God In My Espresso Cup

By Instaurator

As someone who has made their livelihood from coffee, I have been involved for over two decades now in the roasting, packing, selecting, brewing, tasting, marketing and enjoyment of specialty coffee. There have been enormous changes that have taken place in the coffee industry all around the world, and not just in my home country of Australia, over this time.

And it has all boiled down to this: a few sips of thick, viscous, nectar which taste bitter-sweet almost like liquid rich, dark mocha chocolate mixed with various smooth spices. This is espresso coffee. The heart of coffee. Sweet and delicate enough to drink all on its own, without sugar.

It is the humble espresso shot, a few milliliters (No more than an ounce!) of black coffee poured in front of your eyes, which has become the foundation stone for the building of complete coffee menus and vast coffee empires. It also sustains untold households, from many lowly paid, humble plantation coffee pickers, to the hi-tech, chic café society set.

But if the espresso coffee shot is not all it could be, the rest of the menu and the empire will not be all it could be either. Professional coffee tasters cup thousands of coffees every year and very occasionally you come across one that has all the elements of perfection. It tastes sublime. It is what some professionals describe as "seeing God in the cup."

It is this experience that excites enormous passion. It drives not just coffee professionals but also many people from all walks of life, to almost fanatically pursue the experience again and again. Along the way, vast amounts of time, energy and money can be invested, for it is always an investment in learning, as repeating the perfect espresso coffee appears to be so confounding and so elusive in comparison to other coffees. Like a beautiful shimmering mirage in the distance or the proverbial end of the rainbow, consistently repeating this wonderful taste seems to often be just beyond our grasp.

Espresso Roasting Objectives
Consumer Preferences: By and large most consumers are looking for a strong smooth flavor with no bitterness.

Roast Color: North v. South: North and south Italy that is. North equals approximately 45-50 on the Agtron Scale and south equals approximately 25 - 35. There are valid explanations for both but there one is definitely superior in terms of flavor - so how can we get it all the time.

Straight Espresso v. Espresso & Milk: In Italy approximately 85% of coffee served in espresso bars is straight espresso. In the United States as in Australia, up to 98% of retail sales are milk based espresso drinks and we would be lucky to have 2% as straight espresso. Blending for milk-based drinks is different to straight espresso.

Espresso Tasting
Tasting Espresso v. Traditional Cupping: In traditional cupping acidity is seen as a positive quality. In espresso, low acidity is desirable, particularly for milk-based espresso as higher acidity gets lost in large volumes of milk and good coffee flavor consequently becomes hard to detect.

Espresso Tasting Sheet: (Based on International Institute of Coffee Tasters Card) cupping for espresso is different.

Too Fresh v. Fresh v. Stale: Tasting the same coffee daily over say a 30 day period reveals that in the first few days, ironically its volatility adversely affects the crema and the flavor.

Roasting Variables
Roast Time: 15 Minutes v. 23 Minutes: The longer roast time enhances body and mellowness but good flavor can be achieved within 16 minutes. Ramping v. "Flat" Temperature: Increasing the temperature during the roast cycle enhances sweetness, a universally appreciated natural characteristic.

Espresso Blending
Espresso v. Drip Filter & French Press: Acidity is desirable and pleasant in Drip Filter. It is especially desirable in French Press blends to punch through the muddy characteristic that often predominates as a result of the residue of finer particles that come through the infuser. But body, smoothness and low acidity are more preferable in Espresso blends. This is particularly so in coffee cultures like North America and Australia where again so much milk is replacing the water found in Drip Filter and French Press cups.

Washed v. Natural & Semi Washed: Natural and Semi washed coffees, as a rule, definitely produce more body. This enables a relatively lighter espresso roast i.e. approximately Agtron 45 rather than say Agtron 35 for a washed coffee, while producing a gutsy milk-espresso drink with plenty of intensity and better smoothness.

Crema: Robusta crema has a different quality apart from being simply more voluminous. It is not quite as refined as an Arabica crema. Obviously some arabicas like Sumatra Mandehling can approximate robusta levels of Crema. As a roaster/blender I am not advocating any position other than let your taste be your guide. This can be dangerous. I had to jettison an old point of view I had held for twenty odd years recently, when I tasted a particularly good type of coffee from a source I had always rejected out of hand.

A simple tasting that compares and evaluates different roast color, different lengths of time since roasting, roasting method, and crema will reveal new insights. At the very least it is fun. And so this is the real key to great espresso coffee: taste everything and everywhere. It is amazing how in the least likely places we can be pleasantly surprised.

Like the time I was at a friend's house, George Sabados and he made a straight doppio espresso for me on his home Krups machine with a hand grinder. The coffee blend belonged to a competitor of mine in Sydney, Ian Berstein. It was one of the best espresso coffees I have ever had. This time I learned more about barista skills than blending, but there is always something to learn from tasting espresso coffees no matter where or when.

Part II
Extra Virgin Espresso Coffee Oil

The Olive press and hydraulics.
What? Yes - olive oil only comes out when the olives are pressed and so it is to a large degree with espresso coffee oils. But for espresso coffee grounds to be "pressed' they must fill the porta-filter insert so full that after having been properly tamped they almost and sometimes do touch the dispersion screen in the machine. As we know, when water comes into contact with ground coffee - it expands. If there is no room for the coffee to expand in the porta-filter, it gets squeezed or 'pressed' between the dispersion screen at the top and the filter basket/insert at the bottom. It is this pressure that presses the extra delicious, precious oils out of the ground coffee. The difference in taste is like chalk and cheese. A cup of espresso that has not been 'pressed' will have a slightly ashy characteristic and will be much thinner, more watery and slightly more astringent. A cup of properly 'pressed' espresso will have all the lovely texture and viscous body, similar to extra-virgin olive oil, but with the extraordinary sweet, smooth chocolaty richness that only great espresso coffee can provide.

Hydraulics and coffee? The principle of hydraulics states that pressure applied to a liquid will exert even pressure at all other points. This is critical in ensuring that espresso coffee is evenly extracted. If there is a gap between the top of the ground espresso coffee and the dispersion screen, the water will have to fill the entire gap before it will start exerting downward pressure on the coffee. This is bad. What happens is the very top layer of coffee has water swirling around on it, over-extracting and 'burning' the coffee while the water is filling the gap. If the gap is too big, there will never be any 'pressing' either. The resultant taste is like an ashy mask over the top of what could otherwise be a great espresso coffee. If we apply the specialty definition: "tastes great with no defects", then espresso coffee made this way is not truly specialty coffee. It will taste ok, maybe even good if you use a triple filter basket and a very, very short pour (about 20mls for a double porta-filter) as one famous latte artist served me in Anaheim recently. But it will not taste great.

Remember if this way of thinking upsets or challenges the existing order: we should always let our taste be our guide. This is the only way we can be sure we are truly pursuing great specialty coffee.


Reproduced with permission from http://www.SCAA.org.  Instaurator is Director of Michel's Espresso in Granville, Australia, former Chairman of the Australian Coffee & Tea Association, a founder of the Australasian Specialty Coffee Association, and a World Barista Championship Judge.