Photo courtesy of the Specialty Coffee Association and DXB Live
The first World Coffee Championship of 2026 is in the books. Taking place over the weekend at World of Coffee Dubai, the 2026 World Cezve/Ibrik Championship kicked of the 2026 WCC season by crowing the first champion: Jane Espante representing the United Arab Emirates.
Per her competitor profile, Espante is a Barista Training Manager with Family First Cafe and last year represented the UAE as the Coffee in Good Spirits champion. This year, Espante turned her attention to Cezve/Ibrik. For both courses in her routine, Espante used a blend of two coffees, a carbonic macerated Colombia Gesha and a natural processed Panama Gesha. For her signature course, she combined them with a coffee cryoconcentrate made from the same blend and cryofermented strawberries.
This is the UAE’s third win at the World Cezve/Ibrik Championship and their first since Karthikeyan Rajendram and Michaela Ruazol-Recera went back to back (sort of) in 2017 and 2022, respectively; there were no competitions held between in the interim years.
The results for the 2026 World Cezve/Ibrik Championship are as follows:
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Jane Espante, United Arab Emirates
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Angel Kotsifakis, Greece
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Wael Hachem, France
That’s one World Coffee Championship in the books with six more to go before it’s all said and done. For more information or for a full list of the results, visit the World Coffee Championship’s official website.
Zac Cadwalader is the managing editor at Sprudge Media Network and a staff writer based in Dallas. Read more Zac Cadwalader on Sprudge.
