There was a time - and not too long ago - when ordering a cup of coffee was a simple
procedure. You flagged down a waitress, looked her square in the eye and said, "I'd like a
cup of coffee, please."
That was it - no big deal.
Today however, things have gotten much more complicated. In today's coffee climate, it is
possible - even likely - to find yourself ordering something a lot less straightforward:
- "Can I help you?"
- "Yes, please; I'd like a half-caff / half-decaff, sugar-free vanilla latte with soy milk, hold
the cocoa."
- "One Number Three, coming up!"
The choices are mind-boggling: coffees, flavored coffees, decaffeinated flavored coffees,
espresso, cappuccino, latte, iced latte, cafe mocha, cafe grande, French roast, Italian roast,
Swiss water-processed decaffeinated Sumatra grande... Where did this madness start?
"In Seattle," says Ellen Pearce, owner of Brewbaker's, a Keene coffee bar. "Coffee first
got fancy in the late '80's. It basically started on the West Coast - in the Seattle/Portland area
before it moved down to San Francisco and spread out from there."
Brewbaker's, Pearce's coffee bar* serves 11 varieties of coffee and 7 or 8 basic coffee
drinks with literally hundreds of variations. The emphasis is on good coffee, not on trendy
attitudes. This is fairly typical; most coffee bars work hard to overcome the pretentious,
snooty image that most people associate with cappuccino joints. "I remember going into a
coffee bar on the West Coast and ordering a 'Kaffay Oh-Lett'," Pearce says, recalling her
first Cafe Au Lait. "The staff got their noses completely out of joint and gave me a latte."
Today, most coffee bars go out of their way to put their customers at ease, with relaxed,
non-threatening service in comfortable surroundings.
*Please note the nomenclature - a coffee "BAR". Coffee SHOPS are small, unpretentious
joints where you order regular coffee with a cruller or a grilled cheese sandwich. Coffee
HOUSES are smoky, bohemian places, where ad-hoc poetry recitals and socially conscious
attitudes are as much a part of the scene as coffee
The goal is to expand the up-scale coffee clientele from the Tragically Hip into the
mainstream. That has been largely successful. Today's cappuccino drinker is as likely to
be a municipal snowplow driver or a student as a yuppy prettyboy in Gucci loafers with a
flip-phone. Pearce says that her clientele runs the gamut from Blue Collar to Idle Rich,
though she admits that educating the public about coffee drinks is an on-going process.
"Most of our customers start out by going on vacation to places like New York, Seattle or
San Francisco, try coffee drinks there and come back hooked," she says. "When they're
here, they don't take the time to experiment. They come back from the West Coast and
can't believe that there aren't more coffee places."
Judy Rogers, the owner of Prime Roast in Keene, agrees that there is no "typical" up-scale
coffee drinker anymore. "We have a certain crowd who order espresso," she says. "It
seems to be artists and teachers who order double espressos. I think that's specific to this
shop, though - I don't think that you can generally look at a drink and know what type of
person is going to order it." She says the one thing that all her customers have in common
is a love of good coffee. "I think you'll find that the people who drink espresso drinks
aren't the same type of people who go through two or three pots of canned coffee at the
office. They want to savor one or two cups of really good coffee."
And the truth of the matter is, there is a world of difference between bitter "office coffee"
and freshly ground, freshly brewed premium coffee. Comparing a good cappuccino to a
cup of freeze-dried instant is like comparing a Cadillac to skateboard. The good stuff has
body, depth and a subtlety of flavor that rivals that of fine wine. A wine taster will talk
about undertones of oak, blackberry or flowers; a coffee connoisseur will talk about "earth
tones", nuttiness and chocolate flavors. (This is the coffee itself, mind you - flavored
coffees are something else altogether.)
The problem is - if you don't know much about coffees, where do you start? You don't
want to go into a coffee bar and look like an idiot; you'd like to have some idea of what
you are ordering. It can be intimidating.
Don't panic. It's simpler than you think.
Although the variations are virtually unlimited, there are basically three basic types of
coffee drinks - Espresso, Cappuccino and Latte.
Espresso - Almost all coffee drinks are based on espresso.
(Please note that there is no
"X" in the word. Most of the people who work in coffee bars are too polite to sneer at
customers who order "expresso", but secretly, they want to.)
"'Espresso' refers to the way
the coffee bean is roasted," says Pearce, describing its dark, heavy color and flavor. "You
grind it very fine, put it in a press and force steam through it, which makes it come out
much stronger than regular coffee." She demonstrates by filling a tiny basket with finely
ground coffee powder and inserting it into an espresso machine. She pushes a button and
there is a soft, purring sound. A few seconds later, a stream of dark, fragrant coffee
trickles into a small cup, topped with a thin layer of creamy, beige foam. "That is what is
called the 'creme'," Pearce explains. "It contains most of the delicate, volatile oils from the
coffee bean. It contains a lot of the flavor of the espresso. If you don't have creme, your
machine is broken."
People usually order a "single" or a "double" espresso. This refers to how many "shots" of
espresso the customer wants. A shot is approximately 2 fluid ounces.
Cappuccino - Cappuccino is espresso taken one step further. Steam is forced through milk
to turn it onto a stiff foam. There is no one "proper" type of milk - it can be whole milk,
skim, or even soy milk. This foam is layered on top of the espresso and topped with cocoa
powder or ground cinnamon or nutmeg. (The "whooshing" sound you often hear in coffee
bars is the milk being steamed.)
Latte - Latte is cappuccino taken one step further. Liquid steamed milk is layered
with espresso and topped with foam. It is commonly sweetened with various flavored
syrups; the most popular are vanilla or hazelnut. A "Cafe Mocha" is latte made with
steamed chocolate milk.
That's it - those are the basic three. Each coffee bar has it's own specialties and variations,
but they are all based on those three drinks. Once you are familiar with them, you can
experiment with various flavorings, milks and coffee bases to find the perfect coffee drink
for you and look like an expert.
Here are a few ideas for coffee drinks. Some are easily made at home, others require some
fairly esoteric ingredients and are probably better tried in a coffee bar, where they have
things like hazelnut syrup on hand.
Honey Nut Latte
1 tsp. honey
1/2 oz. hazelnut syrup
1 shot espresso
steamed milk
cinnamon for garnish
In an 8-ounce cup, combine honey, syrup and espresso. Fill cup with steamed milk, top
with foam and sprinkle with cinnamon.
La Dolce Vita
1 1/2 oz. anisette syrup
2 shots espresso
steamed milk
a twist of lemon for garnish
In a 12-ounce cup, combine syrup and espresso. Fill cup with steamed milk, top with foam
and garnish with a twist of lemon.
Acapulco Mocha Iced Latte
ice
1 shot espresso
1 oz. chocolate syrup
1 oz. orange syrup or grand orange syrup
1 oz. cream of coconut or coconut syrup
cold milk
Fill a 12-oz glass with ice, add espresso and syrups and fill with cold milk. Stir to combine
flavors
In a large punch bowl, stir together coffee, sugar and vanilla until sugar is dissolved. Add
ice cream by the spooonfuls. Gently fold in whipped cream and sprinkle with nutmeg.
Velvet Hammer
1 oz. vodka
1 oz. creme de cacao
2 oz. espresso
6 oz. half and half
sugar to taste
1/2 cup crushed ice
Combine vodka, creme de cacao, espresso and half and half into a shaker with 1/2 cup of
ice and shake well. Pour into a tall glass. Add sugar to taste.
All recipes from "Cappuccino/Espresso - The Book of Beverages" by Christie Katona and
Thomas Katona.
