Have you ever seen a barista prepare your coffee or wondered what goes behind the coffee machine?
In this first post, I will be breaking down the process of coffee making and sharing the efforts in managing waste produced in the process. To prepare the espresso shot for a cup of coffee, it takes three steps.
Step 1 – Grinding coffee beans into powder
At our café, we grind freshly roasted coffee beans for every cup of coffee. Once the beans are in the machine, we’ll collect the coffee powder in a portafilter. However, this process is never neat. Excess coffee powder tends to fall off the portafilter, onto the machine and table.
Look at the coffee powder trying its best to stay on the heap!
That’s our first source of waste! But, we don’t just throw it away. We collect it in a separate cup and save it for future uses (definitely not for your drinks ><).
‘Washing powder’ for the coffee machine
This cup of coffee powder is repurposed for cleaning the coffee machine before the first espresso shot is extracted for consumption. When I first joined the company, I was surprised to know that we save the coffee powder! Just last Sunday, I discovered that my co-worker, Anne, has a unique way of using coffee powder. When we were closing the shop and preparing to leave, I saw her adding olive oil into a mysterious cup…
It turns out, mixing coffee powder and olive oil makes a good facial scrub! That is a new discovery for me, and it’s great to see how my co-workers are making use of excess coffee powder in their lives 🙂
Now, moving on with coffee making.
With a filled portafilter, let’s move on to the next step.
Step 2 – Extracting the espresso shot
The portafilter is locked into the machine and an espresso shot is being extracted. For americanos and lattes, two shots of espresso are used. Whereas in flat whites and cappuccinos, only one shot is used.
A shot of espresso shots
So here comes the second source of waste! Sometimes, we may end up with extra espresso shots. Over time, the coffee fragrance may be lost, and new shots need to be pulled for drinks. What happens to the excess espresso shots then?
It’s collected and used to make tiramisu cakes that are also sold at the café!
To me, I’ve always thought of food businesses as wasteful and that their actions are unsustainable. Now that I’ve gotten a chance to work in a café, it has changed the way I look at food businesses. As a service crew, I’ve seen how the café has saved coffee powder and espresso shots for other uses that benefit the company. Businesses may start off with the intentions of maximising the use of every ingredient, to make full use of its production costs.
But here’s a food for thought – aren’t they also subconsciously reducing their waste production?
Wait, where’s the third step in coffee making?
itfigures52 September 11, 2020
Hey Jo!
That was a really insightful post! I never knew olive oil and coffee powder could create a facial scrub. Sounds really unorthodox!
I thought the point you made about businesses reducing their waste via the maximisation of ingredients was good. I’ve never really considered that perspective before.
Also just out of curiousity, how many shots are there in a mocha? Those are my favourite!!
jolee2001 September 11, 2020 — Post Author
Hello Joseph!
Thank you! I was really surprised to find out that coffee powder has such uses. I’m also glad you have a new perspective of food businesses now 🙂 Although some businesses may be reducing their waste through maximising the use of their ingredients, I do hope they will do so consciously in the future! In fact, I’m sure there are businesses out there that are already consciously reducing their waste. Nevertheless, I feel that this way of waste reduction can be a good start to food businesses being more sustainable in the long run.
As for your favourite mocha, it requires two espresso shots! But, you can always add more shots if you’re in for more caffeine ><
– Jo
Si Ying September 11, 2020
Hi Jo! It is interesting and heartening to know that the café you work at makes the effort to reduce their waste even if the primary goal was to maximize the use of their resources. (it’s like killing two birds with one stone!) Do you think other cafés in Singapore have similar practices to reduce their waste? If not, how do you think more cafés can be encouraged to adopt such practices?
jolee2001 September 11, 2020 — Post Author
Hey Si Ying!
Thank you for popping by 🙂 I’ve never seen how other cafes manage their waste, but i believe they have such practices catered to their own operations! I feel that such practices are hard to be enforced in a company until the workers see it being implemented in another cafe, and understand the purpose behind doing so. Through a first hand exposure to such new practices, the service crew can learn from each other and adopt these practices in their own cafes. Maybe just by observing a service crew’s day at another cafe, one can learn about the ways to reduce waste through simple actions.
– Jo
glixuan September 11, 2020
Hi Jo,
That was a really interesting post, it gives me hope as I always see food outlets like Dunkin’ donuts throwing away their unsold donuts at the end of the night… Do you know if such practices common in other cafes?
By the way, your latte art is so cute, I am obsessed!
Lixuan
jolee2001 September 11, 2020 — Post Author
Hey Lixuan!
I’m glad my post gave you some hope in food businesses! It sure is a waste to throw away unsold donuts, or food in general when the shop closes. I don’t know about such practices in other cafes, but I do know it is common for restaurants. I used to work at Sushi Tei during the holidays in Secondary 4. When the shop closes at night, we can help ourselves to leftover chawanmushi, salad and sushi. However, we were not allowed to pack anything home and whatever that was left needs to be thrown away. When I joined this cafe two years back, we used to throw away leftover bread too. We could be throwing away five to six baguettes a day when business was bad. It really didn’t feel good to throw away bread that could still be consumed. But over the years, we have changed our way in managing leftover bread! I will be sharing more about our efforts in my upcoming posts, so do look out for them 🙂
And also, thank you for the compliment! Stay tuned to more latte arts in my posts 🙂
– Jo
itfigures52 September 13, 2020
Hey Li Xuan!
I briefly worked at bakers and cook in January 2020 and a common practice we had was to give away as many leftover pastries to the staff on duty as we could. It was a small step we took to minimising food waste.
Stacia Loong September 18, 2020
Hi Jo!
Really enjoyed reading your post especially with all the amazing art pieces! I think that it’s great that you’re cafe is utilizing all sorts of resources and I really would never think of using extra coffee beans as a facial scrub!
Just out of curiosity, when you have extra espresso shots, is it because of the wrong order, or is it like prepared beforehand?
Other than that, I hope that more cafes adopt such practices. I worked at a cafe/bar once and what they did with their used coffee beans for plants and as ashtrays. I definitely will share with my ex-colleagues some of the methods you guys use as well!
Excited to read more about your blog!
jolee2001 September 19, 2020 — Post Author
Hello Stacia:)
Nice to hear that you are enjoying the post! The coffee machine will extract two shots of espresso each time. When we receive orders like flat whites or cappuccinos which require one espresso shot each, we will have one extra espresso shot lying around. It will normally be used for the next cup of coffee that requires just one shot of espresso! Sometimes, however, there will be no coffee orders for a long time. As the espresso sits out for too long, it turns cold and the coffee aroma may not be as strong. This espresso will then be used for iced coffee, but if it’s been out for more than 30 minutes, we’d normally keep it for making tiramisu!
Most of the time when we have wrong orders, we’d end up with the entire cup of coffee (with milk) instead of just the espresso! At least for me, I would only realise I made a mistake after adding milk to the coffee. But don’t worry, the coffee doesn’t go to waste! Either my co workers or I will drink it 🙂 (Luckily over the years, I have been more careful in ensuring I don’t make any mistake in the coffee orders. If not, I might not be able to sleep with the high caffeine intake ><)
It's interesting to see how different cafes make use of their coffee waste! Maybe it's time for me to make an observation at other cafes other than mine. Do feel free to share with me the new practices your cafe/bar have!
– Jo
Joanna Coleman September 25, 2020
Hi Stacia,
Not sure if you’ll see this, but out of curiosity, what do you mean by “and as ashtrays” ? This is confusing to me on several levels, starting with the fact that it’s illegal to smoke in a café and ending with not understanding how coffee beans = ashtray”.
jc