I was resting in a restaurant, and a strange man next to me told me firmly that he had drunk the best hand on Rumaz and told me to try it. I said, I've heard of this name, at least in Shanghai, if you love coffee, who doesn't know about Rumaz?
On an ordinary weekday morning, at the fork in the road outside the Wukang Building, many tourists who took photos had gathered on the three floors outside. M Stand across the road is a great photo spot, and the store has placed cushions on the stairs directly opposite the entrance of the building, where visitors can drink coffee while admiring Hudak's artistic heritage, after all, where there is traffic, there is business.
Just a few hundred meters more, Xingguo Road is a different scenery, there is no top stream, no Internet celebrities, no noisy crowds. The green plane leaves shade the sky, which is what a quiet summer day should look like.
There is a Lumazi on Xingguo Road, which is the second store opened by Zhongshan Keiichi and his wife Jiaming after the old store on Hunan Road. Like the old shop, the décor here is simple and low-key, with large floor-to-ceiling windows, pastel-toned wooden floors, tables and chairs, and neatly arranged coffee bean cans all over the wall, and the aroma of coffee like a pleasant note fills the space, making people feel very comfortable.
Zhongshan is from Japan, and his wife Jiaming is an authentic Shanghainese. Thirteen years ago, the two decided to open their own specialty coffee shop in Shanghai, so they started from scratch and learned to make them. The movie "Chocolate Love" once said: When the love is not strong enough, the chocolate cannot be pure and smooth. Coffee doesn't need to be sweet, but it does need ingenuity. At Rumaz, every coffee bean in the store is roasted by Zhongshan himself, and the aroma, taste, roasting degree, and hand-brewing temperature of the beans... Every detail has been carefully designed, and it's no wonder that for more than a decade, those who have drunk it are unforgettable.
And Zhongshan was never satisfied, he wanted to make "tea-like coffee". "Every place has a coffee that suits you, and in China, tea has a very long history, and I explore every day whether I can make coffee like tea, light, refreshing and fragrant. I want my guests to enjoy my coffee like they would drink tea. ”
Thirteen years of friendship with coffee, the story of Zhongshan and Jiaming is endless, just like good coffee, you always want to renew the next cup.
Keiichi Nakayama and his wife Jiaming (All pictures in this article were taken by photographer Gao Zheng)
IP SHANGHAI wants to know what kind of existence coffee is in Japanese culture or everyday life?
Nakayama: Like China, coffee is an imported product, and coffee drinking has been drinking for hundreds of years. In Japan, people used to drink home-roasted coffee, dark roasted espresso, also known as Japanese coffee. Affected by the third wave of coffee in the United States, slowly, light-roasted specialty coffee represented by "sour coffee" has also become the focus of attention. In addition, as the times have changed, some old shops have been replaced by beer shops because the owners are getting older, so the number of traditional Japanese cafes is now decreasing.
IP SHANGHAI: Did you have experience opening a coffee shop before you came to China?
Nakayama: In the past, I was an ordinary office worker in Japan, and I had been working in sales, but because I often traveled to Shanghai, I gradually liked the city and always wanted to do something in Shanghai, so I originally planned to open a trading company in Shanghai, but the process was not very smooth. Later, in Japan, my wife and I came across a coffee shop, and my wife said, "We haven't seen such a coffee shop in Shanghai, or let's open one." That's where the whole story comes in.
Jia Ming: Yes, we lived in Tokyo at the time, and when we were free on weekdays, we used to push our baby out for a walk. You know, Japanese stores are very small, and it is very troublesome to push strollers, so you rarely walk into a roadside restaurant, but that day, we suddenly saw a coffee shop on the shopping street, and I said let's go in and sit for a while, so I carefully folded the stroller and walked in.
The menu was particularly long with the names and handling of various coffees, and I didn't know anything about coffee at the time, so I ordered a random one. After the coffee was served, I just took a sip and immediately said to my husband, I have never drunk such coffee in Shanghai, we can open a restaurant in Shanghai and bake it ourselves.
Usually such a conversation, placed on many people, may not have a follow-up, but for us, that day can be said to become a comma or a ton. After the official decision, our first action was to buy different coffee beans back, taste them ourselves, and exchange feelings with each other. My husband went to the teacher to learn baking, and groped himself while reading a book.
IP SHANGHAI: DID YOU ENCOUNTER ANY DIFFICULTIES IN STARTING FROM SCRATCH?
Zhongshan: Opening a café is easier said than done, but it's really not the same thing at all, and for an amateur coffee lover, professional coffee roasting is a whole different world. Later, I went to the bookstore and saw a book called "Coffee Roaster", and I thought to myself, I can also become a professional when making coffee, like a craftsman, you can bring your family in your favorite place, and work exactly according to your own ideas. It's really funny to think about it.
So, I visited the coffee shop I had visited and asked if they could teach me how to bake, but they refused. Later, I searched on the Internet, and by chance I found my current master, whose disciple happened to open a coffee shop in Machida, Tokyo, very close to my house. I went there and started studying coffee roasting. After studying with the master for 2 years, we finally decided to come to Shanghai and open our own roasting coffee shop.
IP SHANGHAI: Why is it called "Rumaz"?
Nakayama: My master's shop is called "Kawangrumor", which means "friend and home" in Indonesian. That's how Rumaz's "Rumor" came about.
IP SHANGHAI: HOW MUCH INFLUENCE DOES THE ROASTING DEGREE OF COFFEE BEANS HAVE ON THE TASTE OF COFFEE?
Nakayama: American baking is completely different from Japanese baking, and the time it takes is different. American baking is about making aromas and sourness through baking in a short period of time, while Japanese baking is more like cooking rice, starting from the inside of the beans to remove impurities and create a rounded taste. Coffee that is roasted in place, even if it is cold, will not taste bad. Conversely, if the inside of the beans is not roasted sufficiently, the taste will be inferior.
IP SHANGHAI: Why did you choose the first store on Hunan Road? Will there be any initial worries about opening?
Zhongshan: After coming to Shanghai, I looked for about half a year, because I lived near Hunan Road before, and I would walk here occasionally, which was very comfortable and suitable for a person to do things quietly. So in twelve years, we haven't moved.
At that time, in Shanghai, most people only knew about chain coffee shops like Starbucks, and they had almost no concept of specialty coffee, but my wife said that I made it very well, so I was very confident at the beginning of the opening, and I thought there should be no problem. At that time, the store was also small, with only ten seats, and I stood in a small space inside the bar. The Shanghai aunt passing by was very curious about us, and often walked in directly to ask how much the rent was here, and then counted how many seats there were, and looked east and west, which was very interesting. At that time, the symphony orchestra was also located nearby, and every Friday night, a small concert was held there, and customers often passed by, and there was a consulate not far away, where staff also frequented.
Jiaming: Yes, the first guests we met were very good, they were very supportive. Everyone recognized the quality of our coffee, so we introduced new friends and spread word of mouth, and the popularity slowly accumulated. Another episode is that at that time, there was a director of the foreign language channel of Shanghai TV, who happened to pass by and had a drink, thought it was delicious, and came to interview us, so we opened the store in January of that year, and we went on TV in March and were quickly known.
IP SHANGHAI: In Shanghai, the coffee industry is highly competitive, and a store that can be opened for 10 years can be said to be an old store. What's the secret to staying with it so far?
Nakayama: I like to stand at the bar and hold the coffee in front of the customer and ask them to taste it, because it can intuitively understand the customer's feedback, and if the customer says it tastes good, it means that the roasting level is just right.
It's a bit like the Japanese tea ceremony, and I think making hand-brewed coffee also requires some ritual.
But the hardest part of making coffee is to improve the quality every year. Because the catering industry has such a problem, that is, at the beginning the taste is good, can attract a lot of people, but over time, once the quality begins to decline, word of mouth will soon decline, so if we do not improve our skills, diners will one day get tired.
This may sound like a matter of course, but in fact most coffee shops can't. That's why we've only had two stores in the past thirteen years, because if we open three, quality control is very difficult. Taste can't deceive people, and if you can't convince customers with taste, it's hard to last.
IP SHANGHAI: What do you think of the coffee boom in Shanghai in recent years?
Zhongshan: The increasing number of people drinking coffee is a good thing, because the foundation of the market is there, but to really form a culture, I think it is more important for people to understand the story behind the coffee and the skills that cannot be seen, rather than selling beans at a high price because they are expensive, after all, even if the beans are good and the production technology is very poor, they cannot be sold.
IP SHANGHAI: HOW DO YOU DEFINE YOUR HAND-BREWED COFFEE CHARACTERISTICS AND HOW DO YOU UNDERSTAND WHAT MAKES GOOD COFFEE?
Nakayama: Because I'm Japanese, people often ask me, do you make Japanese coffee? Actually, I didn't run a coffee shop in Japan, and it was my first time to open a shop after coming to Shanghai, and it was the first time I made roasted coffee, and although I also used Japanese roasting methods, the coffee I made was mainly to cater to the tastes of customers here.
Coffee is from the United States, so in the past, good coffee is often the standard of the West, but in fact, the taste of Asians is different from the taste of Westerners, so we must have confidence in our own taste and have our own thinking, just like the way I bake it now, I will make my own improvement to the established standard.
Of course, everyone's preferences are different, and even when the mood is different, the taste will change. But at least what kind of coffee is delicious, you first need to have a certain understanding, if you can't imagine its taste, you can't make it.
IP SHANGHAI: THERE WAS AN INTERESTING JOKE ON THE INTERNET THAT SAID, "THERE ARE ONLY TWO KINDS OF PEOPLE IN THE WORLD: COFFEE PARTY AND TEA PARTY", AND THERE SEEMS TO BE A CONSTANT RIVALRY BETWEEN GROUPS WHO LIKE TEA AND THOSE WHO LIKE COFFEE, WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THIS?
Nakayama: I think people who know tea must also understand coffee. This is also why I pursue hand brewing, because in tea culture, the difference between good tea and good tea is very subtle, if your taste is delicate, I believe you will be able to understand the deliciousness of specialty coffee. Isn't it the same with cooking? This delicacy is universal. Pursuing the essence of things and enjoying things themselves is what I expect.
IP SHANGHAI: How has the public's love for coffee changed since the store opened? Are guests' tastes getting picky?
Nakayama: We started as a small mom-and-pop shop, and along the way, we have received the support and respect of many people, and I am grateful to the diners who came for their deliciousness. It is not so much to be picky as to say that more and more people understand coffee and study it.
Jiaming: Trends change all the time, but no matter how it changes, good taste is the most important thing, and I think this evaluation should come from the customer's instinct, to taste with instinct, rather than being taught what is good or bad.
IP SHANGHAI: Looking back now, what did life as a coffee worker bring you?
Jiaming: People often ask, do you open a coffee shop to make money? Especially in Shanghai more than a decade ago, no one was optimistic about this business, or even worried about how we could survive. But to be honest, if we are purely for making money, then we will definitely not choose this path, let alone refuse many temptations in the process of growing the store.
The two of us can be said to be idealists, for us, opening a coffee shop is a thing that can make us feel happy, not a lot of money, not admired by everyone, but every day, you feel that your life is full and valuable, and as long as you really immerse yourself in doing it, one day you will get the reward and respect you deserve.
Nakayama: Yes. Now it feels like I'm really doing what I want to do. Although the process is difficult, after overcoming the test, you can enjoy it.
IP SHANGHAI: What kind of praise do you feel particularly happy to hear now?
Nakayama: The happiest thing is to hear customers say, "The service of the staff is so good", "The coffee is still as good as ever".
Jia Ming: Also, "I feel so happy after drinking your coffee."