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Not a bad place to find yourself on a work trip. It could definitely be worse. Wayne Oberholzer is currently on the spectacular Ile Maurice and gave us a brief rundown on what's going on up there:
"We have been supplying the wonderful team here (pictured above) at The One & Only Le Saint Geran for the last 4 years. This is the first of the One and Only group hotels situated on the beautiful island of Mauritius.
We (Origin Coffee Roasting) have a joint venture with the team and we get flown out every so often to assist with training and machine maintenance.
There are obviously a few challenges that we face in such a place. Key of which is Milk. UHT long life dominates the market here, and as such is the preferred choice of the hotel chains here. Now any barista worth his salt knows that steaming long life is a challenge. But with a few tweaks in technique, we have been able to step up to the challenge and achieve good results.
There is a booming coffee industry here, and I feel it's only going to get better. Currently Lavazza, Nespresso and Illy dominate the market with their pod systems (A blatant slap in the face of the barista profession, if you ask me), but the market is slowly starting to wake up. With roasteries starting to pop up, watch this space. Exciting times are ahead."
Exciting times indeed! Big thanks to Wayne for keeping us updated, while he fights the good fight for baristas and artisan coffee! Soon he will be visiting a small coffee farm on the island and he promises to let us in on his adventure. Living the dream :)
