TODAY'S BARTENDER

A traditional northern Italian cappuccino is served with milk stretched into a chiffon, rather than foam. The stretched milk allows the server to make "presentation pours" such as this rosette pattern poured by Andrew Whaley.Northern Italian tradition holds that a freshly, roasted coffee bean maintains an even chestnut color and sweats very little of the oil, holding the flavor inside the bean until ground.

Iced Caffe Moca is a great way to cool down while still getting your caffeine fix.

* The coffee culture has spawned the need for someone who can do more than pour coffee and count change.

Legend credits an east African goat herder named Kaldi with first discovering the coffee bean.

One day Kaldi was watching his goats and he noticed they became friskier after eating a certain "berry." Kaldi ate a few himself and decided he also felt a bit more energetic. So he brought the berries back home with him and shared them.

That little berry has been a part of human culture ever since.

Andrew Whaley has never herded goats, but he'll share his comprehensive knowledge of cappuccino as enthusiastically as the boy who first discovered the bean.

"Civilizations have grown and fallen over this agricultural product," Whaley says. He launches into a description of how coffeehouses in England used to issue their own money -- before tea took over.

No wonder they call him "Coffeeboy."

The growing influence of the coffee culture in the United States has spawned the need for a new breed of counter servers -- someone who can do more than pour coffee and count change. Filling that niche are the baristas, who get their name from the Italian word for bartender. They understand the language of mochas, shots and lattes.

A native of Desloge, Mo., Whaley has been immersed in espresso -- the heart of most modern coffee drinks -- as a barista for nearly six years.

Friendly rival Michael Hines has been a barista for nearly four years.

Both claim to make the best caffe mocha in town.

A student at Southeast Missouri State University, Hines said his job at Europas fits well into his lifestyle.

His favorite part of the job is conversations with customers. "It's people-based. I like that," Hines said.

Whaley went into his first coffeehouse as a youth minister and saw an environment he could use to reach kids.

Whaley hopes to go to Europe to finish the theological education he began at St. Thomas Aquinas center at Purdue University and down the road he hopes to marry his education with his love of coffee by opening a reading room for students, which serves the perfect cup of coffee.

For now, he serves his masterpieces at Grace Cafe, stretching milk into a chiffon, a velvety marriage of steamed milk and milk foam for presentation pours and strives toward the perfect shot of espresso.

For Hines, working toward simultaneous degrees in philosophy, mathematics and pre-engineering has been convenient on the job.

"Understanding physics is handy to know around the espresso machine," he said.

Whaley agreed. "Someone once said that running an espresso machine is like playing a Stradivarius violin outside on a humid day," Whaley said. It's possible, but you're constantly making adjustments.

Newcomer to the profession, Matt Gibbons can testify to the technological challenges of the trade. Early lesson: "You get burned a lot."

Gibbons, who hopes to begin mass communication studies this fall at Oral Roberts University said he found he loves his job as a barista.

All agree the coffee is only as good as its surroundings, and the job of a barista is to connect with people.

"I forget who said, "A pub is only pleasant for a while. A coffeehouse is a place where you can dwell.' I believe that," Whaley said, adding:

"It's that theory of a third place, the first place being home, second place is work the third place is a place of comfort."

Hines' view is similar, if less idealized:

"The best part about being a barista is you have all the assets of being a bartender with none of the liabilities. You don't have the late hours, you don't have to throw people out and there's no lewd creatures crawling over the bar after you."

Soon to have a regular column in OFF magazine, Whaley can rhapsodize about espresso for hours.

"With wines, cigars and -- for the most part -- food, the difference between amazing and border-line perfect can only be sensed by connoisseurs. With espresso, it's not so," Whaley said.

While Barnes and Noble, which serves Starbucks coffee, is steeped in the Seattle tradition of dark roast, Europas incorporates both northern Italian and Seattle coffee traditions.

Grace Cafe leans more toward the lighter roast of northern Italy, mostly because of Whaley, who credits his major influence as David Schomer.

Schomer, the owner of Espresso Vivace in Seattle, has broken away from the Seattle tradition of dark roasted coffee and researched espresso in Trieste, Italy. Over the years, he established the concept of controlling temperature variation during brewing.

"He's like Obi-Wan Kenobe and I'm a junior Jedi," Whaley said of Schomer.

The goal is to brew a cup of coffee that tastes exactly like freshly ground coffee smells, without the bitterness found in so many cups of the stuff.

Asked his views of "cappuccino" machines in quick-stop markets, Whaley scorns, "Don't even get me started."

Too late. He said calling the stuff sold in gas stations cappuccino is like convincing a whole population that a Honda Civic is a truck.

"That's not coffee," he said. If anything, it's a powdered version of cafe au lait (drip coffee with milk).

Likewise the iced coffee drinks made from powdered mixes.

"That's not coffee," he repeats. " I like them, I'll drink them, but it's not coffee."