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Today’s post comes from über-coffee-maker Dave Jones, Origin coffee’s head barista trainer, pictured in green above. I attended one of Origin’s coffee courses (newly available to the public) at their geek-chic coffee lab in Helston last week and was bowled over by the complexities of brewing coffee but most of all by Dave’s amazingly detailist approach.

There are all sorts of things to think about like brew ratios, over-extraction, under-extraction, grind size, immersion time, saturation, freshness of beans… Ah, so that’ll be why there is so much poor coffee sloshing about, often even when the cafe has superb coffee beans to start with (talking of which, try smooth-talking Finca Los Altos by Origin, my new fave).

Don’t know about you but I’ve had enough limp lattes to last a lifetime, so without further ado, here’s Dave’s good coffee guide to Cornwall:

Relish Food and Drink
“Deeply passionate about coffee of all shapes and sizes. Hugo was 2008 UK Barista champion (10th in the world that year I think). Lovely courtyard location in Wadebridge and fantastic deli.”

Rick Stein’s Seafood Restaurant

“Some of the best baristas we work with are at the Seafood. Thanks to some very knowledgeable and enthusiastic individuals (UKBC competitors), the quality of the coffee matches that of the food.”

Fifteen Cornwall
“It has long been Fifteen’s mission to create the finest Italian cuisine using the freshest local ingredients, so it figures that an espresso here is about as perfect an example of this as you’re likely to find. They too can boast some UKBC entrants.”

108 Café Kenwyn Street, Truro
“Paul used to work for Starbucks but left to start 108 recently. Very competent and passionate barista, and his partner bakes all the cakes and nibbles. A shining a example of how start a coffee shop on little more than loose change and allow the product to speak for itself.”

The Courtyard Deli, Falmouth

“Rae who runs it used to do my job but left to take over the deli, so lots of knowledge and passion for coffee, as well as food and drink in general. The coffee is as you would expect from a former Origin employee and the deli is well stocked with the best of local and foreign produce.”

Crap coffee no more! Big thanks, Dave, for your gems of wisdom.

Origin Coffee is at www.origincoffee.co.uk; Finca Los Altos from Nicaragua, £5.05 for 250g. Barista courses £65 – call for details.