PepsiCo is to launch a coffee-flavoured cola

PepsiCo is to launch a coffee-flavoured cola in the UK next year, according to local reports. Citing an insider, Marketing Week said last week that the soft drinks company will launch Pepsi Max Cino in Asda supermarkets on Boxing Day (26 December), with the drink being rolled out nationwide in January.
As the drink contains no added sugar and no extra caffeine, it is not going to be classed alongside energy drinks such as Red Bull and Sprite 3G, the trade publication said.
“PepsiCo hopes that Cino will attract older, more sophisticated consumers who will enjoy its smooth taste,” the source was cited as saying.Pepsi Max Cino is expected to be a permanent addition to the UK unit’s portfolio, Marketing Week added.

SIC show in Milano

While some people in the Netherlands did a simple coffee-test for a simple newspaper, some other coffee lovers traveled to Milan this weekend. Every two years it’s SIC time. (Salone internazionale Del caffe) This is one of the biggest coffee shows in the world held in absolute the most wonderful show complex I’ve ever seen. Beautiful architecture and a perfect routing. And of course Milan espresso bars. It’s so good to see the roots of espresso coffee. With roots I mean the passion of Italian people to make the best out of a product and the patience of Italian people to wait in a row for a good product. Believe me, we drunk a lot espresso and cappuccino and all of them were good, better or very good. None of them were real bad but none of them were perfect. It’s just because the Italian follow their feeling and their hart. They do not adjust the grinder very often, they dont clean the machine or steamwand, they do dose but no leveling and no tamping. (The pre infusion on most of the machines replaces the tamping part) and the coffee is good almost every time.
But to be really honest, the atmosphere of screaming waiters and screaming customers helps the taste of the espresso.

In the famous Zucco at Galleria bar we have drunk our espresso and cappuccino every day. How much cappuccino (latte art) do you think they make every day….?
1000 to 1200!! Maybe for Portland and Seattle readers it’s not that much. But for Dutch readers it’s incredible.

On the show we met a lot of old friends. Luigi Lupi with his beautiful Mussetti booth, Fritz Storm at the La Marzocco booth (with a Kees v/d Westen mistral and a 5 group LM), Kees van der Westen with his new one group machine, Mahlkonig with their grinder connected to an Del La Corte machine. This brand made some nice improvements. Every group his own 500 ml boiler with own temperature for each boiler, a new mysterious steamwand witch let everybody steam perfect foam. (I think it blows and sucks at the same time), because every group has his own boiler they build the pre infusion at the cold water side. And this brings a real nice extraction.
The machine checks the extraction time every shot. When the extraction time is to long or short the machines interface give signal to the Mahlkonig k60 and it adjusts it selves…

What made me scary were the pods and the capsules. Very much pods, pod machines, capsules, capsule machines, thea pods, etc.

Take care, Jeroen

I dont believe my eyes…

Can you believe this?
I like it very much…

Take care, Jeroen

ESPRESSI

Mobile carts seems to be popular in Holland.
We all know our friends from MobiCcino with their beautiful carts equipped with a Monster Marzocco or Mirage.
Today I’ve found this picture on the Net.
I’ve never had the change to see how it works and more important how they work.
As soon as I have the change to taste their espressi I will tell you…

Jeroen

It comes together…

As you all know; I’m a big fan of Kees van der Westen. And even a bigger fan of his machines.
Today Kees make his beautiful Mirage machines and new Mistrals. In the past he made some pieces of art ( check his site and look at Ãearlierr work’) As you know too I’m working for Sara Lee/Douwe Egberts and we have several espresso brands. Ofcourse Piazza d’Oro and Douwe Egberts espresso but we have also Laurentis espresso.
In 1989 Kees made a machine (piece of art) for Laurentis. In those years Laurentis had her own headquarter in The Hague.

This is what Kees said about this machine:
Built on commission for the Laurentis coffee roasting company. CMA Astoria parts are used. Stand-alone draintray, small pressuregauges to spruce up the groups, glass level-indicator pipe specially bent to run along the curved belly of the machine, between the thick vertical glass pieces. Tube lights at the rear, illuminating the large bent glass plates. This light reacts on the boilerpressure, making the machine come alive. A minimum of 4 men is needed to move this machine.

Since a few weeks Laurentis moved to our headquarter in Utrecht and guess what?
They brougt their piece off art with them. Now its in our trainingcentre and almost ready to use.
I’m a lucky basterd…

Robot Barista!!!

I received an e-mail from Peter from Belgium.
The mail was about a new project in Helsinki called Pauli.
This robot does it all… espresso, cappuccino etc.
Pauli is part of a larger project named ‘Industrial Robot Meets Consumer’ by the Robotics Society in Finland.
On this link you can find a small movie.
http://www.projectpauli.net/ (the site)
a robot doing the whole lot (the movie)
What do you think… Should we be afraid already?

Cool machines

I thought our Dutch artist Kees van der Westen was the only one who’s making mad machines. See them all on www.keesvanderwesten.com

On the blog of my friend Dismas Smith (www.dismasespresso.blogspot.com ) I’ve found some other mad machines made by Espresso Smith.

They look very cool, but I’m interested in the interior too. How do they do their work.

We all know the consistency of the Mirage and the Mistral machines made by Kees. Who can tell us more about the Espresso Smith machines…

Jeroen

Last Tuesday we ‘my barista teammates Onno and Wilco and me’ where making some espressi and cappuccini in The Hague.

The world famous photographer Jan Bartelsman ( http://www.bartelsman.nl/ ) presented his new restaurant guides.
A lot of restaurant owners where invited and we took our change to serve them some nice espressi.

(Jan and Me and a nice waiter)

I was very proud on Onno and Wilco. They improved their latte art so well. It’s really good to see that they combine their passion for coffee with their creativity. They really make a good change to win the Dutch Latte art contest. We go for it as a team and I’m pretty sure that will work. The pre finals are on October 10th and 17th. The finals on November 7th. More information on http://www.latteart.nl/

Take care, Jeroen

Last Tuesday we ‘my barista teammates Onno and Wi…

Last Tuesday we ‘my barista teammates Onno and Wilco and me’ where making some espressi and cappuccini in The Hague.

The world famous photographer Jan Bartelsman ( http://www.bartelsman.nl/ ) presented his new restaurant guides.
A lot of restaurant owners where invited and we took our change to serve them some nice espressi.

(Jan and Me and a nice waiter)

I was very proud on Onno and Wilco. They improved their latte art so well. It’s really good to see that they combine their passion for coffee with their creativity. They really make a good change to win the Dutch Latte art contest. We go for it as a team and I’m pretty sure that will work. The pre finals are on October 10th and 17th. The finals on November 7th. More information on http://www.latteart.nl/

Take care, Jeroen