CANADIAN BARISTA TAKES LATTE ART GOLD MEDAL AT SEATTLE!
Vancouver's Zlatan Lakic pours rosetta blindfolded to win competition
Author: D. Penner, The Vancouver Sun, November-2002

If Cafe Artigiano manager Zlatan Lakic ever pours a latte that is a little too frothy, he'll toss it and make another before he'll ever serve it to a customer. I don't put my coffee out unless it's totally perfect, I don't give it to the customer," says the barista artist. "It's serious."

Indeed. Lakic is so serious, he won gold ( and a $1,000 US prize) in the latte art competition at Seattle's 12th annual coffee trade fair Sunday, stealing it for Vancouver away from the Northwest's self-proclaimed coffee capital. It took a perfect latte, with a perfect design etched into the foam, to win the event contested by baristas from as far away as Scotland, New Zealand and Taiwan.

And while other competitors might have poured designs that were equally good, Lakic's winning touch was to pour his - an intricate Rosetta -blindfolded. "I practiced for two weeks before the competition, but it turned out 50-50. Sometimes I poured good, sometimes not so good," Lakic said. "But [Sunday] when I put the blindfold on my eyes, I was full of energy and I got that kind of sixth sense so I sensed what the milk could look like and what the design could look like."

Still, it was the first time he had participated in a latte art competition, so he found having to pour with judges practically in his face and an audience a metre behind him a bit intimidating. Baristas were given three minutes to get to know the machine, then had three chances to reach perfection and were judged on creativity of design, crispness of edges and for their performance before the judges and the audience. "Believe me, my whole body was shaking. I don't know how I did all those latte arts the first time," Lakic said. "I couldn't even remember them."

He said the reputation from winning the award was far more important to him than the cash. He traveled to Seattle with his Caffe Artigiano bosses, Vince and Simmy Piccolo. The Piccolos maintain two locations, one on Pender Street in the West End, the other on Hornby across from the Vancouver Art Gallery, and their aim was to prove that their cafes are tops when it comes to the quality of their coffee and service.

"I just didn't win for myself;" Lakic said. "I won it for both those cafes and all the guys who work there. I won it for all of us, and Canada too." Lakic isn't quite a citizen yet, but he is going through the process and considers his adopted country of almost five years home. Back in Bosnia, Lakic was a professional athlete playing both soccer and basketball. That competitive drive likely helped him in Seattle.

The barista hired on at Cafe Artigiano as a busboy about two-and-a-half years ago. Lakic said Vince Piccolo liked how quickly and how well he worked and invited him to try being a barista. There was some frustration at first, but Lakic was determined to become just as good as his bosses.

Now he etches happy-face designs on his lattes fIrst thing in the morning. Lakic also does tulips, hearts, trees or the more complicated tree flowing from a heart. And of course there is his championship rosetta. "I don't know if I can say if latte is important," he said. "It's just part of the job we do, trying to make customers happy so they walk out of the door with a smile on their face."

Following the win in Seattle, Lakic has his sights set on the Canadian barista championships, tentatively set for some- time in 2003, in Vancouver. The winner of that competition, he said, qualifies for the world barista championships in Rome in 2005.
As for the annual Seattle competition, Lakic said he will hang up his milk pitcher and make way for the baristas he has trained.
"I'm going to take care of them so that they bring another gold to Cafe Artigiano."