6th Place in the First Taiwan Coffee Brewing Championship — Huang Jijun: Enjoying the Process

Text & Photos /Coffee Uncle

The 2014 Taiwan Brewers Cup Championship (TBrC) was a significant inaugural competition. Unlike the previous Taiwan Coffee Masters competitions, which focused mainly on espresso, participants in this event could use any brewing device that met the defined rules. The champion would qualify to represent Taiwan at the WCE World Brewers Cup held in Italy that year.

Around thirty contestants participated in the TBrC Coffee Brewing Championship, many of whom had excelled in other fields such as espresso or coffee roasting competitions. After intense preliminary and semifinal rounds on May 2nd, the representatives for Taiwan were finally selected, with the following rankings:

1st Place: Wei Ruying (Cafe LuLu) (5th Place in the WBrC World Brewers Cup)

2nd Place: Zhang Yuyu (Simple Kaffa)

3rd Place: Lü Yibei (Taster's Coffee)

4th Place: Huang Xiaoqing (Taster's Coffee)

5th Place: Li Wenqi (Cafe LuLU)

6th Place: Huang Jijun (Single Origin Espresso & Roast)

Why is it called a brewing championship rather than a pour-over championship? Because contestants can use any “manual” brewing devices such as pour-over kettles, filter cones, AeroPress, French press, etc. Moreover, no additives can be introduced to the coffee, so creative coffee variations are not allowed.

The competition is divided into preliminary and final rounds, with a preparation time of five minutes. The brewing time is seven minutes in the preliminaries and ten minutes in the finals, with three cups required for judging within each allotted time. In the preliminaries, participants must brew both the designated coffee beans provided by the organizers (washed process, roasted to around Agtron 58–68) and their own chosen beans. If they advance to the finals, they only need to brew their own prepared beans.

Using a Kalita 1600CC stainless steel pour-over kettle

We interviewed Huang Jijun, who won 6th place in this Coffee Brewing Championship and currently works at Single Origin Espresso Roast. Regarding the competition, he said: “I used a relatively high temperature for the bloom to wake up the beans, then extracted at a lower temperature.” During the preliminary round with the designated beans, using an electronic scale, he first poured 20 grams of coffee grounds into 30 grams of 90°C hot water for about 30 seconds of bloom, then continued extraction at 88°C using a steady, uninterrupted stream until 220–230 grams of brewed coffee were produced, taking about one minute and thirty seconds in total.

Both in the preliminaries and finals, Huang Jijun used this uniquely shaped Arita-yaki conical bone china filter. He said: “This filter has a slower flow rate than V60 but faster than KONO—somewhere in between—and the inner groove design slows down the drainage towards the end.”

For the finals, his self-selected bean was the Panamanian Elida Estate sun-dried process. “I aimed to stack flavors using a high-temperature, fast brewing method to bring out berry, floral notes, and the distinctive winey-cherry-chocolate taste of sun-dried beans.” Huang Jijun mentioned that he personally enjoys such flavor profiles.

With a lighter roast level, he used 20 grams of coffee grounds, 90–91°C water temperature, a bloom time of about 40 seconds, and poured 230 grams of water, letting it drip through completely. The total brewing time was about one minute and fifty seconds.

Although he only secured 6th place, Huang Jijun truly enjoyed the competition process and felt delighted to share the brewing experience he’d accumulated over time with others at the event.

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