The Road to Espresso
I was in my late twenties before I began drinking coffee on a regular basis. I really don’t remember when I had my first cup but I began with plain brewed coffee and liberal amounts of creamer and sugar added to help me make it through the work day. I had joined the teeming masses packed onto the coffee highway. I was introduced to the strong, dark coffee of the Caribbean when my boss brought some Puerto Rican coffee to the construction job site one day. Not knowing any better I poured myself a full cup, added the normal amounts of sugar and creamer, and then proceeded to type over 100 words per minute and talk even faster. The Puerto Rican contingent on the project got quite a kick out of that. It was several years later when another Puerto Rican friend showed me the proper way to drink ‘cafe con leche.’ He put double the normal amount of Puerto Rican coffee into the coffee filter, then only half the amount of water. He then filled only one-half of a cup with the dark, thick coffee and filled the rest of the cup with milk. I enjoyed the richer, stronger flavor. I even bought my own beans and began grinding them at home, but eventually discovered French Market coffee and began using it as my regular ‘cafe du jour’. The coffee/chicory mixture produces a strong but smooth flavor with less caffeine while using less coffee per pot. A friend who had grown up in the Pacific Northwest was the one who first introduced me to a little place in Arlington, Texas known as the Coffee Haus. At his suggestion I ordered something called ‘Latte’ which they served to me in a cup the size of a soup bowl! I had to doctor it a bit to take the edge off of it, but eventually came up with the right combination of half-and-half and sugar to create my usual dessert flavor. I tried a few other types of fancy coffees over the next several weeks but none of them really impressed me enough to continue visiting this establishment. I had experimented with the world of Euro-coffee and came away with an empty mug. I decided that I must be just a regular Joe, and I pulled back out onto the coffee highway, leaving the roadside coffee house behind in the rear-view mirror. Still, my regular trips to Barnes & Noble kept me exposed to the aroma coming from the espresso machine. I would walk away from the counter with my Barnes & Noble travel cup, looking like any other cappucino connosieur, but a simple Au Lait lay beneath the foam. And then one day, in my new neighborhood Starbucks, I spied a brochure listing all of the intracacies of espresso — latte, cappucino, solo, doppio, ristretto, macchiato, dry, wet. The options seemed endless! I was mesmerized, I was seduced. The next time I entered Starbucks I approached the cashier with my travel cup in one hand and brochure labeled “Experience the Perfect Cup” in the other. I ordered a Breve Latte Doppio Ristretto Wet. The cashier explained that I could drop the Doppio as all large drinks had two espresso shots, and that a Latte has very little foam to begin with, so I could drop the Wet. That left me with a Breve Latte Ristretto. So I lost a couple of words, no matter. I was cool now, I was ordering coffee with multiple-word Italian titles! I added a shot of sugar-free flavoring and I was able to cut down my add-ons to just one packet of Nutrasweet. I swear I could taste the caramel flavor from the Ristretto (short pull) espresso shots, just like the brochure had said. I headed for the nearest exit, determined to take the espresso scenic route. On my next visit to Barnes & Noble my favorite barista Sarah was thrilled when I ordered something besides my usual Au Lait. I was her very first Ristretto order! Her co-workers gathered around her to learn how to time a Ristretto pull, and she explained that Ristretto was Italian for ‘restrained’ which explained why you pulled the small espresso pitchers out before the shot was finished brewing. Sarah turned out to be somewhat of a perfectionist, carefully watching the shot finish and making sure that the Ristretto was a specific percentage of the brewing time. The third attempt was the charm, and soon she was mixing in the half-and-half and adding the foam. As a final touch she used a knife to mix the brown espresso and white foam into a swirl. She talked me into trying it without the extra syrup. As she handed it to me I realized I was not looking at a mere cup of coffee. No, I was holding a work of art in my hands! No more crowded highways for me, I was now cruising on the espresso expressway. Of course, the next stop on the road to espresso Nirvana is to make your own at home and I am now the proud owner of a small Melitta espresso machine! I am learning the finer points of the craft and experimenting with different roasts of coffee beans, different techniques for packing the grounds and the best timing for frothing my cream. My wife is really enjoying our nightly lattes and she even enjoyed helping me price some accessories on our last trip to Starbucks. However, I thought I saw a flash of concern in her eyes when I explained to her how some people actually roast their own beans…