Coffee. A thousand year old phenomenon that has spread life and wealth across the continents. An intricate process that has created joyous flavours among the population. Yet somehow it’s taken Leeds about 995 of those years to wake up and smell the roasted beans.

Since then the city has developed from muddy mugs through mass chains to spend this decade catching up quickly with the coffee-cool culture. Now the city has an array of excellent independent offerings, such as La Bottega Milanese, Opposite, Mrs Atha’s and Laynes Espresso.
To celebrate another destination for the coffee-centric of the city, we asked Dave Olejnik exactly what makes the perfect brew?
“There are so many variables, the room affects it, the temperature, the specific machine…” he says, before rattling off the number of grams being brewed today, for how many seconds and at what temperature.
The process for creating a great cup of coffee it seems is much the same as cooking a great plate food…

“People seem so surprised when we explain how we work out the best recipe for our coffees each morning and we follow that recipe for the day with maybe a small tweak here and there as we go. We all know that if you want to bake a cake and just throw flour, eggs and the other ingredients in at random you’re not that likely to get a great cake at the end of it. It’s the same with preparing a good cup of coffee.” 

The comparison between Barista and chef is key and emphasised by Dave: “Each coffee we serve will be tasted by our staff and we’ll work out what recipe works best to get the most flavour out. We pay attention to how much ground coffee goes in, and what texture the coffee is ground, how much water we pass through the ground coffee and at what temperature the water is when it makes contact with the grounds. All these variables are checked and checked again throughout the day to ensure the coffee is tasting great all day long.”
With more and more ordinary folk joining the coffee obsessives in eschewing instant jars and purchasing machinery to make their own interpretations at home, just how easy it is for the untrained to replicate a master brewer?

“People recognise what’s good and what’s bad but don’t know why, and that’s fine. I care that we know why,” he says. “We encourage people brewing coffee at home to pay that little more attention to the variables, they’ll find they have a way tastier cup and it makes the purchasing of the coffee more value for money. The Barista does have a lot more to do than the home brewer though, they have a far greater responsibility to be completely consistent and all the while maintaining customer service and requirements…it’s a lot of work in a busy coffee shop!”

As for his own favourite tipple, Dave opts for a proper filter coffee, “purposefully brewed longer”, or a classic espresso for the purists, but insists there is no right and wrong; “I personally don’t like mocha but lots of people love it.”

Unsurprisingly, the products are ethically sourced and personally selected for maximum quality, from the sumptuous hot chocolate with 60% cocoa pellets, to using local green coffee suppliers Falcon. All of which makes it all the more unusual when Dave tells us; “We don’t use fair-trade,” going on to explain; “They did a great job initially but it’s become a brand with no benchmark for quality. When market price is higher growers can get paid less and when market price is lower they can cut corners. By buying directly, our farmers are paid more and supply a better product.”

Which leads us on to the effect of the industry superpowers, such as Starbucks and Costa, have on independents. Whilst not condoning them generally, Dave is accepting: ”Every industry needs a mainstream. I first drank coffee in Nero because I didn’t know better. Back then there was nowhere better!”