What is the Cup of Excellence?

Discover Cup of Excellence - a prestigious coffee competition that selects the highest quality coffees in the world. Why are we mentioning it? Because one of these coffees has just been added to our coffee offering.

The unique Buena Esperanza. Directly from Nicaragua, home to some of the best coffees in the world. Its history dates back to 1790, when the first coffee tree was planted. It is characterized by exceptional beans, in which you will find the taste of dried dates, fruity notes of ripe orange, and honey. The aftertaste it leaves behind resembles aromatic Earl Grey tea drunk in the morning.

This is the first coffee in the history of our roastery to be awarded in the prestigious competition for coffee producers – Cup of Excellence. As part of the competition, among thousands of coffees and cupping cups, the best ones are selected.

Cup of Excellence - prestigious coffee competition

More and more is being said about the Polish Barista Championships, Roasters, Brewers Cup, and other coffee competitions. Undoubtedly, these are events promoting high-quality coffee and showing that coffee means endless, new sensory experiences. Competitions for baristas are dedicated to people at the end of the "coffee chain." The question arises – what about the people at the beginning, i.e., the Roasters?

The Cup of Excellence (CoE) competition is reserved for them.

The history of CoE began in 1999. It was then that the competition began to create the market for high-quality coffee. It benefited small producers, focusing on providing the best quality beans and dividing their harvests into micro-lots (these are small batches of specially selected beans based on variety, part of the farm, sensory profile).

This competition is independently organized in 12 countries:

• Brazil,
• Burundi,
• Costa Rica,
• Ecuador,
• El Salvador,
• Ethiopia,
• Guatemala,
• Honduras,
• Mexico,
• Nicaragua,
• Rwanda.

Participation in the competition is free and available to everyone. However, a participant can present only one of their lots (a selected part of the harvest). Throughout the competition, judges from the national and international jury use specially prepared sheets to evaluate the coffee. Unlike the well-known sheets (here in the roastery) prepared by the Specialty Coffee Association (SCA), this one is used to evaluate only specialty coffees, and the primary goal when filling it out is to evaluate, describe, and select the best coffee from a given country.

It is easy to notice the difference in both sheets. What stands out is the scoring scale for individual attributes. In SCA, the scale for each attribute starts from 6 and ends at 10 (with three exceptions), while in CoE, the scoring scale ranges from 0 to 8.

SCA cupping form

CoE does not include aroma in its coffee evaluation; its use is purely descriptive and does not affect the final score. It is also worth noting that the number of evaluated attributes differs – CoE has 8 features, and SCA has 10.

CoE cupping form

Both forms also approach defect evaluation differently. SCA divides defects into two categories – taint ("minor defect" that is detectable but does not overshadow the coffee's character) and fault (a major defect that disrupts the taste of a given sample). Cup of Excellence allows for the assessment of defect intensity, and based on this, negative points are calculated using a formula. Interestingly, if a coffee exhibits a defect in even one of the cups at the international stage, it is immediately disqualified.

Stages of the Cup of Excellence competition

The entire competition is divided into 6 stages:

1. Preliminary selection – the national judging panel tests each sample only once, and coffees with a score of 86+ proceed to the next round. A maximum of 150 samples participate in the preliminary selection.
2. Second round – a maximum of 90 coffees participate in this round, which are re-evaluated by national judges, and coffees must again score at least 86 points.
3. Third round – coffees that advance from the previous round (maximum 40) are tested once again and must also score 86 points to proceed to the next stage.
4. Fourth round – after a week, an international jury gathers to evaluate coffees from the third round, and coffees scored at least 87 points proceed to the next stage.
5. Fifth round – coffees that reached the fifth stage are awarded and go to auction. They are re-evaluated and described for auction purposes.
6. Sixth round – the top 10 coffees go to the final round, where they are evaluated with particular care to determine the final result and select the winners. 

After the demanding stages of the competition – the moment comes to honor the winners. Interestingly, coffees from the last two rounds are put up for auction. Due to high interest and limited quantity of coffees, winners often pay exorbitant amounts, which go to the farmer as an additional reward.

Uniqueness of Cup of Excellence coffee

Undoubtedly, Cup of Excellence is the most demanding coffee competition, for which participants prepare throughout the season. It requires a great deal of work, attention, sacrifices, investment, but above all, luck. Unfortunately, we have no influence on weather conditions, which affect bean quality.  

Fortunately, the results of this hard work bring benefits not only to the winners but also to us, people who have the good fortune and pleasure to brew and enjoy such carefully selected coffees.

Author: Alek Smęt, Head Coffee Roaster