Seattle gets its first certified coffee sommelier, and he likes Starbucks

There are about 330 coffee shops in Seattle. When people think Seattle, they think coffee. And now we have something new to add to that scene: Seattle’s first ever, certified coffee sommelier.

Erik Leidholm is the wine director over at John Howie Steak (Full disclosure: John Howie Steak is an advertiser on KIRO Radio, but this is not an ad, just a story about a man and his coffee certification). He is also owner of Wildwood Spirits.

After being flown over to Switzerland by Nespresso for their intense coffee sommelier program, Leidholm is now certified in coffee as well.

“There are a lot of parallels,” Leidholm said. “Wine has tannin, tannic acid. That’s a polyphenol, to get real dorky and technical. But coffee also has polyfenals, which has tannic acid. You can drop parallels really immediately that way, but also just the subtle nuance of aroma.”

A sommelier is traditionally associated with wine. It is a professional, trained in the intricacies of the imbibe, on the level of a respected chef. They hold a variety of responsibilities such as pairing the flavors of coffee with tasty fare. Interestingly, Nespresso only selects wine sommeliers for their program.

Just like wine tasting, where one might say they taste hints of cherry or forest floor, Leidholm was introduced to coffee talk as he went through the sommelier program.

“They have their own little lexicon of descriptors that they expect you to use just like in a wine tasting,” he said. “The fun ones are ‘cat pee’ and ‘barnyard’ and ‘poop.’ That’s evident in some coffees, particularly the robusta type of coffee where they have a little bit of the animal.”

“On the positive side,” Leidholm notes. “There’s of course chocolate, white flowers, violets, caramel. One real common trait we found, that I now always smell in coffee, is cereal. You know, like Malt-O-Meal? It’s weird.”

Ten sommeliers from around the world were given a crash course in coffee, and tested on the last day.

“They gave us green beans and then they had these little teeny roasters and so we actually roasted the coffee to a specification and then we would grind it properly,” he said. “And then they actually also taught us how to make a perfect cup of espresso.

“It turned out to be really challenging to get the stream just right, coming out of the machine, get the crema the right color. It took a lot of us many attempts to get it right,” Leidholm said. “I’ve been making coffee wrong for so long.”

Leidholm has the official certification, but he knows that he is still an amateur compared to, say, the guys who started Cafe Vita or other fanatical Seattle coffee roasters who’ve been in the game for years.

“I have no illusions that I’m the coffee expert in Seattle,” Leidholm said. “I’m certified and accredited through Nespresso, but for me to go into a micro-roaster and try and school them on all things coffee would be embarrassing for me, I’m sure.”

And despite being a coffee aficionado, he manages to keep the snobbiness to a minimum.

“I drink Starbucks. I’m in Seattle,” he said. “I mean, come on. Illy, Stumptown, Cafe Vita, Olympic. I don’t discriminate, I just want good coffee.”