“Pull your hair back, wear closed-toed shoes and a shirt with sleeves,” Sara the barista tells me over the phone. If she thinks I’m showing up for my first-ever shift as a barista in huarache sandals, a tank top and a free-flowing mullet, she’s got me all wrong. I’ve been dreaming of this day for a while, and I don’t dream in hairnets and flabby underarms.
I meet Sara Judy early the next morning as she’s opening up. Sara opens every morning at True Brew Barista, one of Concord’s true coffee houses and my home, off and on, for the next few days. I’m here to learn the ropes –to get a dollop of what it’s like to be a barista, to grind and brew some beans, make frozen drinks and try to look as calm and competent as Sarah and her coworkers do every time I’m in here.
True Brew hit the scene in 2009, when Rob and Steph Zinser opened the doors in Bicentennial Square to Concord’s coffee and tea drinkers who’d grown sick of the drive-thru selections, tired of the gas station varieties and bored with every-day home brewed beverages. True Brew’s been offering espresso, drip coffee and every variation in between ever since, not to mention more tea than a man can drink in one lifetime.
Sara’s been a barista at True Brew since the summer of 2010, when she came to Concord in pursuit of her then-boyfriend, now-husband and co-worker Sean Ring. Sara hails from a town of 650 people on the prairies of Saskatchewan, Canada. “People love to talk to baristas,” she says, “and working here really helped me connect with the community.” And she means it. She and her husband Sean are so connected to this community of coffee drinkers that they held their wedding ceremony earlier this summer right out front of True Brew in the brick and fountain-adorned Square. “I’d live upstairs if there was an open apartment,” she says with a laugh.
About five minutes into the shift, it’s clear Sara’s customers feel that same connection – evident by the variation of the stink eye I’m getting from all of them. “Who’s this lurker? Why is he distracting my Sara? I bet he drinks decaf!” They eye me with contempt so I retreat into the shadows until Sara’s ready for me.
Now the lesson begins. Sara shows me how to prep, clean, grind, measure, tamp, brew, assess and pour a double shot of espresso, emphasizing the importance of never letting stray grinds into the brew. She cleans the handle, and after filling it, she has a lightning-quick habit of pressing down into the grind and tapping the sides to shake away any loose grounds. “The trick is to apply just enough pressure – too much and your espresso’s bitter; not enough and you have a mess.” She says this as “pulls” the shot and smacks the handle against the knock box, clearing out the hot grinds to get ready for the next double shot. She later explains that the quality of the espresso can be judged a few ways – first, you can see if your puck – the spent grounds – hold together as you “knock the puck into the box.” Secondly, just after the espresso shot’s been pulled, you can see what the “crema” looks like. The crema’s the tan-colored foam on the top of the shot, the liquid folding in and around itself as the hot liquid settles in the shot glass.
I try and pull a double shot of dark roast, knocking a so-so puck into the box as the crema envelopes the sides of my glass. “Apply more pressure next time,” Sara tells me. I drink the espresso fast and try again and again, drinking everything I pull. Sara told me that one of the benefits of working at True Brew is having all the coffee I want. I’m taking full advantage of this, at least until my heart gives out. It’s not quite 8:30 in the morning, and I’ve had enough caffeine to stop a rhino, win an MMA bout and watch The View simultaneously.
Sara doesn’t say things I thought baristas would say. Instead of statements like, “Decaf cap with a double hazelnut shot,” or “Dry macchiato extra hot skinny with vanilla,” she says things like, “All the vegans I know are chain smokers,” and “They call me ‘The Giant.’”
Everything about True Brew is groovy – from the seven-foot Viking to the chalkboard menus to the vaguely atonal acoustic music you can barely hear above the hiss of the steaming milk. Specialty drinks like the Bikini Bottom, Phrosty Penguin and the Fluffy Bunny compete with a roster of teas for attention. This place is a real tea party, minus the angry pensioners on Medicare-funded scooters. Where else in town can you choose between the Paimutan Peony, Russian Caravan and Green Mango, not to be outdone by the Dragonswell, a cup of iced Blood Orange or the ever-inscrutable Lapsong Sauchang?
I don’t recall how my training shift ended except I remember not wanting anymore coffee that day. A few days later I return. Today is Day One of Market Days, Concord’s three-day outdoor celebration of culture, community, commerce and cheese fries. Rob puts me to work outside, where I stand for the next three hours selling beer to the crowd checking out the rotating local bands, who play everything from foot-tapping jazz standards to original pieces to Grateful Dead covers.
I’m not sure serving beer is a real barista activity, but this is fun! Little girls twirl around in the late afternoon breeze as a couple arrives with ferrets draped across their shoulders. One customer’s making a dent in my canned beer collection, taking a roundabout course towards me every time – like he’d just shown up and was surprised we sold beer. “Cool! Gimme a PBR,” he says. I oblige and he sits right back down where he was before he did his slow serpentine through the crowd. A guy in plaid shorts is on stage with his band, rocking his ukulele like nobody’s business as the crowd cheers. Outdoor beer garden barista duty is a nice way to spend a summer night.
It’s finally my time to head inside, and Sara and Sean put me to work, sending me to Penuche’s for a bucket of ice. “Don’t forget to filter that ice!” Sean yells as I return. Nobody told me I had to filter it, I think, starting to panic. Sean starts laughing, knowing the new guy falls for the filtered ice trick all the time. I half-expect him to send me to the Capital building in search of the double-barreled left-handed bean grinder. Instead, he shows me how to make a smoothie, and seconds later I take my first real order. The customer wants a frozen coffee drink. Before disaster strikes, Sara quietly reminds me that I should probably stop making a hot espresso shot, explaining the physics of ice and hot liquids, pointing out the cold espresso for my use instead.
I recover to make a 32-oz. chocolate masterpiece to calories, ice and caffeine. As more customers arrive, I try my hand at a few other drinks, managing to not quite perfect my puck but drinking at least four more shots of espresso before it’s time to go. I notice one of tonight’s barista’s left a perfectly shaped puck on the knock box, a signature to master craftsmanship of espresso making.
It’s getting late. Sara hands me my share of tips for the night, the most gratifying $20 in singles and quarters I’ve ever held. Barista duty is fun. You need a little bit of skill, lots of practice and someone like Sara whispering instruction in your ear, even if her husband makes you filter the ice.
