

Gisel Alvarez, Monarch

Ryan Wojton, Madcap Coffee Co

Anthony Ragler, Counter Culture Coffee

Kay Cheon, Dune Coffee Roasters

Cris Mendoza, Saint Frank Coffee

Samuel Schaefer, Stovetop Roasters

Juan Diaz, Deeply Coffee Co

Ali Abderrahman, State Street Coffee/La Reunion

Shane Hess, Jubala Coffee

Ben Vollmar, Flatlands Coffee

Rachel Diaz, Flatlands Coffee

Brewers Cup

Much of the talk around Track One (and even extending to Twitter) stemmed from the Brewers Cup, where innovative new brewing techniques found their way onto the stage and into the national round of competition in Kansas City. Most notably, 2017 US Brewers Cup runner-up Chelsea Walker-Watson had the people buzzing with her use of a sous vide bath to help keep her brew at a precise temperature.

Not to be out-innovated, Dune Coffee’s Felix Felix came with his own custom-design brewing device that he made using a 3D printer.

Even amongst the progressive takes on brewing, perhaps the most impressive feet was that of Grace McCutchan, a competitor unknown to the national stage of competition but still able to best seasoned vets Jennifer Hwang, Tyler Duncan, and 2018 US Cup Tasters Champion Ken Selby. She’s become one to watch. Will we have back-to-back newcomers taking it all down at the US Brewers Cup? McCutchan is making an argument.

Grace McCutchan, Red Rooster Coffee Roaster

Jennifer Hwang, Klatch Coffee

Tyler Duncan, Topeca Coffee Roasters

John Kruegler, Blanchard’s Coffee Roasting Co

Ben Martin, Madcap Coffee Co

Kenneth Selby, Vashon Coffee Co

Cody Barnhart, Vienna Coffee Co

Gunnar Lagenhuizen, Dune Coffee Roasters

Chelsey Walker-Watson, Atlas Coffee Importers

Elika Liftee, Onyx Coffee Lab

Skyler Richter, LAMILL

Felix Felix, Dune Coffee Roasters

Coffee In Good Spirits

After a slow start in Denver, the Coffee in Good Spirits competition found stronger footing in Nashville, where the number of competitors over quadrupled. The competition really ramped up for the second leg of the Qualifying Event stage. Fire, smoke, ice, the drinks here in Nashville looked as tasty as they did dramatic.

Though only in its first year on American soil, if Nashville is any indication, Coffee in Good Spirits is going to be around for the long haul.

Kris Wood, Black Fox Coffee Co

Nathanael Mehrens, Stay Golden

Matt Foster, Kaldi’s Coffee Roasting Co

Leo-Charles Salerno, Greater Goods Coffee Roasters

Brodie Lewis, Madcap Coffee Co

Rachel Huffman, Dose Nashville

John Martin, LAMILL

Jen McElroy, Klatch Coffee

Brian Beyke, Quills Coffee

Koji Daremo, The Ruin Daily

Dan Hilburn, Backyard Beans Coffee Co

Joel Cronenberg, Provision Coffee

Lindy Schubring, Greyhouse Coffee & Supply Co

Cup Tasters

In case you needed any convincing that Onyx Coffee Lab is really, really good at coffee competition (and, y’know, their Roasters title, Brewers Cup title, and multiple consecutive Finals appearances in the Barista Championship aren’t enough for you), look no further than the Cup Tasters competition in Nashville. Fielding three Tasters—roughly 1/16th of the total competitors—Onyx nonetheless found all three of those competitors moving on, one in five.

But it would be foolish to make any future predictions at this point. With five competitors correctly identifying all six sets and perpetual finalist Samuel Demisse lurking in the field, this is one is still anyone’s to claim.

Matthew McDaniel, Summit Coffee

Summer Zhang, Onyx Coffee Lab

Aaron Lerner, SkyTop Coffee

Sarah Lambeth, Congregation Coffee Roasters

Brandon Hutchingson, Mission Coffee

Rachel Stanich, Red Fox Coffee Merchants

Bear Soliven, Onyx Coffee Lab

Samuel Demisse, Keffa Coffee Importers

Elisabeth Johnson, Venture Coffee Co

Hyoung Wuk Jung, Loit Café

Jeff Mooney, Folly Coffee Roasters

Jarrett Johnson, Lineage Roasting

Cameron Metzinger, Backyard Beans Coffee Co

Joshua Edens, Onyx Coffee Lab

Helen Choi, Luce Ave Coffee Roasters

Roasters Championship

Roasters Championship competitors found themselves with a unique challenge: how to roast a coffee without knowing a thing about it. That coffee, it turned out, was a natural processed Myanmar, which many competitors found to be quite the sticky wicket. How do you ramp up the sweetness and soften the nuttiness?

Ultimately, it was a nut that the roasters (first) cracked. Having personally tasted multiple roasters’ takes on the coffee—thanks in no small part to the Sprudge Live desk being very, very close to the Roasters Village—I can say that many roasters found that balance. The cups were sweet, not overly heavy, with little to no hint of ferment.

If these coffees are any indication of what’s to come in Kansas City, attendees are in for LOTS of really good coffee.

Amanda Hagenbuch, Rival Bros Coffee Roasters

Jeremy Moore, Bonlife Coffee Roasters

Steve Cuevas, Black Oak Coffee Roasters

Eduardo Choza, Mayorga Organics

José René Martínez, J.René Coffee Roasters

Kenneth Thomas, Umble Coffee Co

Anthony Greatorex, Red Rooster Coffee Roaster

Jason Burkum, Archetype Coffee

Matthew Delarosa, Ironsmith Coffee Roasters

Evan Pollitt, Summitt Coffee

Aaron MacDougall, Broadsheet Coffee Roasters

Eric Stone, Mudhouse Coffee Roasters

Photos for Sprudge and Sprudge Live by Elizabeth Chai and Charlie Burt.

Zac Cadwalader is the managing editor at Sprudge Media Network and a staff writer based in Dallas. Read more Zac Cadwalader on Sprudge.

The post Looking Back At The US Coffee Championships Nashville Qualifying Event appeared first on Sprudge.

from Sprudge http://bit.ly/2Fxii9d

[epchapman89]

Looking Back At The US Coffee Championships Nashville Qualifying Event

It’s official. The field for the 2019 US Coffee Championships is set. After learning the first 62 competitors to punch their tickets at last month’s Denver Qualifying Event, we now know the other 70 coffee professionals to round out the field for the national stage of competition, taking place in just a few short months in Kansas City, Missouri.

From a list of 200 coffee professionals spread across five competitions—Barista Championship, Brewers Cup, Coffee in Goods Spirits, Cup Tasters, and Roasters Championship—the field was winnowed down by nearly two-thirds to a tight 70. There were names new and old—both in terms of competitor and coffee company represented—but as they so often do, the familiar veteran names often found their way to the tops of the list.

That’s not to say that the first-timers didn’t make a splash in Nashville. There were more than a handful of those new to competition who walked away with some wooden hardware, poised to take their rightful place as one of the wily vets in the 2020 season and beyond.

We’re still two months away from the US Coffee Championships storming the Kansas City Convention Center in March, and you can expect the 130+ coffee professionals making the trip will use those 58 days to ramp up their practice time and fine tune their performances. We’ve witnessed a lot of coffee competition already, but we haven’t seen anything yet. Now is when it gets really real.

But before all the really really realness, let’s take a few minutes to enjoy what transpired over the weekend. Let’s look back at the US Coffee Championships Qualifying Even in Nashville, Tennessee.

SprudgeLive’s coverage of the 2019 US Coffee Champs is made possible by Joe Glo and Mahlkönig. All of SprudgeLive’s 2019 competition coverage is made possible by Acaia, Baratza, Faema, Cafe Imports, and Wilbur Curtis.

Barista Championship

A common thread throughout most of the 10-minute routines at the Barista Championship was a general sense of cool collectedness. Participants stayed within themselves even in the face of the oppressive time constrictions. Even though the competition was split pretty evenly between veterans and rookies, the overarching zeitgeist was one of, “we’ve been here before.” The event felt more academic than ecstatic.

Until it didn’t. Competitors like Adam JacksonBey, Rodrigo Vargas, Anthony Ragler, and the undeniable crowd favorite Sara Gill—”you can call me Mama Mocha”—blew the roof off the Track One events space. Their energy was infectious, riling up the otherwise polite crowd into a frenzy of full-throated yowls and even the occasional post-routine interview bum-rush for a 20+ person 4:20 selfie.

Juan Diaz of Deeply Coffee Co.

Amid all the excitement, after the dust settled there was one clear winner: La Palma y El Tucan. The esteemed Colombian farm produced the coffees used by the top three finalists (who all just so happened to go back-to-back-to-back at the end of Day Two). The only other two competitors to use La Palma in the Nashville Barista competition, Juan Diaz and Shane Hess, also found their way to nationals by taking 14th and 16th, respectively.

It’s about as close to a clean sweep as you can expect from a single producer. But the question remains: can they finish the fight or will they lose out to other competition heavyweights like Hacienda La Papaya and Finca Nuguo, the coffees used by the last three years’ winners? We’ll just have to wait until March to find out.

Dylan Siemens, Onyx Coffee Lab

Samantha Spillman, Dillanos Coffee Roasters

T. Ben Fischer, Elixr Coffee Roasters

Jenna Gotthelf, Counter Culture Coffe

Rodrigo Vargas, Rival Bros Coffee Roasters

Isaiah Sheese, Archetype Coffee

Elisabeth Johnson, Venture Coffee Co

Gisel Alvarez, Monarch

Ryan Wojton, Madcap Coffee Co

Anthony Ragler, Counter Culture Coffee

Kay Cheon, Dune Coffee Roasters

Cris Mendoza, Saint Frank Coffee

Samuel Schaefer, Stovetop Roasters

Juan Diaz, Deeply Coffee Co

Ali Abderrahman, State Street Coffee/La Reunion

Shane Hess, Jubala Coffee

Ben Vollmar, Flatlands Coffee

Rachel Diaz, Flatlands Coffee

Brewers Cup

Much of the talk around Track One (and even extending to Twitter) stemmed from the Brewers Cup, where innovative new brewing techniques found their way onto the stage and into the national round of competition in Kansas City. Most notably, 2017 US Brewers Cup runner-up Chelsea Walker-Watson had the people buzzing with her use of a sous vide bath to help keep her brew at a precise temperature.

Not to be out-innovated, Dune Coffee’s Felix Felix came with his own custom-design brewing device that he made using a 3D printer.

Even amongst the progressive takes on brewing, perhaps the most impressive feet was that of Grace McCutchan, a competitor unknown to the national stage of competition but still able to best seasoned vets Jennifer Hwang, Tyler Duncan, and 2018 US Cup Tasters Champion Ken Selby. She’s become one to watch. Will we have back-to-back newcomers taking it all down at the US Brewers Cup? McCutchan is making an argument.

Grace McCutchan, Red Rooster Coffee Roaster

Jennifer Hwang, Klatch Coffee

Tyler Duncan, Topeca Coffee Roasters

John Kruegler, Blanchard’s Coffee Roasting Co

Ben Martin, Madcap Coffee Co

Kenneth Selby, Vashon Coffee Co

Cody Barnhart, Vienna Coffee Co

Gunnar Lagenhuizen, Dune Coffee Roasters

Chelsey Walker-Watson, Atlas Coffee Importers

Elika Liftee, Onyx Coffee Lab

Skyler Richter, LAMILL

Felix Felix, Dune Coffee Roasters

Coffee In Good Spirits

After a slow start in Denver, the Coffee in Good Spirits competition found stronger footing in Nashville, where the number of competitors over quadrupled. The competition really ramped up for the second leg of the Qualifying Event stage. Fire, smoke, ice, the drinks here in Nashville looked as tasty as they did dramatic.

Though only in its first year on American soil, if Nashville is any indication, Coffee in Good Spirits is going to be around for the long haul.

Kris Wood, Black Fox Coffee Co

Nathanael Mehrens, Stay Golden

Matt Foster, Kaldi’s Coffee Roasting Co

Leo-Charles Salerno, Greater Goods Coffee Roasters

Brodie Lewis, Madcap Coffee Co

Rachel Huffman, Dose Nashville

John Martin, LAMILL

Jen McElroy, Klatch Coffee

Brian Beyke, Quills Coffee

Koji Daremo, The Ruin Daily

Dan Hilburn, Backyard Beans Coffee Co

Joel Cronenberg, Provision Coffee

Lindy Schubring, Greyhouse Coffee & Supply Co

Cup Tasters

In case you needed any convincing that Onyx Coffee Lab is really, really good at coffee competition (and, y’know, their Roasters title, Brewers Cup title, and multiple consecutive Finals appearances in the Barista Championship aren’t enough for you), look no further than the Cup Tasters competition in Nashville. Fielding three Tasters—roughly 1/16th of the total competitors—Onyx nonetheless found all three of those competitors moving on, one in five.

But it would be foolish to make any future predictions at this point. With five competitors correctly identifying all six sets and perpetual finalist Samuel Demisse lurking in the field, this is one is still anyone’s to claim.

Matthew McDaniel, Summit Coffee

Summer Zhang, Onyx Coffee Lab

Aaron Lerner, SkyTop Coffee

Sarah Lambeth, Congregation Coffee Roasters

Brandon Hutchingson, Mission Coffee

Rachel Stanich, Red Fox Coffee Merchants

Bear Soliven, Onyx Coffee Lab

Samuel Demisse, Keffa Coffee Importers

Elisabeth Johnson, Venture Coffee Co

Hyoung Wuk Jung, Loit Café

Jeff Mooney, Folly Coffee Roasters

Jarrett Johnson, Lineage Roasting

Cameron Metzinger, Backyard Beans Coffee Co

Joshua Edens, Onyx Coffee Lab

Helen Choi, Luce Ave Coffee Roasters

Roasters Championship

Roasters Championship competitors found themselves with a unique challenge: how to roast a coffee without knowing a thing about it. That coffee, it turned out, was a natural processed Myanmar, which many competitors found to be quite the sticky wicket. How do you ramp up the sweetness and soften the nuttiness?

Ultimately, it was a nut that the roasters (first) cracked. Having personally tasted multiple roasters’ takes on the coffee—thanks in no small part to the Sprudge Live desk being very, very close to the Roasters Village—I can say that many roasters found that balance. The cups were sweet, not overly heavy, with little to no hint of ferment.

If these coffees are any indication of what’s to come in Kansas City, attendees are in for LOTS of really good coffee.

Amanda Hagenbuch, Rival Bros Coffee Roasters

Jeremy Moore, Bonlife Coffee Roasters

Steve Cuevas, Black Oak Coffee Roasters

Eduardo Choza, Mayorga Organics

José René Martínez, J.René Coffee Roasters

Kenneth Thomas, Umble Coffee Co

Anthony Greatorex, Red Rooster Coffee Roaster

Jason Burkum, Archetype Coffee

Matthew Delarosa, Ironsmith Coffee Roasters

Evan Pollitt, Summitt Coffee

Aaron MacDougall, Broadsheet Coffee Roasters

Eric Stone, Mudhouse Coffee Roasters

Photos for Sprudge and Sprudge Live by Elizabeth Chai and Charlie Burt.

Zac Cadwalader is the managing editor at Sprudge Media Network and a staff writer based in Dallas. Read more Zac Cadwalader on Sprudge.

The post Looking Back At The US Coffee Championships Nashville Qualifying Event appeared first on Sprudge.

seen 1st on http://sprudge.com

[michaelfallcon]

Looking Back At The US Coffee Championships Nashville Qualifying Event

It’s official. The field for the 2019 US Coffee Championships is set. After learning the first 62 competitors to punch their tickets at last month’s Denver Qualifying Event, we now know the other 70 coffee professionals to round out the field for the national stage of competition, taking place in just a few short months in Kansas City, Missouri.

From a list of 200 coffee professionals spread across five competitions—Barista Championship, Brewers Cup, Coffee in Goods Spirits, Cup Tasters, and Roasters Championship—the field was winnowed down by nearly two-thirds to a tight 70. There were names new and old—both in terms of competitor and coffee company represented—but as they so often do, the familiar veteran names often found their way to the tops of the list.

That’s not to say that the first-timers didn’t make a splash in Nashville. There were more than a handful of those new to competition who walked away with some wooden hardware, poised to take their rightful place as one of the wily vets in the 2020 season and beyond.

We’re still two months away from the US Coffee Championships storming the Kansas City Convention Center in March, and you can expect the 130+ coffee professionals making the trip will use those 58 days to ramp up their practice time and fine tune their performances. We’ve witnessed a lot of coffee competition already, but we haven’t seen anything yet. Now is when it gets really real.

But before all the really really realness, let’s take a few minutes to enjoy what transpired over the weekend. Let’s look back at the US Coffee Championships Qualifying Even in Nashville, Tennessee.

SprudgeLive’s coverage of the 2019 US Coffee Champs is made possible by Joe Glo and Mahlkönig. All of SprudgeLive’s 2019 competition coverage is made possible by Acaia, Baratza, Faema, Cafe Imports, and Wilbur Curtis.

Barista Championship

A common thread throughout most of the 10-minute routines at the Barista Championship was a general sense of cool collectedness. Participants stayed within themselves even in the face of the oppressive time constrictions. Even though the competition was split pretty evenly between veterans and rookies, the overarching zeitgeist was one of, “we’ve been here before.” The event felt more academic than ecstatic.

Until it didn’t. Competitors like Adam JacksonBey, Rodrigo Vargas, Anthony Ragler, and the undeniable crowd favorite Sara Gill—”you can call me Mama Mocha”—blew the roof off the Track One events space. Their energy was infectious, riling up the otherwise polite crowd into a frenzy of full-throated yowls and even the occasional post-routine interview bum-rush for a 20+ person 4:20 selfie.

Juan Diaz of Deeply Coffee Co.

Amid all the excitement, after the dust settled there was one clear winner: La Palma y El Tucan. The esteemed Colombian farm produced the coffees used by the top three finalists (who all just so happened to go back-to-back-to-back at the end of Day Two). The only other two competitors to use La Palma in the Nashville Barista competition, Juan Diaz and Shane Hess, also found their way to nationals by taking 14th and 16th, respectively.

It’s about as close to a clean sweep as you can expect from a single producer. But the question remains: can they finish the fight or will they lose out to other competition heavyweights like Hacienda La Papaya and Finca Nuguo, the coffees used by the last three years’ winners? We’ll just have to wait until March to find out.

Dylan Siemens, Onyx Coffee Lab

Samantha Spillman, Dillanos Coffee Roasters

T. Ben Fischer, Elixr Coffee Roasters

Jenna Gotthelf, Counter Culture Coffe

Rodrigo Vargas, Rival Bros Coffee Roasters

Isaiah Sheese, Archetype Coffee

Elisabeth Johnson, Venture Coffee Co

Gisel Alvarez, Monarch

Ryan Wojton, Madcap Coffee Co

Anthony Ragler, Counter Culture Coffee

Kay Cheon, Dune Coffee Roasters

Cris Mendoza, Saint Frank Coffee

Samuel Schaefer, Stovetop Roasters

Juan Diaz, Deeply Coffee Co

Ali Abderrahman, State Street Coffee/La Reunion

Shane Hess, Jubala Coffee

Ben Vollmar, Flatlands Coffee

Rachel Diaz, Flatlands Coffee

Brewers Cup

Much of the talk around Track One (and even extending to Twitter) stemmed from the Brewers Cup, where innovative new brewing techniques found their way onto the stage and into the national round of competition in Kansas City. Most notably, 2017 US Brewers Cup runner-up Chelsea Walker-Watson had the people buzzing with her use of a sous vide bath to help keep her brew at a precise temperature.

Not to be out-innovated, Dune Coffee’s Felix Felix came with his own custom-design brewing device that he made using a 3D printer.

Even amongst the progressive takes on brewing, perhaps the most impressive feet was that of Grace McCutchan, a competitor unknown to the national stage of competition but still able to best seasoned vets Jennifer Hwang, Tyler Duncan, and 2018 US Cup Tasters Champion Ken Selby. She’s become one to watch. Will we have back-to-back newcomers taking it all down at the US Brewers Cup? McCutchan is making an argument.

Grace McCutchan, Red Rooster Coffee Roaster

Jennifer Hwang, Klatch Coffee

Tyler Duncan, Topeca Coffee Roasters

John Kruegler, Blanchard’s Coffee Roasting Co

Ben Martin, Madcap Coffee Co

Kenneth Selby, Vashon Coffee Co

Cody Barnhart, Vienna Coffee Co

Gunnar Lagenhuizen, Dune Coffee Roasters

Chelsey Walker-Watson, Atlas Coffee Importers

Elika Liftee, Onyx Coffee Lab

Skyler Richter, LAMILL

Felix Felix, Dune Coffee Roasters

Coffee In Good Spirits

After a slow start in Denver, the Coffee in Good Spirits competition found stronger footing in Nashville, where the number of competitors over quadrupled. The competition really ramped up for the second leg of the Qualifying Event stage. Fire, smoke, ice, the drinks here in Nashville looked as tasty as they did dramatic.

Though only in its first year on American soil, if Nashville is any indication, Coffee in Good Spirits is going to be around for the long haul.

Kris Wood, Black Fox Coffee Co

Nathanael Mehrens, Stay Golden

Matt Foster, Kaldi’s Coffee Roasting Co

Leo-Charles Salerno, Greater Goods Coffee Roasters

Brodie Lewis, Madcap Coffee Co

Rachel Huffman, Dose Nashville

John Martin, LAMILL

Jen McElroy, Klatch Coffee

Brian Beyke, Quills Coffee

Koji Daremo, The Ruin Daily

Dan Hilburn, Backyard Beans Coffee Co

Joel Cronenberg, Provision Coffee

Lindy Schubring, Greyhouse Coffee & Supply Co

Cup Tasters

In case you needed any convincing that Onyx Coffee Lab is really, really good at coffee competition (and, y’know, their Roasters title, Brewers Cup title, and multiple consecutive Finals appearances in the Barista Championship aren’t enough for you), look no further than the Cup Tasters competition in Nashville. Fielding three Tasters—roughly 1/16th of the total competitors—Onyx nonetheless found all three of those competitors moving on, one in five.

But it would be foolish to make any future predictions at this point. With five competitors correctly identifying all six sets and perpetual finalist Samuel Demisse lurking in the field, this is one is still anyone’s to claim.

Matthew McDaniel, Summit Coffee

Summer Zhang, Onyx Coffee Lab

Aaron Lerner, SkyTop Coffee

Sarah Lambeth, Congregation Coffee Roasters

Brandon Hutchingson, Mission Coffee

Rachel Stanich, Red Fox Coffee Merchants

Bear Soliven, Onyx Coffee Lab

Samuel Demisse, Keffa Coffee Importers

Elisabeth Johnson, Venture Coffee Co

Hyoung Wuk Jung, Loit Café

Jeff Mooney, Folly Coffee Roasters

Jarrett Johnson, Lineage Roasting

Cameron Metzinger, Backyard Beans Coffee Co

Joshua Edens, Onyx Coffee Lab

Helen Choi, Luce Ave Coffee Roasters

Roasters Championship

Roasters Championship competitors found themselves with a unique challenge: how to roast a coffee without knowing a thing about it. That coffee, it turned out, was a natural processed Myanmar, which many competitors found to be quite the sticky wicket. How do you ramp up the sweetness and soften the nuttiness?

Ultimately, it was a nut that the roasters (first) cracked. Having personally tasted multiple roasters’ takes on the coffee—thanks in no small part to the Sprudge Live desk being very, very close to the Roasters Village—I can say that many roasters found that balance. The cups were sweet, not overly heavy, with little to no hint of ferment.

If these coffees are any indication of what’s to come in Kansas City, attendees are in for LOTS of really good coffee.

Amanda Hagenbuch, Rival Bros Coffee Roasters

Jeremy Moore, Bonlife Coffee Roasters

Steve Cuevas, Black Oak Coffee Roasters

Eduardo Choza, Mayorga Organics

José René Martínez, J.René Coffee Roasters

Kenneth Thomas, Umble Coffee Co

Anthony Greatorex, Red Rooster Coffee Roaster

Jason Burkum, Archetype Coffee

Matthew Delarosa, Ironsmith Coffee Roasters

Evan Pollitt, Summitt Coffee

Aaron MacDougall, Broadsheet Coffee Roasters

Eric Stone, Mudhouse Coffee Roasters

Photos for Sprudge and Sprudge Live by Elizabeth Chai and Charlie Burt.

Zac Cadwalader is the managing editor at Sprudge Media Network and a staff writer based in Dallas. Read more Zac Cadwalader on Sprudge.

The post Looking Back At The US Coffee Championships Nashville Qualifying Event appeared first on Sprudge.

Looking Back At The US Coffee Championships Nashville Qualifying Event published first on https://medium.com/@LinLinCoffee

[epchapman89]

Looking Back At The US Coffee Championships Nashville Qualifying Event

It’s official. The field for the 2019 US Coffee Championships is set. After learning the first 62 competitors to punch their tickets at last month’s Denver Qualifying Event, we now know the other 70 coffee professionals to round out the field for the national stage of competition, taking place in just a few short months in Kansas City, Missouri.

From a list of 200 coffee professionals spread across five competitions—Barista Championship, Brewers Cup, Coffee in Goods Spirits, Cup Tasters, and Roasters Championship—the field was winnowed down by nearly two-thirds to a tight 70. There were names new and old—both in terms of competitor and coffee company represented—but as they so often do, the familiar veteran names often found their way to the tops of the list.

That’s not to say that the first-timers didn’t make a splash in Nashville. There were more than a handful of those new to competition who walked away with some wooden hardware, poised to take their rightful place as one of the wily vets in the 2020 season and beyond.

We’re still two months away from the US Coffee Championships storming the Kansas City Convention Center in March, and you can expect the 130+ coffee professionals making the trip will use those 58 days to ramp up their practice time and fine tune their performances. We’ve witnessed a lot of coffee competition already, but we haven’t seen anything yet. Now is when it gets really real.

But before all the really really realness, let’s take a few minutes to enjoy what transpired over the weekend. Let’s look back at the US Coffee Championships Qualifying Even in Nashville, Tennessee.

SprudgeLive’s coverage of the 2019 US Coffee Champs is made possible by Joe Glo and Mahlkönig. All of SprudgeLive’s 2019 competition coverage is made possible by Acaia, Baratza, Faema, Cafe Imports, and Wilbur Curtis.

Barista Championship

A common thread throughout most of the 10-minute routines at the Barista Championship was a general sense of cool collectedness. Participants stayed within themselves even in the face of the oppressive time constrictions. Even though the competition was split pretty evenly between veterans and rookies, the overarching zeitgeist was one of, “we’ve been here before.” The event felt more academic than ecstatic.

Until it didn’t. Competitors like Adam JacksonBey, Rodrigo Vargas, Anthony Ragler, and the undeniable crowd favorite Sara Gill—”you can call me Mama Mocha”—blew the roof off the Track One events space. Their energy was infectious, riling up the otherwise polite crowd into a frenzy of full-throated yowls and even the occasional post-routine interview bum-rush for a 20+ person 4:20 selfie.

Juan Diaz of Deeply Coffee Co.

Amid all the excitement, after the dust settled there was one clear winner: La Palma y El Tucan. The esteemed Colombian farm produced the coffees used by the top three finalists (who all just so happened to go back-to-back-to-back at the end of Day Two). The only other two competitors to use La Palma in the Nashville Barista competition, Juan Diaz and Shane Hess, also found their way to nationals by taking 14th and 16th, respectively.

It’s about as close to a clean sweep as you can expect from a single producer. But the question remains: can they finish the fight or will they lose out to other competition heavyweights like Hacienda La Papaya and Finca Nuguo, the coffees used by the last three years’ winners? We’ll just have to wait until March to find out.

Dylan Siemens, Onyx Coffee Lab

Samantha Spillman, Dillanos Coffee Roasters

T. Ben Fischer, Elixr Coffee Roasters

Jenna Gotthelf, Counter Culture Coffe

Rodrigo Vargas, Rival Bros Coffee Roasters

Isaiah Sheese, Archetype Coffee

Elisabeth Johnson, Venture Coffee Co

Gisel Alvarez, Monarch

Ryan Wojton, Madcap Coffee Co

Anthony Ragler, Counter Culture Coffee

Kay Cheon, Dune Coffee Roasters

Cris Mendoza, Saint Frank Coffee

Samuel Schaefer, Stovetop Roasters

Juan Diaz, Deeply Coffee Co

Ali Abderrahman, State Street Coffee/La Reunion

Shane Hess, Jubala Coffee

Ben Vollmar, Flatlands Coffee

Rachel Diaz, Flatlands Coffee

Brewers Cup

Much of the talk around Track One (and even extending to Twitter) stemmed from the Brewers Cup, where innovative new brewing techniques found their way onto the stage and into the national round of competition in Kansas City. Most notably, 2017 US Brewers Cup runner-up Chelsea Walker-Watson had the people buzzing with her use of a sous vide bath to help keep her brew at a precise temperature.

Not to be out-innovated, Dune Coffee’s Felix Felix came with his own custom-design brewing device that he made using a 3D printer.

Even amongst the progressive takes on brewing, perhaps the most impressive feet was that of Grace McCutchan, a competitor unknown to the national stage of competition but still able to best seasoned vets Jennifer Hwang, Tyler Duncan, and 2018 US Cup Tasters Champion Ken Selby. She’s become one to watch. Will we have back-to-back newcomers taking it all down at the US Brewers Cup? McCutchan is making an argument.

Grace McCutchan, Red Rooster Coffee Roaster

Jennifer Hwang, Klatch Coffee

Tyler Duncan, Topeca Coffee Roasters

John Kruegler, Blanchard’s Coffee Roasting Co

Ben Martin, Madcap Coffee Co

Kenneth Selby, Vashon Coffee Co

Cody Barnhart, Vienna Coffee Co

Gunnar Lagenhuizen, Dune Coffee Roasters

Chelsey Walker-Watson, Atlas Coffee Importers

Elika Liftee, Onyx Coffee Lab

Skyler Richter, LAMILL

Felix Felix, Dune Coffee Roasters

Coffee In Good Spirits

After a slow start in Denver, the Coffee in Good Spirits competition found stronger footing in Nashville, where the number of competitors over quadrupled. The competition really ramped up for the second leg of the Qualifying Event stage. Fire, smoke, ice, the drinks here in Nashville looked as tasty as they did dramatic.

Though only in its first year on American soil, if Nashville is any indication, Coffee in Good Spirits is going to be around for the long haul.

Kris Wood, Black Fox Coffee Co

Nathanael Mehrens, Stay Golden

Matt Foster, Kaldi’s Coffee Roasting Co

Leo-Charles Salerno, Greater Goods Coffee Roasters

Brodie Lewis, Madcap Coffee Co

Rachel Huffman, Dose Nashville

John Martin, LAMILL

Jen McElroy, Klatch Coffee

Brian Beyke, Quills Coffee

Koji Daremo, The Ruin Daily

Dan Hilburn, Backyard Beans Coffee Co

Joel Cronenberg, Provision Coffee

Lindy Schubring, Greyhouse Coffee & Supply Co

Cup Tasters

In case you needed any convincing that Onyx Coffee Lab is really, really good at coffee competition (and, y’know, their Roasters title, Brewers Cup title, and multiple consecutive Finals appearances in the Barista Championship aren’t enough for you), look no further than the Cup Tasters competition in Nashville. Fielding three Tasters—roughly 1/16th of the total competitors—Onyx nonetheless found all three of those competitors moving on, one in five.

But it would be foolish to make any future predictions at this point. With five competitors correctly identifying all six sets and perpetual finalist Samuel Demisse lurking in the field, this is one is still anyone’s to claim.

Matthew McDaniel, Summit Coffee

Summer Zhang, Onyx Coffee Lab

Aaron Lerner, SkyTop Coffee

Sarah Lambeth, Congregation Coffee Roasters

Brandon Hutchingson, Mission Coffee

Rachel Stanich, Red Fox Coffee Merchants

Bear Soliven, Onyx Coffee Lab

Samuel Demisse, Keffa Coffee Importers

Elisabeth Johnson, Venture Coffee Co

Hyoung Wuk Jung, Loit Café

Jeff Mooney, Folly Coffee Roasters

Jarrett Johnson, Lineage Roasting

Cameron Metzinger, Backyard Beans Coffee Co

Joshua Edens, Onyx Coffee Lab

Helen Choi, Luce Ave Coffee Roasters

Roasters Championship

Roasters Championship competitors found themselves with a unique challenge: how to roast a coffee without knowing a thing about it. That coffee, it turned out, was a natural processed Myanmar, which many competitors found to be quite the sticky wicket. How do you ramp up the sweetness and soften the nuttiness?

Ultimately, it was a nut that the roasters (first) cracked. Having personally tasted multiple roasters’ takes on the coffee—thanks in no small part to the Sprudge Live desk being very, very close to the Roasters Village—I can say that many roasters found that balance. The cups were sweet, not overly heavy, with little to no hint of ferment.

If these coffees are any indication of what’s to come in Kansas City, attendees are in for LOTS of really good coffee.

Amanda Hagenbuch, Rival Bros Coffee Roasters

Jeremy Moore, Bonlife Coffee Roasters

Steve Cuevas, Black Oak Coffee Roasters

Eduardo Choza, Mayorga Organics

José René Martínez, J.René Coffee Roasters

Kenneth Thomas, Umble Coffee Co

Anthony Greatorex, Red Rooster Coffee Roaster

Jason Burkum, Archetype Coffee

Matthew Delarosa, Ironsmith Coffee Roasters

Evan Pollitt, Summitt Coffee

Aaron MacDougall, Broadsheet Coffee Roasters

Eric Stone, Mudhouse Coffee Roasters

Photos for Sprudge and Sprudge Live by Elizabeth Chai and Charlie Burt.

Zac Cadwalader is the managing editor at Sprudge Media Network and a staff writer based in Dallas. Read more Zac Cadwalader on Sprudge.

The post Looking Back At The US Coffee Championships Nashville Qualifying Event appeared first on Sprudge.

seen 1st on http://sprudge.com

[mrwilliamcharley]

Looking Back At The US Coffee Championships Nashville Qualifying Event

It’s official. The field for the 2019 US Coffee Championships is set. After learning the first 62 competitors to punch their tickets at last month’s Denver Qualifying Event, we now know the other 70 coffee professionals to round out the field for the national stage of competition, taking place in just a few short months in Kansas City, Missouri.

From a list of 200 coffee professionals spread across five competitions—Barista Championship, Brewers Cup, Coffee in Goods Spirits, Cup Tasters, and Roasters Championship—the field was winnowed down by nearly two-thirds to a tight 70. There were names new and old—both in terms of competitor and coffee company represented—but as they so often do, the familiar veteran names often found their way to the tops of the list.

That’s not to say that the first-timers didn’t make a splash in Nashville. There were more than a handful of those new to competition who walked away with some wooden hardware, poised to take their rightful place as one of the wily vets in the 2020 season and beyond.

We’re still two months away from the US Coffee Championships storming the Kansas City Convention Center in March, and you can expect the 130+ coffee professionals making the trip will use those 58 days to ramp up their practice time and fine tune their performances. We’ve witnessed a lot of coffee competition already, but we haven’t seen anything yet. Now is when it gets really real.

But before all the really really realness, let’s take a few minutes to enjoy what transpired over the weekend. Let’s look back at the US Coffee Championships Qualifying Even in Nashville, Tennessee.

SprudgeLive’s coverage of the 2019 US Coffee Champs is made possible by Joe Glo and Mahlkönig. All of SprudgeLive’s 2019 competition coverage is made possible by Acaia, Baratza, Faema, Cafe Imports, and Wilbur Curtis.

Barista Championship

A common thread throughout most of the 10-minute routines at the Barista Championship was a general sense of cool collectedness. Participants stayed within themselves even in the face of the oppressive time constrictions. Even though the competition was split pretty evenly between veterans and rookies, the overarching zeitgeist was one of, “we’ve been here before.” The event felt more academic than ecstatic.

Until it didn’t. Competitors like Adam JacksonBey, Rodrigo Vargas, Anthony Ragler, and the undeniable crowd favorite Sara Gill—”you can call me Mama Mocha”—blew the roof off the Track One events space. Their energy was infectious, riling up the otherwise polite crowd into a frenzy of full-throated yowls and even the occasional post-routine interview bum-rush for a 20+ person 4:20 selfie.

Juan Diaz of Deeply Coffee Co.

Amid all the excitement, after the dust settled there was one clear winner: La Palma y El Tucan. The esteemed Colombian farm produced the coffees used by the top three finalists (who all just so happened to go back-to-back-to-back at the end of Day Two). The only other two competitors to use La Palma in the Nashville Barista competition, Juan Diaz and Shane Hess, also found their way to nationals by taking 14th and 16th, respectively.

It’s about as close to a clean sweep as you can expect from a single producer. But the question remains: can they finish the fight or will they lose out to other competition heavyweights like Hacienda La Papaya and Finca Nuguo, the coffees used by the last three years’ winners? We’ll just have to wait until March to find out.

Dylan Siemens, Onyx Coffee Lab

Samantha Spillman, Dillanos Coffee Roasters

T. Ben Fischer, Elixr Coffee Roasters

Jenna Gotthelf, Counter Culture Coffe

Rodrigo Vargas, Rival Bros Coffee Roasters

Isaiah Sheese, Archetype Coffee

Elisabeth Johnson, Venture Coffee Co

Gisel Alvarez, Monarch

Ryan Wojton, Madcap Coffee Co

Anthony Ragler, Counter Culture Coffee

Kay Cheon, Dune Coffee Roasters

Cris Mendoza, Saint Frank Coffee

Samuel Schaefer, Stovetop Roasters

Juan Diaz, Deeply Coffee Co

Ali Abderrahman, State Street Coffee/La Reunion

Shane Hess, Jubala Coffee

Ben Vollmar, Flatlands Coffee

Rachel Diaz, Flatlands Coffee

Brewers Cup

Much of the talk around Track One (and even extending to Twitter) stemmed from the Brewers Cup, where innovative new brewing techniques found their way onto the stage and into the national round of competition in Kansas City. Most notably, 2017 US Brewers Cup runner-up Chelsea Walker-Watson had the people buzzing with her use of a sous vide bath to help keep her brew at a precise temperature.

Not to be out-innovated, Dune Coffee’s Felix Felix came with his own custom-design brewing device that he made using a 3D printer.

Even amongst the progressive takes on brewing, perhaps the most impressive feet was that of Grace McCutchan, a competitor unknown to the national stage of competition but still able to best seasoned vets Jennifer Hwang, Tyler Duncan, and 2018 US Cup Tasters Champion Ken Selby. She’s become one to watch. Will we have back-to-back newcomers taking it all down at the US Brewers Cup? McCutchan is making an argument.

Grace McCutchan, Red Rooster Coffee Roaster

Jennifer Hwang, Klatch Coffee

Tyler Duncan, Topeca Coffee Roasters

John Kruegler, Blanchard’s Coffee Roasting Co

Ben Martin, Madcap Coffee Co

Kenneth Selby, Vashon Coffee Co

Cody Barnhart, Vienna Coffee Co

Gunnar Lagenhuizen, Dune Coffee Roasters

Chelsey Walker-Watson, Atlas Coffee Importers

Elika Liftee, Onyx Coffee Lab

Skyler Richter, LAMILL

Felix Felix, Dune Coffee Roasters

Coffee In Good Spirits

After a slow start in Denver, the Coffee in Good Spirits competition found stronger footing in Nashville, where the number of competitors over quadrupled. The competition really ramped up for the second leg of the Qualifying Event stage. Fire, smoke, ice, the drinks here in Nashville looked as tasty as they did dramatic.

Though only in its first year on American soil, if Nashville is any indication, Coffee in Good Spirits is going to be around for the long haul.

Kris Wood, Black Fox Coffee Co

Nathanael Mehrens, Stay Golden

Matt Foster, Kaldi’s Coffee Roasting Co

Leo-Charles Salerno, Greater Goods Coffee Roasters

Brodie Lewis, Madcap Coffee Co

Rachel Huffman, Dose Nashville

John Martin, LAMILL

Jen McElroy, Klatch Coffee

Brian Beyke, Quills Coffee

Koji Daremo, The Ruin Daily

Dan Hilburn, Backyard Beans Coffee Co

Joel Cronenberg, Provision Coffee

Lindy Schubring, Greyhouse Coffee & Supply Co

Cup Tasters

In case you needed any convincing that Onyx Coffee Lab is really, really good at coffee competition (and, y’know, their Roasters title, Brewers Cup title, and multiple consecutive Finals appearances in the Barista Championship aren’t enough for you), look no further than the Cup Tasters competition in Nashville. Fielding three Tasters—roughly 1/16th of the total competitors—Onyx nonetheless found all three of those competitors moving on, one in five.

But it would be foolish to make any future predictions at this point. With five competitors correctly identifying all six sets and perpetual finalist Samuel Demisse lurking in the field, this is one is still anyone’s to claim.

Matthew McDaniel, Summit Coffee

Summer Zhang, Onyx Coffee Lab

Aaron Lerner, SkyTop Coffee

Sarah Lambeth, Congregation Coffee Roasters

Brandon Hutchingson, Mission Coffee

Rachel Stanich, Red Fox Coffee Merchants

Bear Soliven, Onyx Coffee Lab

Samuel Demisse, Keffa Coffee Importers

Elisabeth Johnson, Venture Coffee Co

Hyoung Wuk Jung, Loit Café

Jeff Mooney, Folly Coffee Roasters

Jarrett Johnson, Lineage Roasting

Cameron Metzinger, Backyard Beans Coffee Co

Joshua Edens, Onyx Coffee Lab

Helen Choi, Luce Ave Coffee Roasters

Roasters Championship

Roasters Championship competitors found themselves with a unique challenge: how to roast a coffee without knowing a thing about it. That coffee, it turned out, was a natural processed Myanmar, which many competitors found to be quite the sticky wicket. How do you ramp up the sweetness and soften the nuttiness?

Ultimately, it was a nut that the roasters (first) cracked. Having personally tasted multiple roasters’ takes on the coffee—thanks in no small part to the Sprudge Live desk being very, very close to the Roasters Village—I can say that many roasters found that balance. The cups were sweet, not overly heavy, with little to no hint of ferment.

If these coffees are any indication of what’s to come in Kansas City, attendees are in for LOTS of really good coffee.

Amanda Hagenbuch, Rival Bros Coffee Roasters

Jeremy Moore, Bonlife Coffee Roasters

Steve Cuevas, Black Oak Coffee Roasters

Eduardo Choza, Mayorga Organics

José René Martínez, J.René Coffee Roasters

Kenneth Thomas, Umble Coffee Co

Anthony Greatorex, Red Rooster Coffee Roaster

Jason Burkum, Archetype Coffee

Matthew Delarosa, Ironsmith Coffee Roasters

Evan Pollitt, Summitt Coffee

Aaron MacDougall, Broadsheet Coffee Roasters

Eric Stone, Mudhouse Coffee Roasters

Photos for Sprudge and Sprudge Live by Elizabeth Chai and Charlie Burt.

Zac Cadwalader is the managing editor at Sprudge Media Network and a staff writer based in Dallas. Read more Zac Cadwalader on Sprudge.

The post Looking Back At The US Coffee Championships Nashville Qualifying Event appeared first on Sprudge.

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