Supplier Roundtable: Coffee Kingdom

Meet the Experts:

Tony Billingham, CEO, Boncafe Middle East LLC.
Boncafe Middle East is a specialist roaster of premium coffees and supplier of Bonice Tea Mixes, Bonchoco and Torani products, as well as domestic and commercial fully automatic and traditional Italian-style coffee machines and equipment. The company also operates a 24-hour service maintenance support and calibration service.

Robert Jones managing director, Coffee Planet.
Coffee Planet is one of the leading coffee roasters in the UAE with fully HACCP-certified facilities that roasts coffee from 20 countries around the world. Together with the distribution, installation and maintenance of fully equipped coffee equipment, Coffee Planet delivers food service solutions to customers such as hotels, offices, restaurants and airlines.

Darya Yurkina marketing manager, La Marquise International.
La Marquise International has been supplying world leading Horeca brands to the UAE & GCC for the past 10 years. Its portfolio has a wide range of professional equipment, F&B products and ingredients for pastry, bakery and gelato brands such as La Cimbali, WMF, Pellini Caffe,MEC3, Barnier, IceTeam and Irinox. It also provides customers with full product support including 24/7 emergency equipment maintenance as well as professional training facilities and courses.

Andre Biedenkopf, director of sales and operations, Ronnefeldt Trading.
The Ronnefeldt Tea Company was founded 190 years ago and specialises in importing and blending high-quality leaf teas from all of the major tea-growing regions including India, Sri Lanka, China, Japan, Taiwan and Africa. Ronnefeldt is also the creator of the TeaMaster training programme, which endows the hotel industry with a well-rounded knowledge of tea and tea-culture.

Majid Zaman, Middle East beverages head, Unilever Food Solutions.
Unilever has worked in the food industry since the 1880s and is now home to some of the world’s favourite brands: Knorr, Hellmann’s, Lipton and more. Unilever Food Solution aims to provide hotels with ingredients that save precious preparation time in the kitchen, without compromising on flavour or flair and constantly provide ideas and inspiration that keep menus fresh and exciting. Its tea brand Lipton is supplied to businesses of all sizes, from independent restaurants through to hotels chains and contract caterers, across 74 countries.

Article continues on next page ...

Q: SHOULD HOTELS CARE ABOUT WHERE THEIR TEA AND COFFEE COMES FROM, AND HOW MUCH WILL THEIR GUESTS?
Tony Billingham: Hoteliers should take an interest in where their tea and coffee comes from as they should only want their guests to have the best. Knowing details such as the coffee’s origins, the type of beans, as well as how they were roasted, packaged and stored can assist in providing a satisfactory and enjoyable experience for their guests.

Robert Jones: The level of consumer coffee knowledge is growing all the time and this is turn means it is quite common these days for hotel guests to ask questions of where their coffee is sourced. So from a credibility point of view it is becoming increasingly important for hotel staff to be able to speak from a position of authority.

Darya Yurkina: With the existing competition in the industry and the growing awareness of coffee and tea culture in the region, more and more hotels are favouring high-quality coffee that takes into account its origin, producer and reputation on the market.

When it comes to the outlets within a hotel, it is a matter of exceeding expectations by providing a unique experience where the quality of the tea and coffee is one of the key components.

Andre Biedenkopf: Tea has very distinctive characteristics depending on its origin and the way it is produced. Like a chef’s menu, hotels need a good selection of different teas as their guests are ambitious and demand choice and variety.

Majid Zaman: Yes, they should definitely care where their coffee and tea comes from. With all the talk around sustainable and ethical sourcing, big corporations are increasingly lookng at sourcing their raw materials from sustainable sources. This is more relevant with products like tea and coffee which are a part of everyone’s daily consumption and an essential aspect of the hospitality sector.

Article continues on next page ...

Q: HOW CAN A HOTEL BEST ASSESS THE QUALITY OF ITS TEA AND COFFEE?
Jones: The simplest way is whether you need to grind the coffee. If it is instant – it’s not quality! The most immediate way is how the coffee tastes in the cup, provided it has been made using the correct method on appropriate clean and serviced equipment.

Freshness can play a vital role as coffee is a naturally harvested product which will deteriorate over time. A well-trained barista will be able to judge things like uniformity of bean size, roast profile as well as extraction quality and the presence of any defects in the coffee can also contribute to quality.

Zaman: The easiest way is to opt for a well known quality brand. By doing so hotels can ensure that they are buying a high standard product. If they still want to verify then a simple tasting/sampling session with the chef or barista will let them know whether what they are buying is up to the mark or not.

Biedenkopf: You need to know a little bit about tea, as some teas from specific origins have very distinctive aromas and can be easily spotted by a tea drinker. Have look on the actual tea leaf, in general orthodox produced teas have a high quality, so if you find a large leaf tea or broken tea leaf, that will be a good indication already.

Billingham: Our senses can definitely help us here by looking, smelling and taste! Just as importantly, the quality of the water can play a huge role, as does the type of equipment used and whether the equipment is clean and calibrated correctly.

Yurkina: F&B professionals and purchasing managers are very good at doing their research and building a knowledge of the market. After an arranged tasting session they are more than capable of recognising the quality products from the substandard.

Article continues on next page ...

Q: HOW IMPORTANT IS HOTEL STAFF TRAINING FOR THE PERFECT CUP?
Biedenkopf: In one word, “essential”. As a tea supplier, we go through a long process to find the best qualities, blends and flavours of tea. We handle, store, pack and ship them half way around the world to make some of the best teas on this planet available to hotel customers. If then on the last step, a service person doesn't prepare it correctly for his guests; all these efforts are for nothing.

Yurkina: It is extremely important to get training for the staff and it is a common practice in most outlets. However, a high turnover of employees in the sector does not make it any easier and affects the quality of the served coffee/tea immensely as well as causing an inconsistency in service.

Biedenkopf: This is a very important factor as not only is the barista representing the product but also the hotel. A badly served coffee can make a long lasting impression on the customer which can be damaging to both brands. Continuous and regular refresher staff training is imperative as it can help motivate staff.

Jones: This is huge factor! As a coffee roaster, we visit farms, we taste hundreds of coffees to decide on the correct beans and then ship these beans to our Roastery in Dubai which can take about three months.

We carefully store the beans at the appropriate temperature and humidity, roast them by hand, pack them and deliver them. However, if the person behind the machine is not trained, in the 30 seconds it takes to make the coffee, all of the work we do to source and develop that wonderful coffee is wasted.

Zaman: This is a very critical area which if the hotel gets right can mean the difference between failure and success. Properly trained staff will ensure that they give their guest the “right experience” with serving tea or coffee.

There are now dedicated training institutes which train people in the delicate art of beverage service and produce expert "tea connoisseurs/ sommeliers” and “coffee baristas” who can make a world of difference.

Article continues on next page ...

Q: WHAT IS THE MOST COMMON MISTAKE HOTELS MAKE WHEN SERVING GUESTS TEA AND COFFEE?
Billingham: A very common error with hotels is the lack of daily cleaning of the coffee machines and equipment, as this can present a significant lack of quality in the coffee.

A build up of milk and coffee residue can diminish the machine’s performance resulting in poor extractions. Another common mistake is filling coffee bean hoppers with far too much coffee, which ends up not being used and carried over for days, becoming old and stale.

Jones: Many! For example allowing untrained staff to make the coffee, or not using the right equipment such as grinders which are not grind-on-demand. Some grinders grind the coffee into a dosing chamber which allows the coffee to oxidize very quickly and will cause the coffee to deteriorate massively within several minutes.

Other mistakes include not using fresh coffee, serving the coffee in cold cups (by the time it reaches the guest the cold cup has reduced the coffee temperature significantly) or over steaming the milk so the temperature is too high.

Often customers ask for ‘extra hot’ cappuccino but over steaming the milk can burn it and create a very bad taste. It also will lose the microfoam density which is appropriate for cappuccino and latte drinks.

Biedenkopf: One of the most common mistakes is the choice of strainer used for the loose leaf tea service. A proper strainer is essential for the development of the best tea flavour and makes it easy to remove the tea leaves, once the perfect brewing time is reached.

Strainers where you do not remove the tea leaves from the water cause the remaining tea leaves in the tea pot to carry on brewing, delivering no tea pleasure. And an extra pot of hot water on the side is not going to solve the problem, it just dilutes an already over brewed tea.

Article continues on next page ...

Q: HOW MUCH EMPHASIS SHOULD HOTELS PLACE ON USING EXPERT COFFEE BARISTAS AND TEA SOMMELIERS?
Zaman: A lot! Having an expert will not only ensure that the hotel serves the perfect cup of tea or coffee but also the “experience” along with it. Both of these together will determine if the guest will keep coming back for more.

Yurkina: Tea and coffee culture is growing rapidly in the region and we have witnessed an 85% growth in coffee consumption in GCC for the past few years with more and more franchises taking the market by storm. This has in turn forced hotels to step up their game and turn to professional baristas and tea sommeliers for assistance in order to remain competitive.

Jones: I would love to see a lot more emphasis on this especially as the average consumer is becoming more educated, but unfortunately, it is often a commercial decision over a quality decision.

Coffee is often the first and last interaction a guest will have with a hotel from the first thing they drink in the morning with breakfast to the last thing after dinner at night. This can leave a lasting impression with the guests if the coffee is not well prepared.

A well trained barista can ensure that the guest leaves with a positive, satisfied impression of a great quality coffee.

Biedenkopf: In my opinion it is absolutely necessary for any five-star hotel to have a tea sommelier. Tea, especially in our region, is consumed all day from the early morning to a late night herbal cup. Hotels that live a service culture therefore need a “tea specialist” for this widely used product.

Somebody with a passion for tea and its fascinating culture, who wants to extend his knowledge about the product, is the ideal candidate for our ‘TeaMaster’ programme, Silver and Gold.

The training programme qualifies staff to develop sophisticated tea concepts, to create tea collections that match the needs of the different F&B outlets and to act as a “train-the trainer” in-house.

Taking care of the correct handling of tea and its equipment as well as its proper maintenance is also important in the daily operation. I believe that the ‘TeaMaster’ is as important as a wine sommelier as we have so many different teas from different countries and production methods.

Billingham: Hotels should ensure that their staff are well trained and their training is continuously refreshed to ensure that beverages are consistent and presented to the highest quality at all times.

As a brand it is fantastic to know that an expert coffee barista is serving our coffee blends, but with hotels being challenged with a high turnover of staff and different cultures, we understand that this is not something the majority of them can consider; although it would definitely make our job as coffee roaster and supplier much easier.