The Curious Barista's Guide to Coffee by Tristan Stephenson

Author:Tristan Stephenson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Ryland Peters & Small
Published: 2015-02-08T16:00:00+00:00

A perfectly formed stream of finely ground coffee falls from the doser of a top-end Mazzer espresso grinder.

06

ESPRESSO

INTRODUCTION

Ten years ago, it would have been easy to convince the average consumer that espresso (and drinks based around the espresso) is the only acceptable way to drink coffee when out of the home. It was true, after all, that espresso was riding a 50-year rolling wave of domination, shaping the coffee shops of the Western world and beyond. Indeed, when I first learned how to make good coffee I held the strong belief that coffee prepared any other way simply would not do. Baristas were generally in agreement that big, watery cups of black coffee with – heaven forbid! – absolutely no crema (see pages 96–97) were an altogether inferior product. I do look back on those days of pursuing the ‘god shot’ with a great sense of nostalgia, though, and it’s with a sense of focused enthusiasm that I hope to discuss the subject with you, dear reader.

And focus is as good a place to start as any, since that’s what espresso is really: finely ground coffee and pressurized hot water, served in concentrated form. I once heard Stephen Morrissey, the 2008 World Barista Champion, describe making an espresso as ‘like looking at coffee through a magnifying glass’. I personally liken it to watching cars race through a pair of binoculars, where mastering the difficult job of following a fast-moving object will reward you with excellent clarity of the spectacle – the downside being the apparent ease with which you can miss the mark entirely.

A shot of espresso is an honest and unforgiving thing. It celebrates attention to detail by highlighting what may be excellent about a coffee, and laughs at your bad practices by tasting intensely bad. The variables may seem a small set – grind size, dosage, extraction time and beverage weight, but the margin for error is enormous. Even when all the variables are fixed through a complex balancing act, an espresso machine and grinder can still produce unexpected results and coffee that ends up down the drain.

Why then, do we bother? Wouldn’t it be easier if every café just made a big pot of coffee in the morning to last the whole day? Well, part of the allure is perhaps the seemingly endless customization of the espresso that has fostered our enduring love of the espresso bar. The simple mixture of water, coffee and milk can be bought and savoured in a remarkable range of styles and options these days and we will discuss some of these in the following section (pages 100– 111).

Then, there is the freshly made convenience of the whole thing. It takes little more than 30 seconds to extract an espresso, which is a great deal quicker than any other brewing method in this book. The ritual of the barista comes into this, too. Like an engine driver mastering an infernal machine, the barista moves around with practised grace – his or her actions punctuated by a sharp hisses of the steam and a low whirr of the pump.

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