Barista Magazine

AUG-SEP 2012

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WORLD BARISTA CHAMPION 2012 2012 World Barista Champion Raul Rodas, Guatemala Text by Sarah Allen On Thursday morning, June 21, in Vienna, Austria, Raul Rodas leaned casually against the World Barista Championship (WBC) Espresso Bar set up behind the stage of the 2012 WBC event. Sipping from a demitasse, Raul flipped through a copy of the WBC Event Program, stopping to smile and wave at the passers-by calling hello-and-how-are-you as they headed in to watch the competition. Raul, the Barista Champion of Guatemala, looked comfortable, relaxed, happy. He certainly didn't look like someone whose grinder, all of his competition gear, and the delicate, refrigerated cherry he had shipped from his home country—the key element of his fresh cascara and mucilage- centric 2012 WBC performance—were caught up in Austrian customs. Luckily, Raul had carried his competition coffee—all of which he roasted himself—in his own luggage. He was able to practice with it at the Vienna School of Coffee, where Director Johanna Wechselberger had generously welcomed all barista competitors to warm up. Raul also spent time with his friends at Nuova Simonelli, dialing in his coffee at their booth. But without his competition gear, his grinder, and his cherry, there was only so much he could do. Raul—who placed second at the 2010 World Barista Championship behind American Michael Phillips in London, and also represented Guatemala at the 2008 and 2009 WBC competitions—was scheduled to compete in the 2012 WBC preliminary round on Thursday afternoon. Because these things unfortunately happen sometimes, WBC organizers pushed his performance time to the last possible spot in the prelims: Friday afternoon. But by Friday morning, the packages still hadn't arrived. Raul, however, was composed. He chatted with his friend, Roukiat Delrue, a WBC judge, and one of Raul's best friends back in Guatemala (don't worry; she noted him as a conflict of interest and never judged him in Vienna). To Roukiat—whose coffee friends affectionately call Rouki—Raul may have expressed some panic. Still, it was mild panic. This 25-year- old has professionalism and composure beyond his years. But then, the shipment showed. Raul busied himself unpacking it all, checking his grinder, inspecting his equipment. This is something that barista competitors usually give themselves most of an entire day to do. "I had about two hours to unpack and prepare everything, which is awful!" Raul recalls. "You usually want to polish everything and control every last little bit. I trusted the coffee and knew that the first round would probably not be my best, but I gave it my all hoping to make it to semifinals." And he did. And then he made the finals. And then he won the World. It's a memorable story, but there are lots of things about Raul that stand out. Take, for example, the fact that he is the only World Barista Champion to win using coffee from a roasting company that he owns and operates. "The company is basically me," says Raul of Paradigma Coffee Roasters, which is based in Guatemala City. "Rouki is also part of it; she helps me a lot in quality control." He's also one of the most experienced baristas to win the WBC: Raul has already traveled the world training baristas for various organizations, including the nonprofit Coffee Corps. He's trained baristas in Peru, Colombia, Rwanda, Tanzania, Ethiopia, Brazil, Jamaica, Venezuela, Nicaragua, Panama, Honduras, El Salvador, and Italy. But the last thing you'd call Raul Rodas is jaded; while he is incredibly accomlished as a coffee professional, he's still very much an enthusiastic, inquisitive, joyful twenty something. Right now what Raul is most excited about is being able to use his WBC title to continue elevating specialty coffee in Guatemala and throughout Latin America. In fact, he was almost as overwhelmed to be sharing the last-two-standing spot at the WBC with the Barista Champion of Mexico, Fabrizio Sencion, as he was to win the whole thing. "I was so happy to be standing there with Fabrizio—two producing countries in the first two spots!" he says, bringing to mind the impromptu decision by 2011 WBC Champ Alejandro Mendez of El Salvador, who was making that fateful announcement, to deliver the final results in Spanish. "I think now baristas from producing countries are realizing that we can change things, and we are fortunate enough to have everything we need right there. But there is a lot of work to do. I would love to see a barista from Africa for example in the finals (it has never happened), not to mention winning it. There is more connection with the producers and so much learning still to share in the roasting and processing." In the weeks following Raul's crowning as the 2012 World Barista Champion, he spent some time answering questions for Barista Magazine for this story. We were lucky to get him when we did, because from here on out—at least

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