The Coffee Man is a movie documentary that explores the extraordinary world of specialty coffee and the lengths one man will go to reach ‘coffee nirvana’. The journey takes the viewer from the farm to cup, to the dizzying heights of international competition, where Canberra’s Sasa Sestic will win at any cost, even if that means ‘smuggling’ Australian milk through US customs to attain the perfect flavoured coffee with milk!
Sasa, a former immigrant from war-torn Bosnia, found international acclaim of a different kind when he first moved to Australia in 1996, by representing his new country playing Handball at the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games. Meeting Olympic heroes including Cathy Freeman gave Sasa the taste of victory. This desire for victory stayed with Sasa until 15 years later when he outclasses and out coffee’d his competitors from over 50 countries to become victor of the 2015 World Barrister Championship (WBC) title in Seattle- the ‘Olympic Games’ of coffee.
Sasa battles ill health and the memories of a crucial mistake he made in the Australian Barrister competition the year before, to come out as the champ. His supportive wife, strong and dedicated team and connections and relationships with coffee growers around the world helped Sasa come out on top. Sasa trained hard for months before the competition, hiring the previous comp winner to be his coach and existing on a diet of only coffee. Sasa’s hard work, determination and hunger for victory saw him triumphantly claim victory. The film will make you laugh, it will make you cry, it will make you cheer and it will definitely make crave a delicious double shot latte with one sugar.
Sasa’ tips for the perfect coffee:
– Check the used by date: for fresh and flavoursome coffee use coffee within 5 weeks of roasting date. Store beans in a dark cool place.
– Clean your machine: a dirty machine will produce poor tasting coffee. Follow the instructions for a perfect clean.
– Choose your water carefully: water played a large part in a coffee so ensure you use good, filtered water to achieve that great taste.
– Use good quality milk: We all have different preferences with milk. Try a few and see what works best with your beans. Heat milk to max 65 degrees, any hotter and this will damage the milk resulting in poor tasting coffee.
The Coffee Man will be released internationally in to cinemas via TUGG, the ‘cinema on demand’ platform. TUGG allows everyday Australians and community organisations to use their local cinema and sell tickets via social media to one-off screenings of independent and niche movies.
Check out one of the screenings of The Coffee Man across Australia: https://tugg.com.au/thecoffeeman
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