Winner's cup

Heard the one about the white one centimetre ribbon? Meet Costa's best barista in the Middle East.

Carlos Martinez, coffeemaster.

Before Carlos Martinez gave up his job as a bartender at the five-star Century Park Hotel in Manila for a better paid position as a Costa barista in Dubai, he had no idea how hard it was to make a latte. "You have to come up with the white one centimetre ribbon on top," he told me on a work break, "and that's the most challenging part. It's a clear glass, the foam is very visible. So if you make it too frothy," he paused, "it will come up looking like a cappuccino in a latte glass."

Martinez is this year's Costa Coffee Regional Champion Barista. To earn the title, he had to vanquish 10 country champions from Costa's Middle East and North Africa region in a two-day battle held at the Dubai Courtyard Marriot. In October, he will compete in Costa's International Barista of the Year tournament at the Lambeth Costa Roastery in London. Should he win there, he will be Costa's representative at the 2009 Annual World Barista Championships in Atlanta, Georgia.

"I always want to win, because the point of entering a competition is to win," Martinez said. "But I just do my best, and I know God will take care of the rest." Martinez works at Costa's UAE headquarters store near the Dubai airport, the supposed mother of all Emirates Costas, where "bosses, big bosses, some of the right-hand men of our Sheikh" demand the highest standards. Sipping, I tasted the difference: the headquarters store makes the best cup of espresso I'd had in over seven months in the Emirates.

Costa baristas are selected for competition through a series of "heats": store heats are followed by area heats, which are followed by country and regional heats. Every barista has the opportunity to participate if he wants to, and each heat lasts two days: the first day tests technical coffee making skills, and the second covers presentation, service skills and creative flair. Barista means bartender in Italian, but in multinational consumer English it seems to mean "person who makes coffee and has special knowledge of espresso-making secrets" - like how to intensely froth milk. "You can make a full jar with just this milk," Martinez explained, miming a big jar and a little bit of milk. In his three years at the Century Park Hotel, Martinez had never made coffee, and was surprised when he learnt how much intricate rigmarole can go into caffeination. "Actually," said the 26-year old Filipino flatly, "I was amazed."

"Put passion on your coffee," he kept telling me in an oddly mechanical monotone. "The art of making coffee, for me - if you don't have the passion, you cannot make coffee." After two years spent at three Costas - the second being the Concourse Costa, the busiest in the Dubai airport - Martinez has evidently found his calling. According to him, the barista's life is like the basketball player's or the guitarist's (both pursuits were hobbies of his in the Philippines). "You have to use sense," he declaimed. "What interests me is how to put some art on the coffee. You don't just strum your guitar, you have to have the rhythm. For example, when I made my first cappuccino, back in 2006, I only got liquid on it. No froth at all. I didn't know how to swirl, I didn't know how to bounce. So as long as each cup of coffee that you make, you want to make better and better."

Martinez didn't make my espresso - another barista from the headquarters store did - but by the time I reached the dregs I knew what he was talking about. At my neighbourhood Costa in Abu Dhabi's Wahda Mall, I thought to myself, they use the same automated process as this store - they have the same machines, and they use the same beans. So why is the result nowhere near as rich, smooth or aromatic than what Martinez's store serves? No swirl or bounce, I suppose.

Last year's regional champion, Gihan Weerasinghe, was also from Dubai. Weerasinghe, a laid back Indian with spiked-up hair, went on to win the London contest, which facilitated his promotion to Costa retail training executive. He happened to be in the headquarters store during my meeting with Martinez, and eventually came to sit with us and recount his own experience of the world competition. He explained that Dubai baristas have more experience than any others in the regional competition, since the region's first Costa opened there in 1999. The world competition, he warned, is more competitive.

But Weerasinghe repeatedly insisted that winning was easy. Asked to give his successor some advice, Weerasinghe turned round to face him directly, crossed his legs and put down a piece of paper he had been holding. "Be yourself."
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