How Do You Drink Your Coffee?

We all order our favourite coffees, but do we actually know what they are comprised of?

Of course these are just 12 variants of coffee – we can progress all the way into wet and dry cappuccinos, ristretto, piccolo latte, half-caf and on and on; the list really is impressive!  

I’m always asked by my non-coffee friends what they should drink if they are just getting into coffee. While the drawing above does not entirely show it, the best one to drink would be a flat white (if you’re ordering in an Australian coffee shop). The reason being that milk to coffee ratio is the higher, as one shot of espresso in the cup is topped off with milk and very little foam, making it a milkier coffee. As such the coffee taste (with the usual brunt and bitter taste that is so common in poorly mad coffees today) is less prominent.

Traditionally I was always a long black drinker (i.e. an Americano), but coffee shops today seem to butcher the flavour. Even the really good and high end cafes with the best machines, baristas and beans can often produce coffees with undesirable flavours. While all coffees will experience these tasting notes, at least the sweetness (from properly textured milk that hasn’t been burnt!) can cover them, whereas a long black just seems to highlight them.

Flavour Profile Wheel

Funnily enough though, some coffee shops have taken to advertising what flavour profiles you’ll experience in your coffee. Honestly I think it’s a great idea; you’re educating the customer about what they’re going to taste and what’s good and bad. I just can’t stand it when someone mindlessly words off flavour profiles without knowing what they’re talking about, nor do I appreciate it when someone rhymes of statements such as “the back of pallet acidity will mellow out and the front pallet sweetness will conjure up flavours of chocolate covered strawberries with rough saltiness”… yes, believe it or not, a shop owner has said something very similar to me!

Amiss are the days when you could just drink a coffee and describe it as tasting like coffee. But is it really that bad that we are becoming more discerning with our taste? On the whole, I think not.

Overall it comes down to the individual. Most of use can’t taste the difference between a really good coffee and simply an average one, let alone the individual taste profiles… however, it’s always good to informed when it comes to making your choices. Why keep drinking that burnt coffee when there are so many cafes trying to produce the best coffee for their customers at the same price?

Aesthetically Pleasing

Unquestionably, as individuals, we put an emphasis on the aesthetics; the better it looks the more we are drawn to it. Of course we eventually realise that the substance matters, but there’s no denying that we (at least initially) rate pretty things better.

Aesthetics are also important when it comes to coffee – the nicer the presentation the better we think it is. So what constitutes a good looking coffee?

In the coffee world baristas pride themselves on latte art, the illustrations on top of the milky coffees. This is done by the mixing of two colloids; the crema of the espresso and the microfoam of the textured milk. There are two ways to produce this: free pour and etching.

Let’s first look at etching. This is where baristas use other utensils to manipulate the pattern within the foam after the milk has been poured. This includes the use of sticks/metal equivalents, syrups, chocolate powder and even colouring to achieve artistic results. Some of the works can be very intricate and even show great artistic ability as can be seen below.

Using chocolate syrup and utensils

Etch of John Lennon - very artistic!

The other way is free pouring. This is where the barista pours a pattern straight away when pouring the textured milk into the shot of coffee. This is done by either keeping the cup level or on a tilt and the barista pouring the milk in a wiggle or back-and-forth motion of the jug, allowing the textured milk to separate into the drier foam and liquid milk, thus forming latte art… at least that’s the simplified method barring the in-depth scientific analysis of colloids.

There are three basic patterns that free pour latte artists create; the heart, rosetta and tulip.

6 part tulip

Heart

Rosetta

So which method is better? Often people argue that there is great skill in doing free pour as it takes greater manipulation and understanding of the milk. Furthermore, you only have one chance to get it right, whereas with etching you can go back and “edit” (so to speak) the art on the coffee. Personally speaking, having tried to do free pour, it is very difficult to get a pattern with good symmetry, contrast and presence in the cup…. Also I just don’t like the idea that someone has been messing with my coffee and using utensils for over a minute trying to make it look pretty. Just free pour it and send it out!

Having said that, having a coffee with latte art doesn’t necessarily mean it will be a good cup of coffee. Baristas have taken note that aesthetically pleasing coffee can attract customers and as such have placed an emphasis on this. But that is another issue – another blog maybe…

 So next time you get a latte or a flat white, take a look at the art. If there’s nothing on your coffee really think about how good it is. If there is latte art, is it really a good cup of coffee, or is it just pretty?