Winston Douglas Coffee

22/05/2023

It’s been a while JHB but we’re back 🙂

We’ll be a hosting a certified SCA Barista Skills Foundation AND Intermediate Combo course with our friends at Seam Coffee Roasters. This is a great opportunity to get certified, learn more about coffee and spend time with a group of engaging and quality focused coffee folk!

When : 29 May - 01 June (9am - 3pm daily)

Where : Seam Coffee

Cost = R7999 (includes certification fee and lunch daily)

Bookings can be done via our website. Click on the button link.

This SCA Barista Skills Combo Course will teach beginners a deep understanding on practical and theory barista requirements and more.

18/05/2023

One of the hardest skills to learn is accurately articulating what we taste 👅 This is tricky subject. Partly because coffees often the similar volatile compounds which can be found in different fruits, nuts etc . For example - almonds and cherries both have the same volatile compound. Therefore, two people could identify two completely different notes in a coffee and would both be correct. So yes it can be slightly subjective but that’s a conversation for another day 🤫

The skill we want to focus on building here is confidence to articulate what we taste and experience when we drink coffee!

The reality is that everyone knows how to taste. But when it comes to tasting coffee there’s often a mental (or sensory) block when it comes to describing what that is. For example we touch and feel things with our hands every day but we don’t go around licking things to get a better sense of texture through our mouths 😅

At WDC we have a few simple exercises we use to help students build on this confidence :

1. The Blueberry Exercise - Blueberries are tasty. And they taste like…blueberries. Everyone knows that right? The interesting thing about eating consecutive blueberries is that they often have varying levels of sweetness, acidity (due to certain organic compounds) thus taste balanced or not. Doing a simple exercise of eating multiple blueberries after one another can help develop an objective idea of high / med / low acidity and sweetness.

2. Textural Materials - To help students identify differences in texture we make use of different types of material or clothes to learn to articulate texture in coffee.

3. Ball Games - This is a fun one. Throwing around different balls (crickets, tennis etc) can help students identify differences in both texture AND weight. This one is best done when students close their eyes and, instead of identifying which type of ball it is, describe what they feel and the weight thereof.

We do believe that learning sensory skills is one of the hardest to master and improve on. Give these exercises a try and see if it makes a difference for you 💡

📸 via

20/01/2023

The year as officially started as we completed our first SCA course of the year last week!

We’re already got courses set all the way till March. Bookings can be made via our website but check dates and locations for courses below :

☕️ SCA Barista Skills Intermediate : 24 - 26 Jan (CT)
☕️ SCA Barista Skills Foundation : 6 - 7 Feb (Potch)
☕️ SCA Brewing Skills Foundation : 8 - 9 Feb (Potch)
☕️ SCA Barista Skills Foundation : 1 - 2 March (CT)

Hit us up if you have any questions on the course, content or SCA Program. We’re always here to help!

06/01/2023

Hello 2023!

We took a bit of a sabbatical from Social Media in 2022 and we came out stronger in the end. Stronger and with a “Barista Trainer of the Year” Award for our training at the 2022 Awards and our very own the reigning South African Barista Champion finishing 17th in the world at the Melbourne World Barista Championships.

This and so much more! Which makes us very excited for a banger of a year for 2023. Promise we’ll be more active in this neck of the woods this year.

Thanks for sticking around 💙

15/11/2021

Can you tell how excited we get when our students make progress!? 🙂😁🥳

Latte art isn't easy. It takes time. And when you do get it right it's always worth celebrating. Practise makes perfect (although there's still a bit of work to do here haha)!

01/11/2021

Not too long ago, our response to customers asking if they should put their coffee in the freezer was a straight NO! Fast forward till today and freezing coffee has become the norm - we even have content in our courses on the concept of freezing coffee.

The reason for our response above was due to moisture (and partly temperature fluctuations). We never want this to start its work with coffee prematurely - it’s reserved to start its magic in the group head. Storing a full bag in the freezer or fridge makes the coffee beans susceptible to both.

One of the major turning points on this relatively new theory was a published research paper by a group of coffee folk and scientists in 2016 (notable mentions must to to Maxwell Colonna Dashwood and Dr Christopher Hendon). Many competitors at the World Barista Championships in Seoul 2017 then presented this theory in their sets which saw it spread through out cafes around the world! Our very own also use this method as part of his set to win the SA Barista Championships in 2020.

In simple terms freezing coffee beans does 2 primary things :

- Potentially heightened aroma and / or flavour in brewed coffee due to cooler bean temperature (we also experienced a significant change in espresso texture at Winston’s comp).
- Uniform grind size which allows us to extract more coffee (less fines) when grinding coffee under specific temperatures.

What’s important to note is that we have to freeze the specific amount of coffee beans we want to use per brew. And (preferably) not put the entire bag in the freezer.

Have you tried freezing coffee before? We’ve got a couple of gems sitting in our training freezer. Definitely a game changer!

21/08/2021

Happy Saturday friends! We love to geek out on coffee here at WDC and pass on that knowledge to those who wish to learn more 🤓 Whether it be TDS and Extraction testing, freezing coffee, ratio experiments and more!

If you're keen to learn more about this head over to our website and check out our courses. We are based in Cape Town but have been training on the road for a couple of years now. We'll be in Potchefstroom (with friends Toro) and Durban (with friends Flat White SA) in September and have a few more trips (some farther than others 😉) coming up later this year.

Have a great weekend and happy brewing ☕️

18/08/2021

READING :

What does a post Covid-19 world look like for coffee business? Will we even get to a point where we have "passed" Covid-19?

We're not jumping on the Covid-19 theorist bandwagon but we have been putting a lot of thought into our business strategy and how we can adapt during these times. Perfect Daily Grind have written an inisightful article on strategies for coffee businesses to keep afloat and to grow amidst the challenges and uncertainties we face.

"Phil Smith is the Head of Insight at UCC UK. “There is definitely going to be a long-term impact for the roast & ground sector,” he says. “I think it is going to be a positive one, with consumers switching from the instant category to a ‘real’ coffee category."

The figures are based on the UK market but the insight could prove useful for all parts of the world. Enjoy!

How can businesses adapt to the post-pandemic landscape and change their coffee strategy to win mind share with customers?

13/08/2021

*Crickets Chirping*

Things have been quiet on the WDC Social Media front. It’s been an interesting few months! Partly because of a move 🙂

We bid farewell to this humble little training space! We started training in a little corner of Rock and Roller Coffee Culture’s roastery and slowly moved to our own dedicated space at the entrance of their old building - a space that we could call our own.

But alas, change is inevitable as they say. As we’ve both grown WDC has now relocated to a studio space in Side Street Studios in good old Woodstock 😬🙌🏽

The space is not 100% complete but if you do find yourself in that neck of the woods, feel free to pop in and say hi 👋🏽

22/07/2021

We are resilient. We are strong. We are one. ✊🏻✊🏽✊🏿

Thoughts and prayers are with our beloved South Africa. With so much happening all over the country we will be postponing our training in Durban next week. Training in Cape Town will still continue, with new dates for Durban to be set soon.

Peace and love to all from WDC!

09/07/2021

Specialty Coffee Association Barista Skills courses in Durban!

Given the recent announcement of The Coffee Magazine postponing Creative Coffee Week we've decided to add an Intermediate course to our training schedule (in colab with our friends at Flat White) in Durban at the end of July.

- 26 - 27 July = SCA Barista Skills Foundation (for the Novice Barista) @ R2499 in including certification fee.

- 28 - 30 July = SCA Barista Skills Intermediate (for the Experienced Barista) @ R4999 including certification fee.

Lunch and bottomless coffee is served on all training days and strict COVID-19 protocol measures will be put in place to ensure safety for all 😷😄

Limited spots available due to small course numbers so get on it!

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