Latte Art World Championship heats up Baltimore Convention Center

Wake up and smell the coffee, Baltimore! Coffee Fest is in town with more than 3,500 specialty coffee industry professionals bubbling around Charm City!

The soul-quenching three-day trade show will run March 16-18 at the Baltimore Convention Center.

Coffee roasters, specialty coffee retailers, managers and baristas will participate in over 155 hours of coffee industry education, meet new business suppliers, discover innovative & new products and equipment and network with the coffee community.

Three unique coffee competitions will take place over the weekend with companies and individuals contending for top spots.

The Latte Art World Championship Open draws individuals from around the world to compete with a perfect intricate latte design. Competitors are given three minutes to produce one free-pour drink using just skill, milk and espresso – no tools or powders are allowed. A panel of judges reviews each head-to-head competition and evaluates the design based on speed, aesthetic beauty, color infusion, definition and degree of difficulty. Competition begins Friday morning and runs through Sunday mid-day.

America’s Best Espresso Competition brings roasters from across the country to showcase their best beans. Once seeded within the tournament, each roaster is scheduled for their Saturday opening round competition time and match-up. Roasters have 10 minutes to prepare three espresso shots that will be submitted to the judging table of three carefully selected judges. Competitors will go head-to-head in a winner-move-on, loser-goes-home tournament competition starting Saturday afternoon through Sunday afternoon.

America’s Best Cold Brew Competition acknowledges the best tasting still cold brew and nitro cold brew. Attendees invited to taste and vote on the cold brew through several rounds, still competitors against still and nitro against nitro. Blind judge scores are combined with attendee voting results to determine the winners. Competition runs from Saturday afternoon through Sunday afternoon
Over 200 companies make up the tradeshow floor displaying equipment, business services, resell merchandise, coffee, tea and much more. Exhibitors are invited to enter their products in the Best New Product Showcase. Three industry professionals will judge each entry based on innovation and retailer appeal and awards will be presented to the top three consumable and top three non-consumable products in the showcase.

Attendees will also be invited to vote for their favorite new product in the People’s Choice “Best of Fest” New Product Competition and one winner will be awarded.

About Coffee Fest: Coffee Fest is a trade-only event serving the specialty coffee and gourmet tea industries since 1992. Coffee Fest draws more than 10,000 attendees and competitors a year, connecting regional coffee communities through regional tradeshow events. For more details about Coffee Fest, to see the winners of Coffee Fest competitions and much more, visit www.coffeefest.com.

Baltimore Post-Examiner Staff

Baltimore Post-Examiner is run by a creative cadre of dedicated journalists – some who worked at the Washington Post, Baltimore Examiner and other regional and national publications. It’s the Post-Examiner because we love the play on the word “Post” but we are also hoping to answer that question: What’s next after newspapers? We see a lot of websites come and go – and many simply are not making it for various reasons. We have been a model of success since we launched in 2012 with “a little bit of everything” and we aim to continue to break that cycle of websites coming and going.