WORLD
BARISTA CHAMPION
mendez, el salvador by Sarah Allen
It's true that there's something stunningly unique about each and every World Barista Championship event. But no one would argue that 2011 was more magical than any before it, for two reasons: one, it was held for the first time in a coffee producing country, Colombia; and two, its winner was, for the first time, a barista hailing from an origin country, El Salvador. That barista was Alejandro Mendez.
The tragic irony of our industry has been that the best coffees in the world are shipped far away from the places where they were grown; that though the highest quality beans may come from a specific region in East Africa or Latin America, it's almost impossible to get served a decent cup of coffee there.