Radek Nozicka

– Can you please introduce yourself in a few words.
I’m a videographer, photographer and traveler with a main focus on coffee.

– What’s your story in the coffee industry?
I was meant to be a mechanical engineer but during my studies at the university I met with Ales. He got the idea of a project that helps people to find the best cafes with speciality coffee in Europe and also bring them some information about coffee in Europe. Then he shared this idea and coffee (literally) with me and I got excited. Long story short. I’ve never worked as a barista, neither journalist, photographer, filmmaker or anything I do now. Basically I got into the coffee industry through connecting my passions and motivations. My passion is traveling and my motivation is to get better at photography/video and create content for people. Coffee became an intersection between all my interests.

– How and when did you get to specialize as a coffee journalist?
Since the beginning we were talking about ECT as a medium/blog in the first place. So we defined ourselves as a journalist already back then even though we had no previous experience before. We just wanted to create content so we could start doing it.

– What is the story behind European Coffee Trip?
I think I answered this in the first question anyway I can add to that a copy of the answer I have given to some other interviews in the past:

« At the beginning there was an Ales’s idea – travel the Europe and discover the state of speciality coffee in Europe while covering our observations online. I got excited and so I bought my first DSLR so I could learn about coffee through photography and vice versa while traveling – it was perfect. At the beginning we traveled 10 countries as a trial, financing from our own pockets. We were also traveling lowcost and using couchsurfing so this helped us a lot to keep our expenses at the minimum. After this trip we got a great feedback from people and so we were motivated to find a way how to keep on exploring Europe and bring more value and content to the community. »

– What was your first coffee experience?
I remember it was some instant coffee… and I didn’t like it 🙂

– How/when have you discovered about specialty coffee?
It was Ales who brought me to the world of specialty coffee. I remember him using equipment like an Aeropress, v60 or Porlex mini and scaling every cup of coffee. It looked like some alchemy to me and so I got curious and asked him if we could make some cupping together. Next time we met and he brewed some different kind of coffees in his kitchen and actually it was -the- meeting where he shared the idea of European Coffee Trip with me.

– What was your best coffee experience?
It was the visit of the coffee farm in Tanzania this last December 2016 for sure. It was fascinating to finally see the whole process of producing coffee and all the effort that goes into that.

– Do you prepare coffee at home ? If yes, what method do you use?
I use an Aeropress at home but in the office we use mostly V60.

– How do you like your coffee? Black, sugar and milk, iced, vietnamese style,…?
I love filter coffee. Just like that – no sugar, no milk.

– How would you qualify yourself as coffee drinker (occasional, heavy, addict…)?
Normally I drink zero to two coffees per day (when not traveling with ECT). But anyway I love to drink coffee so I think I’m a little bit of addictive to a good coffee 🙂

– Have you always been into the coffee industry? If not, what was your previous job?
I was a student of mechanical engineering at Brno University of Technology when we started European Coffee Trip. After one year I got a bachelor degree and then I left school in order to put all my energy into ECT.

– Do you have another passion or a hobby besides coffee?
My other passions are photography, video and traveling. That’s basically the rest of my work.

– What other place would you recommend, anywhere in the world (coffee or not)?
I fell in love with Iceland simply because of the nature – it is extraordinary! I’ve been there twice and wanna definitely come back in future.

– – –
Ales Pospisil

– Can you please introduce yourself in a few words.
Coffee Geek & Co-founder of European Coffee Trip based in Brno, Czech Republic.

– What’s your story in the coffee industry?
I fell in love with speciality coffee at the home barista training with Jaro Tucek from Doubleshot Roasters.
Then I started Coffee Club Zurich (a club for coffee enthusiasts in the city) and then European Coffee Trip that is an online magazine about speciality coffee in Europe. That is what I do full time, it is our business, it is what we want to do.

– How and when did you get to specialize as a coffee journalist?
I graduated from a technical university (telecommunications) so I have no prior training as a journalist so we speciality by necessity. There was literally no media covering speciality coffee in Europe (apart of London) so we cerated one!

– What is the story behind European Coffee Trip?
We wanted to fill the gap (as described above) and also combine our interests – coffee, travel, photography / video. We created something we thought should exist – and we still try to proof that its existence is worth our efforts.

– What was your first coffee experience?
Instant coffee with milk in 300 ml glass (or more) that I did drink with a former girlfriend.

– How/when have you discovered about specialty coffee?
Home barista workshop during Coffee Week Brno (great coffee festival!) about 5 or 6 years ago. For the first time
I tried coffee from Panama with an aroma and taste of strawberries and milk chocolate. It was incredible, I couldn’t believe it.

– What was your best coffee experience?
Wow, that is hard. If you mean drinking coffee, it can be coffee with my fionce in Switzerland. After a hike we brewed Aeropress using water from mountain spring, it was cold and coffee was great. Not perfect but it was a very special moment. Another time was last December in Tanzania where we visited a coffee farm (Mondul Coffee Estates). In the morning we had a cup of coffee that was harvested and produced just few hundred meters from our table. That was an interesting feeling – really a local cup of coffee.

– Do you prepare coffee at home ? If yes, what method do you use?
Sure, we consider ourselves home baristas:) At home it is primarly V60, when we travel it is Aeropress.

– How do you like your coffee? Black, sugar and milk, iced, vietnamese style,…?
In the morning filter coffee or cappuccino if in the cafe and then I like espresso after my lunch and filter coffee in the afternoon. Sometimes I make myself « bulletproof coffee » in the morning to get some extra energy (mixing with butter).

– How would you qualify yourself as coffee drinker (occasional, heavy, addict…)?
Heavy 🙂

– Have you always been into the coffee industry? If not, what was your previous job?
I have a master degree from a technical university and before starting ECT I worked in various
business positions in various tech startups in the Czech Republic and Switzerland.

– Do you have another passion or a hobby besides coffee?
I think I am pretty absorbed by the coffee world as for now. However I am also addicted to the physical
activity and I am certified strength training instructor (kettlebells) and my new hobby is my sister’s new puppy – little pug called Kalita (yes it is a coffee dog). You can find her on Instagram (Kalita The Pug)

– What other place would you recommend, anywhere in the world (coffee or not)?
I think you should visit Prague and Brno, we are in the middle of Europe and we have great coffee, roaster, baristas, architecture, beer, food 🙂 I know I am biased but really, I think we have a luxury of great things in our country. Then you can check our city guides because I believe that now you can find tasty coffee almost everywhere!

– What is/are your favorite website(s) to get information about coffee?
European Coffee Trip 🙂 Well, I do follow Sprudge, Daily Coffee News and Perfect Daily Grind to have a general overview and then I really like Matt Perger’s and James Hoffmann’s blogs.

– What would you say to people who don’t know much about coffee?
You can prepare world class coffee in your own kitchen. You don’t need any fancy coffee machines, just find
a local roaster, buy good beans and simple equipment and you are good to go. Try to drink coffee without sugar and milk and slowly you will see the difference. Find a good cafe with barista who can guide you a bit. Enjoy your coffee!!