Danish Barista Championship pt. 2

Yes yes yes, we promised to come back with news from the 2008 Danish Barista Championship. Sorry for the delay.

The winner is: Søren Stiller Markussen.


Søren has come in second place in the Danish BC the last two years as well as in the World Latte Art Championship in Antwerp last year. Naturally he was very relieved to win. His presentation made use of the big screen, where he played a video for the judges and crowd to enjoy.


In second place came Mikkel Otto, freelance barista, who were using our espresso blend. He scored the highest on the espresso (Yeii! we say, although it's all his accomplishment).

Unfortunately his cappuccinos didn't work out. He was using a raw milk from a bio-dynamic cow named Ophelia, grazing on the wild meadows of northern Sealand. Single Cow Milk is the latest thing apparently. He had the judges taste the milk as an appetizer before starting with the capps, but unfortunately the milk didn't steam very well on the day (he had fresh milk brought over to Jutland).

Mikkel Otto was very happy with his achievement and we're all sure people will remember his performance.




On third place came Mikkel Pilgaard from Sigfred's Kaffebar in Århus. Quite a surprise to many of us as he's a new face in coffee. Mikkel has been working as a barista for about a year and only began training for the competition a month ago. But talk about a natural talent! His presentation was calm (in spite of some first-time nerves) and he had great communicative skills.

We were very happy that Mikkel also chose our espresso for his performance. He told us he really liked it and his descriptors on stage were, although different from what we've wrote on the label, spot on. He wasn't afraid of talking about very specific aromas and tastes in the espresso, and he delivered! We can only hope to see Mikkel back in the competition again.



The overall level of the competition this year was higher than we've seen before. It's great to see the baristas' skills evolve and the presentations getting better and better.

Go here to see more pictures from the finals. If you understand Danish you can also read interviews, details and follow-up comments from the baristas on EspressoBar.

Søren stopped by our coffee shop yesterday afternoon. It was very cozy and we all had a good chat about the competition and tasted his espresso blend. Now the training for the WBC begins and as usual when the Danish winner has been crowned everyone wants to help prepare the representative of our country for the world championship.

The Danish SCAE chapter had organized the event very well and a big thanks goes out to everyone involved, especially Lene Hyldahl (former Danish Champion) for all her hard work. It was a pleasure for me to emcee the event and everyone we've talked to has been full of praises.

Congratulations to all the competing baristas!