Australia is now hot on the heels of international growers in the competition to bring the world the very best of its favourite hot beverage. Australian grown coffee has just won one silver and three bronze awards in the recent prestigious Royal Hobart Fine Food Awards, against strong international competition.
While this might come as a surprise to many that Australia grows great coffee, one of the world’s leading coffee tasters, Todd Arnett, Head Coffee Educator for the America’s Speciality Coffee Association, recently rated Australian coffee as “excellent”. This was coffee grown in the region spreading from Noosa to Northern New South Wales.
This major international buyer said the coffee has a sweet, caramel taste, with a buttery feel, and was so surprised he plans a trip visit Australian coffee growers at harvest time next year.
The Hobart competition is one of the eminent coffee awards event in Australia, attracting international competitors, and consistently Australian grown coffee rates highly against the competing world’s best coffee growers.
This year the Silver Award for Plunger Coffee (known as French Press coffee elsewhere) was won by Wirui Estate, coffee growers in Northern New South Wales. The award required the coffee to be 100% single origin, either from imported or Australian coffee. Wirui Estate previously won the Golden Bean Award for best Australian Coffee with Milk in 2015.
Kahawa Estate, also in the Byron Bay Hinterland, won the Bronze for its Lava plunger coffee, again against international competition. This is the 10th Medal for Kahawa Estate at the Royal Hobart Fine Food Awards since they first entered in 2010 (1 Gold, 2 Silver and 7 Bronze).
High Trees Estate Rainforest, again in Northern New South Wales, won the Bronze for its organic espresso short black blend and a Bronze for its cappuccino. This follows six silver and five bronze medals for local coffee growers at the Sydney Royal Fine Food Show last January.
Wirui Estate spokesperson, Richard Bradbury, says Australian grown coffee stands alongside international origins as excellent coffee. He is also a spokesperson for the Australian Subtropical Coffee Association (ASTCA), part of an international organisation of coffee growers, tasters and buyers.
Australia has two major growing areas for coffee: the subtropical coffee growing in Northern New South Wales and the Sunshine Coast, and Northern Queensland.
New South Wales and Southern Queensland coffee remains on the coffee trees for as long as nine months and so gathers more sugars from the plant, giving it that premium caramel taste, as found in Ecuadorian coffee, until now rated as the best coffee in the world.
So the answer is yes, we should be drinking more Australian coffee as it is at the top of the tree!
With a growing worldwide shortage of coffee beans, the Australian Subtropical Coffee Association is calling for more people to become growers for what is arguably equal to the best coffee in the world.
However, there is a shortage of Australian coffee, but that is another story!
