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- Coffee art and coffee culture is very popular in South Africa.
- It is a difficult craft to perfect as coffee gets cold very quickly and there is no chance to erase mistakes, says coffee artist Brighton Hotera.
- Hotera perfected the skill through practice, but others are turning to technology for help.
- For more stories, visit the Tech and Trends homepage.
After sustaining a wrist injury, artist Brighton Hotera traded the sketch pad for the cappuccino.
He was working at a Sea Point-based cafe when a wrist injury made it difficult for him to draw on paper, so he found a new medium.
Hotera says there are challenges to making art on coffee. You have to be quick to prevent the coffee from going cold, there is no way to erase your mistakes, and critically, the cup of coffee has to taste good at the end.
"It’s much easier on paper," he says.
But, Hotera stuck at it and is now a master of his craft. He currently works at Juvenate Conscious Eatery in Stellenbosch.
He first froths the milk and then uses a toothpick or a wire to draw on top, before adding the coffee at the end.
He uses raw cocoa powder for a lot of the lines, but he has a wide colour palate. For yellow, he uses turmeric, for green, matcha, and beetroot for red. He said he is resourceful and often uses whatever is on hand.
The most important part for him is seeing his customer's reactions to the coffee art.
He says he often tries to read a customer's mood as they walk in, and then cater the coffee to them. If they have a dog with them, he will often do a portrait of the dog.
There are a few designs that he likes to return to often. Some of his favourites include Bart Simpson, Minions and Snoopy.
His best, in his opinion, is of an island with blue skies and palm trees.
Hotera says he is already taking on some students who want to learn how to make coffee art and that they have progressed well, which he is happy to see.
He says his art has proven to be massively popular and that he would like to open a gallery with a restaurant and coffee shop someday, together with his girlfriend who is currently the head chef at Juvenate.
A hot topic
Hayley Arendse, the head of the barista academy at Cape Town-based coffee roastery Origin, said their barista courses and coffee art lessons had soared in popularity over the years.
Origin started in 2005 and shortly afterward began offering barista courses to wholesale clients.
They began offering courses to the public around eight years ago and have seen a tremendous uptake since then.
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She said that there was lots of interest from home enthusiasts, but there are also lots of people who realised that coffee could become a job if they acquire the necessary skills.
She said that people do enjoy the latte art side of things, but might underestimate how difficult it is to get right.
“It's obviously a lot of fun, but it's difficult. It's really difficult and people often underestimate how difficult it is.”
A new strategy
Some people have side-stepped the difficulties of coffee art by roping in technology to make it as easy as clicking a button. Raymond Mokgotsi from Afriten Technologies and Desire Monisi from Moments Beverage and Desserts have teamed up to introduce what is essentially a printer for coffees to South Africa.
Customers in need of a caffeine kick with a twist first approach Monisi who makes a coffee with foamed milk, which he passes on to Mokgotsi.
Mokgotsi places the coffee into the Evebot coffee printer, which they imported from China. The device can print a range of logos and patterns, and can take a picture of customers which it prints using cocoa into the coffee.
“It’s basically a printer with cocoa in it,” said Mokgotsi.
News24 watched the process play out for Khaya Mfini, who happens to be the head of IT architecture at FNB. He wanted a coffee when he was at the IDC CIO summit which was held at the Sandton Convention Center on 18 May.
Mfini was chuffed with the result. “It’s a cool idea. Technology now is getting into food.”
