Peter Tam's Blog

Talking, talking, it does not make sense......

I had been talking about coffee quite a lot, and for many years. I thought that those so many cafes should care of their business, including those coffee roasters and so they might be really interested in some new things which can help their business. Now, I recognize that they do not.

In the Chinese market, I know that there are chances for those low qualified cafes to exist if no qualified cafes exist. Like, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and many other cities. While in Beijing, due to the… Continue

Added by Peter Tam on July 16, 2008 at 7:00am — No Comments

Reasons for Clasifications of Coffee

In fact, one can say that there is no real reasons, like argue, to confirm the right clarification.

Clasification is a kind of scheme, which can better help people to understand or analysis something. That is to say that, it is only a tool. None of them can be absolutely correct. But, what is the better way to clasify? It depends one different people's understanding.

For the same reason, we have got our own way of clasification. So, we have got our results.

Added by Peter Tam on June 12, 2008 at 7:30am — No Comments

How do we improve the quality level of the world coffee drinks' market?

For the top level of those coffee professionals, we may be at the similar level for the quality of espresso drinks.

But, most people cannot make others to do the same, or even better coffee drinks. It is mainly due to the understanding about espresso and its brewing skills.

As I said once, we can train about 30 - 50 people in 15 days, if there are enough people coming.

Someone said that, they can do many more. Does it mean that they can have those people to make… Continue

Added by Peter Tam on June 7, 2008 at 5:30pm — 1 Comment

Drip Coffee And Espresso!

Drip coffee is not only the coffee made of the drip machines, but also vacuum pots, French press, and so on. It is good for brewing single orgin beans, specially for arabica beans.

Theoretically, all brewing tools can make the same drip coffe with proper management and control. Essentially, they are same.

Espresso should use specially processed beans, and can be very well tasted. Although in several countries, all cafes serve only espresso drinks, not drip coffee any more.… Continue

Added by Peter Tam on May 28, 2008 at 11:45pm — 13 Comments

About Latte Art, and more!

I was going to say something about this problem, but soon I found a post in some forums about it. The guy who made that post remain in that forum on in Feb of 2007, and dispeared totally after that.

It was clearly stated that "we would concentrated in the quality of the drinks, but not the paintings", or similar. It was not due to the creater of the forums, but the participants to get "those" people having different opinions out of that forum, and shut up to talk about their own… Continue

Added by Peter Tam on May 28, 2008 at 10:00am — 15 Comments

Learn to know if one is in a group or not!

According to the definition of Mr. Le Bon, the members of a group of people normally behave differently as they were individually. Originally they could be very gentle and kind as individual, but after enrolled in a group, they will behave quite differently, much better or much worse.

As an individual, one may mostly care of himself and has his own target or purpose. such as win a game, and so on. If not, it can be a sight of difference. In this case, they may also do something,… Continue

Added by Peter Tam on May 26, 2008 at 11:30am — 1 Comment

My First Application about Mr. Le Bon's Theory!

From the very start of my study about Le Bon's Theory, I thought what we can do even if we learn and know such a situation.

Today, I recognized one application for it.

In China, in most of authority of industries and societies, there are always related "Expert Groups" for making the necessary policies. Such as medical and hospitals, tele-communications, and so on, the member experts of those groups can be intelligent individually but within the groups, even if they are… Continue

Added by Peter Tam on May 20, 2008 at 11:46am — 2 Comments

Kaffa Cafe, is ready to go!

After years of development of Coffee and Espresso Theorey and their brewing skills, Kaffa Cafe is ready to go for its commercial business.

Where can we go? Many!

Trianing of baristas, cafes, supply of machines and distribution of coffee beans, and so on, as usual. And, we also have something else to do, which are mainly related to coffee.

While it is organized, we have time left, at least for myself to do something else.

What can I do for this… Continue

Added by Peter Tam on May 11, 2008 at 10:43am — No Comments

A General Idea of Coffee Industry in China (chapter 3)

In chapter 2, we talked about the coffee market in Guangzhou. Let's see it again and maybe in a deeper way.

Many cafes are closing and/or transfered, and the market is going down. What do we expect for the future of this market?

Is it going down and down? No, I do not think so.

When people noticed that some or even many cafes are closing, and they would surely stop to invest for more cafes. Some of the capitals will moved to other industries, like real estates,… Continue

Added by Peter Tam on May 9, 2008 at 10:30am — No Comments

Customer Education, is that right?

From time to time, we heard about the topics of "customer education".

Now, let me say something about it.

Are we able to educate the customers? To know this, I would compare coffee with hamburgers. That is the symble of success of Mc Donald (hope the spelling is correct). Is it good? I do not know. But for me, it is not good, simply because I had the better one, much better. But finally, it was replaced by Mac (may I call it like this? Sorry, apple).

We… Continue

Added by Peter Tam on May 6, 2008 at 11:12am — 5 Comments

Kaffa Cafe, a lonely walker on this lonely planet!

For years after I joining the website and forums abroard where we can meet the baristas, home-baristasm, and coffee professionals, we had been still alone for the good coffee and espresso drinks.

In Chinese phrases, we say that it is the coldest when you are at the high level of development. It is what we have to be, and let us be there.

I cannot conclude that the effects for the trainees from other training of baristas, while for us, it is so nice to have more and… Continue

Added by Peter Tam on May 5, 2008 at 1:17pm — 11 Comments

Barista = bartender? So, we need spirits.

I am writing my book as a manual, for baristas, so it should include the knowledge about spirits and cocktails.

I am learning while I am reading and writing. When I am getting to know it, what do I expect to know about? Should I found the similar situation for this part of the world? Or, it is different.

Anyway, let us see and expect.

I have got the Bible, in Chinese edition, and it really help. But, the real situation has to be found later.

Anybody… Continue

Added by Peter Tam on April 29, 2008 at 11:17am — 1 Comment

Kaffa Cafe will have their own cafe again in Beijing.

Even if we decided not to have any cafes recently, we were asked to set up a cafe in a big office building, in Beijing area, with the most attractable conditions in the market.

Yes, we decided to take it for such a good condition and also a chance to educate people how good an esresso and coffee drinks can be tasty. As the market need more cafes where people can find good coffee drinks, we can do it slowly and one by one. It seems that there will be more people knowing what a good… Continue

Added by Peter Tam on April 11, 2008 at 9:59am — 1 Comment

Who and How to Define the Standards of Coffee Drinks?

Times ago, I suggested our standards of coffee drinks, but ..., as you may know.

There are some one or organizations who may want to make it. But, finally, I am thinking that who and how to define the Standards of Coffee Drinks?

Yes, the market!

If someone, even by chance, can make something that the market would take, it can be done and accepted by the market. But, if not, it must be disappear as you can imagine.

Till now, how much do we know… Continue

Added by Peter Tam on April 3, 2008 at 10:04am — 2 Comments

A General Idea of Coffee Industry in China (chapter 2)

Recently, I am in Guangzhou to develop the local market for the Barista Training of Kaffa Cafe. Our Barista Training Centre was established at the beginning of 2007.

Now, I am training some students. Yesterday, they told me that the cafes, which I suggested them to go to see if they need more baristas or not, are almost all closed. Only few of them, which they did not go, was not known yet.

For Beijing, the situation is almost the same, or a bit of better. Most cafes are… Continue

Added by Peter Tam on April 1, 2008 at 10:41am — No Comments

Understanding and Thoughts of Coffee Science

PDF version of this article,

kscience.pdf

(Peter Tam, Kaffa Café)

After years of learning and understanding about coffee, we had formed our own understanding, or even we call it coffee theory. Although we cannot be sure if it can be called a full established theory or not, we do have our own understanding about… Continue

Added by Peter Tam on March 27, 2008 at 8:00am — 2 Comments

A Simple Analysis of Coffee Consumption

Consumption Analysis.pdf

When we look at the statistic figures of coffee consumption for different countries or regions, we may use different way and units for them. Then, we may have different pictures or understandings of them. For Italy, they used to count in cups, for some reason, while for other countries, they used to do in consumed amount of coffee beans or grounds. For example,… Continue

Added by Peter Tam on March 22, 2008 at 6:00am — 3 Comments

A General Idea of Coffee Industry in China

The Chinese coffee market was started to grow about ten years ago. That was 1997. Maybe in 1992, few of cafes independent from grand hotels were established, but not many. So, I would consider the start of Chinese coffee market was about 1997. For example, one of the famous cafe chain in Beijing, Scrupting Times, was established in 1997. This is one of the commercially succeeded cafes in Beijing.

It was about ten years later than in the States, considering the fact that… Continue

Added by Peter Tam on March 21, 2008 at 11:24am — 2 Comments

Simple Description of Coffee Plantation in China

In China, there are three places where coffee can be planted. One is Yunnan, where they plant arabica beans; The second one is Hainan, where they plant only robusta beans. The third one is Taiwan, no idea what they have. Suppose that they have only robusta beans, due to the low atitude.

The arabica beans of Yunnan is tasted great, in drip coffee. It is not good for espresso. The beans from Hainan is not good for drip coffee, but maybe good for some blends of espresso or drip coffee.… Continue

Added by Peter Tam on March 14, 2008 at 8:13am — 3 Comments

My post in CG (Kaffa Café, Standards of Coffee Drinks, 2)

(For stock only)

Hi Breez,

I am sorry to have no responds to you because I did not understand your words. I really did not know what it mean.

A short history of my English study: I learnt Russian in my high school, because there were no enough teachers for English at that time. In my college, I learnt to read mathematics and physics text books in English, without any experience of speaking and listening English. In Italy, I learnt to…

Continue

Added by Peter Tam on January 30, 2008 at 12:01am — No Comments

Barista Exchange

Peter Tam's Blog (24)