BREW THE ULTIMATE COFFEE

Phaedon Gourtsoyannis is a coffee aficionado, and the owner of Cape Coffee Beans – a company specialising in coffee products of all kinds. These include the items needed for a simple-but-tasty coffee-making method called Pour- Over. Here he explains the a

F Coffee is a neverending flavour/ learning adventure. You’ve got this fruit, grown hundreds and sometimes thousands of kilometres away, that is touched by dozens of people on its way to becoming the beverage in your cup. F Each stage in the process affects what you taste – including growing, picking, processing, transporting, roasting… and finally brewing. People often see brewing as the most important step, but every aspect of this production process is important. Learning about this process while enjoying its fruits is pretty captivating. F Pour- Over coffee makers are a great way to make coffee at home, or even at the office. You get some of the experience of craft, without the need for the technical skills and expensive equipment that espresso requires. They also strike a good balance between being relatively straightforward to use, and still requiring a bit of attention and practice to master. F This method also suits the direction that coffee is moving in South Africa – towards lighter roasts and single- origin coffees with more distinct flavours. The filter- style long brews that PourOvers produce are a great way to enjoy these more progressive coffees. F There should be no such thing as a favourite coffee. Part of the pleasure in coffee is sampling everything there is to offer. Of course there are coffees you love, and coffees you enjoy less, but with coffee- growing countries worldwide producing many different specialitygrade offerings every year, I don’t think it’s possible to identify a single favourite. It would be boring if it was!