Georgius Audrey Teja Reaches Global Cocktail Glory: Part Two

We continue our interview with the recently crowned World Coffee in Good Spirits Champion.

BY CHRIS RYAN
BARISTA MAGAZINE ONLINE

Photos courtesy of Georgius Audrey Teja

After Georgius Audrey Teja won the 2025 Indonesia World Coffee in Good Spirits Championship, he got serious. 

The coffee competitor—who goes by Odi and works at So So Good Coffee Company and Omakafé in Jakarta, Indonesia—spent six months shaping his performance for the World Coffee in Good Spirits Championship (WCIGS)‚ including many nights spent at the practice facility. The hard work paid off for Odi, who won the event in Geneva, Switzerland, last month, and is the 2025 World Coffee in Good Spirits Champion. 

Read the first part of our chat with Odi here. In the conclusion of our interview today, we talk about practice, crafting drinks for the world stage, and Odi’s new role as a coffee and cocktail ambassador.

This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.

Barista Magazine Online: I read that you pushed yourself very hard for this competition. Can you talk about your practice routine and how you prepared for World CIGS? 

Odi: My approach to WCIGS 2025 was a bit different than any other practice routine I’ve ever done. I wrote down what I learned from the national round and tried to apply that to the WCIGS 2025. I went to different people to help me through the competition: a therapist to help me prepare mentally; a public speaking coach that helped me to be a good public speaker and presenter; and so many people in our team that helped me in their own unique way, including various coaches and judges for their feedback.

Practicing for competition in our ecosystem doesn’t mean I can just practice without doing any daily job; this is more like an extracurricular, and a facility that was given to us by Mikael. So I still had to work roughly 9-5, then practice outside of my working hours at the Common Grounds roastery, daily after work and on the weekend. Even me and (2025 Indonesia Brewers Cup Champion) Bayu Prawiro often slept at the roastery to make it easier for us to train without having to commute from our place to the training place, since our homes are quite far away. I split my time between practice at the roastery and building the cocktails at Omakafé, because that’s where our lab is. 

I spent around six months from winning the nationals to May 2025 to build all the concepts, drinks, and workflow. Then in June, I just needed to do any fine adjustment once the sponsored spirit was announced.

About your routine: You mentioned on Instagram that you wanted to bring a piece of Indonesia with you to the competition. Can you describe how you did that through your theme?

I always wanted to bring Indonesia to the world stage, and WCIGS 2025 was my chance. When deciding what to present at the world stage, my mind revolved around: “What should I bring to the table?” Then suddenly, on a random day in January, my mind recalled Mikael explaining to me about Omakafé’s logo, which represents two coffee beans and a piece of root. The root in Omakafé’s logo shows that a root doesn’t just take from the surrounding, but also gives back in another form to sustain the ecosystem. I also realized that “roots” have a deeper meaning, with various interpretations. They can represent origin, ingredients, and absorbing inspiration from others. This would be the backbone of all of the drinks that I presented at WCIGS 2025.

Which beverages did you then concoct to go with that theme?

My hot designer drink was inspired by a traditional medicinal beverage from Java island in Indonesia called jamu, a childhood memory of mine. It represents my origin, Indonesia, and the root as an ingredient. One of my favorite jamu drinks is kunyit asem, or tamarind turmeric, a classic jamu with turmeric, tamarind, and palm sugar. It is sweet, herby, and spicy, with a tanginess from the tamarind. Then, I decided to use coffee from Bali Kintamani in Indonesia, which elevated the entire story and flavor at the same time.

My cold designer drink was inspired by the root of neo-classical coffee cocktails, the espresso martini, which was invented by Dick Bradsell responding to a guy saying, “Wake me up, mess me up.” This time, I was using a coffee from Finca Las Flores, a Java varietal that was named after the Java island in Indonesia. Then as the root element, I made a torch ginger and licorice root cordial, which plays a big role in the complexity and deep herb notes. I mixed it with Nikka Coffey vodka for a creamy texture, combined with Ki No Bi gin to add floral aromatics like citrus. As the final touch, I gave the judges a pipette of sodium bicarbonate that shifted the espresso martini’s quality once mixed—from creamy, full, and vibrant to effervescent, juicy, and playful. 

Lastly, there was the Irish coffee—the root of classic coffee cocktails, and one of the reasons why CIGS was created. I used the same Java coffee for this course. What made my Irish coffee special was the sugar, which I brought from Indonesia. I used sorghum brown sugar, a natural sweetener that comes from the juice of the sorghum plant. It is sweet, savory, and low in glycemic index. Although sorghum is not a native plant in Indonesia, it has been planted in the east side of Indonesia for a long time. 

Finally, can you talk about what it felt like to hear your name called as the winner?

To be honest, none of us expected that we would be coming home as a world champion, since we all know that it is hard to become a world champion, and especially as this was my first world coffee competition and the second WCIGS for us as a team. 

It felt surreal, and I was confused, proud, overwhelmingly happy, and hyped—all at the same time—as the thing that I had been dreaming of finally came true, and all the hard work that we put in as a team finally paid off in full. Becoming a champion is not an easy task for sure; however, I am grateful to bear that title. 

What does it mean to you to represent Indonesia as the World CIGS Champion?

Being crowned as a new World Coffee in Good Spirit Champion means that I need to be a coffee ambassador that represents not just coffee, but also the bar industry. Aside from that, I represent Indonesia as a country, which means my duty as an ambassador extends to promoting and introducing Indonesia to the world stage as much as I can, from coffee to beverage creations.

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