One of the most rigorous coffee competitions in the world has announced its winners. The 18th edition of International Coffee Tasting awarded 38 gold medals to producers from Italy, Spain, Germany, Slovenia, Japan, South Korea and the United States, according to trade publication Comunicaffe. The contest is organised by the IIAC — the International Institute of Coffee Tasters — and was hosted at the Lavazza Training Center in Settimo Torinese, just outside Turin.
Entries competed in six categories: filter coffee, moka, single-serve, espresso blends, single-origin espresso and, for the first time in Italy, ready-to-drink and instant coffee. Over two days, 37 international sensory judges, supported by a team of 15 professionals, gathered more than 22,000 sensory data points. Every sample was assessed blind, with judges unaware of which product was in the cup.
IIAC president Carlo Odello observed that the sector is showing resilience, with companies managing to balance market demands with product quality. The full list of medal winners is published on the competition's official website. For anyone looking for quality benchmarks in a crowded market, blind evaluations like this remain one of the few genuinely objective filters.
Source: Comunicaffe