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Q Graders at ABA
The Q grading course came to a close today with 15 out of 21 people becoming Australia’s newest Q graders! Although there are a disappointed few, there is still an opportunity for these folks to retake their section/s at another grading. More importantly everyone agreed it was a great week of learning and every participant can now speak a common language among the specialty coffee world. The scoring part of the Q grading, where participants needed to rate coffees out of 100 proved to be the strongest area. Everyone passed this with very high scores which reflects their cupping ability. Once again the sweet, sour, salt tests proved to be the toughest part as did some of the olfactory (nasal senses) tests.
I am not sure how many cupping bowls were used this week, but it’s fair to say it was hundreds and hundreds and hundreds, and perhaps a few more hundred. Big thanks go out to Andy Easthope and Chei Wei for all the hard work cleaning, entering scores and tidying up back of house. Craig and Chris from Atlas again ran an incredibly motivating and educational course and were just great guys to have around! If you asked the participants one of the best parts of the Q grading, they would tell you it was listening to Craig’s coffee knowledge and stories from around the globe.
Being able to watch some of the Q grading this time and not stress out with all the tests I could see just how much work goes into this. There was a huge range of specialty coffees shipped to ABA and each sample had been meticulously roasted. Every cup was weighed and ground. There were 21 people that needed to be focused (and fed) for an entire week and every day had to run smoothly. Jen Murray was the orgainser of this event and the feedback from the Atlas guys are that it was the smoothest course they have ever run. Props to you Jen!
The week was also filled with lots of fun. There was singing and guitar playing, fun runs after hours, drinks and plenty of laughs. Goodbye to Craig and Chris and have fun in PNG!
