Espresso at Home: The Right Beans and the Right Equipment Can Make Anyone a Barista

THE ESPRESSO at the Tazza d’Oro, in Rome, is probably the best in a city that drinks it day and night. The bar, just behind the Pantheon, has long been a mecca for those who love espresso so thick, so creamy, and so strong that it is nearly edible.

A customer is engulfed by the powerful smell of coffee when he enters the sprawling bar, with its big burlap sacks of beans waiting to be roasted. People crowd the cash register to pay for their coffee before ordering it, and then, receipts in hand, cross the room, feeling the steam of the giant espresso machine and coming closer to that powerful scent. The barman, or barista, begins by switching on a coffee grinder. Beans swirl down from a glass hopper into the grinder, and the ground coffee rains into a glass cylinder. The barista flicks a lever to dispense ground coffee into a gleaming metal cup fitted with a spout below, and tamps it. He latches the metal cup into the espresso machine, takes a coffee cup from the many that have been heating on a wire rack set over the machine and places it beneath the metal one, and presses a button. A thick black stream trickles from the spout.

This ritual unites all the baristas in Italy. But not everyone accomplishes the layer of light-colored crema, or foam, that is the pride of an expert espresso-maker and a given at the Tazza d’Oro, The crema is not the high, steaming white milk froth that makes an espresso a cappuccino (probably named for the brown Capuchin monk’s habit topped by a cowl), the form in which most Americans prefer to drink espresso. This crema isn’t milk at all, and is shallow. But its very presence shows that the water has come through hot and fast and right.

Why does Italian coffee seem so much richer and more flavorful than American? Does being a superb barista require a fine Italian hand, or can anyone produce a great cup of espresso with the right coffee beans and equipment? And does a great cup of cappuccino require a graduate degree?

THE FIRST DECISION in making espresso is which coffee to buy. No one kind of bean is required or even traditional, and espresso can be made with any roast. Because the process emphasizes the acids in coffee, a relatively low-acid dark roast is typical, It is very difficult for a roaster who is committed to using only arabica beans, the superior kind, to duplicate a European-tasting espresso, because with few exceptions (Illy Caffè, the best large-scale roaster in Italy, is one) Europeans use robusta beans, for body; robusta beans are also naturally lower in acid, but they don’t have good flavor. Italians are considered the master espresso roasters. Others have trouble getting the hang of it. “If you roast too dark, you get the burn, that extra-bitter taste,”says George Howell, of the Coffee Connection, a specialty coffee roaster in Boston. “I’m after a slight bitterness at the beginning, with a sweet, chocolate aftertaste. It’s miraculous to achieve.”

Two Italians who achieve that live in America—in Seattle, in fact, the coffee capital of America. The men, Umberto Bizzarri, at Torrefazione Italia (800827-2333). and Mauro Cipolla, at Caffe Mauro (206-762-4381), roast much better beans than one usually finds in Italy. Both have tried to persuade their clients to accept lighter roasts than what has become standard here, since the flavor of their beans is good enough not to need masking, and both have been obliged to offer much darker roasts than they would prefer. The roasts I like are their medium ones: Perugia from Torrefazione Italia and Espresso Roma from Caffè Mauro. These coffees taste wonderfully rich and deep without being the least bit burned or bitter. You won’t need to add sugar to them, as the Italians almost always have to do.

Starbuck’s, the leading roaster and the leading operator of coffee bars in Seattle, has devoted much time to its espresso blends. I find them too dark, but at a recent tasting at the company’s spiffy new headquarters, a sort of shrine to coffee, I was knocked out by an espresso made with Ethiopian Yrgacheffe, which is not normally used for espresso. Its typical floral notes, surprisingly, came through, and the flavor was powerfully concentrated.

Roasting coffee over wood is still part of coffee mystique in Italy. Modern roasters scoff at the idea that a wood fire could alter flavor, saying that the slower roast that results from a wood fire is in fact baking, not true roasting, and it lowers acidity without developing full flavor. Even so, I happen to like espresso made with the two wood-roasted coffees I have found available in America: Udinese Caffè, roasted over beech wood by Piero Busolini at his small family business in the elegant northern Italian city of Udine (you can find out where to buy it by calling 901-3621593), and Mr. Espresso, roasted over oak by Carlo Di Ruocco, an Italian transplanted to Oakland, California, from Salerno, near Naples, where many small roasters still use wood fires (415-287-5200).

All these roasters offer decaffeinated blends. It’s not true, though, that espresso has more caffeine than other kinds of coffee. You use less coffee for a two-ounce cup of espresso than for a six-ounce cup of filtered coffee, the standard measurement; most people drink one cup of espresso at a time but a good deal more than six ounces of filtered coffee at a time. Because caffeine is easily soluble, some people say that you get all the caffeine no matter what brewing method you use. Others say that the period of contact between coffee and water is also important in caffeine extraction, which would mean that per ounce espresso would have less caffeine than filtered coffee. The kind of beans you start with matters most—arabica beans have about half the caffeine of robusta.

Whatever coffee you buy, if you buy it in the bean—as you should if you want to taste it at its freshest—you face the problem of grinding. The right grind is more important in espresso than in any other kind of coffee, because the grind must create the right amount of resistance to the water under pressure; it determines whether the espresso will taste watery and sour (too coarse) or bitter and sour (too fine) or whether it is richly flavored and comes out with crema. A burr grinder is essential to produce the right grind— as fine as sand or table salt but not a powder, which would gum up the machine and not let any water through. Burr grinders are unfortunately much more expensive than the propellerblade kind. The one I recommended in a previous article, the Jericho, is so expensive (more than $200) that many readers upbraided me. krups makes a burr grinder that sells for about $80, and the Italian company Rancilio one for about $135 (you can find out where to order it from the Chicago importer Xcell, at 312-6447756). If you want to take the easy route and buy ground canned coffee, try Illy Caffè (telephone 800872-4559 to find out where it is sold near you). The espresso you make will demonstrate how crucial grind size is.

Illy will supply a seven-gram scoop with its coffee on request. The right amount of coffee is as important as the right grind, and seven grams is slightly less than the two tablespoons in an American coffee scoop. Most people, both at home and in restaurants, use too much, figuring that espresso is supposed to be strong, after all.

COFFEE-BREWING leaves the range of easily comprehensible technology when it comes to espresso. The underlying principle is simple. Pressure forces hot water at about 192° F — not steam, which would scald the coffee — through ground coffee to produce a syrupy, powerful, smooth dark brew. Espresso has much heavier body than brewed coffee because the pressure forces the water to travel through the grounds themselves instead of dripping through the spaces between the particles. The oils in the ground beans emulsify with the water instead of hanging in a colloidal suspension, which is what produces the seeming slick on the surface of brewed coffee.

According to Ian Bersten, an Australian coffee merchant and historian who has just written a history of coffee, the first patent on a machine using the principle of forcing water through coffee was given to a German, in 1818, English and French inventors, too, soon took out patents; Bersten goes along with the idea that espresso, an Italian word, is taken from the French exprès, in the sense of “made for you alone” (rather than the sense of “made quickly”). But after the turn of the century the Italians claimed espresso as their own—their name stuck too— and they began producing the fantastic contraptions sprouting wings and spigots and spouts which are still on display in some coffee bars.

The Italians have held their lead in technology and design. I avidly leaf through Bar Giornale, a glossy monthly trade publication, less for the useful information on food and restaurants than for the sumptuous pictures of new espresso machines, which are photographed as if they were sports cars. They’re about as sleekly designed and powerful, too. If home machines were that powerful, it would be much easier to make espresso, but cost and space requirements rule out very powerful machines. New technology in home espresso machines has boomed in the past two years, as the market has grown from $30 million in 1987 to $56 million last year. Prices vary tremendously, and before you consider buying a fancy machine, you should think about what you really want to drink.

People not brought up on quick stops at a coffee bar for a businesslike gulp may not appreciate the brevity of an espresso, which can seem like a big cheat—one thimbleful after all that trouble. It makes little sense to spend a lot of money on an electric pump machine, which makes the best espresso, and try to brew more than the tiny shot of coffee it is designed to produce. Trying to brew more than a two-ounce cup at a time will result in overextracted coffee, weak and sourish. Better to buy a stovetop steam machine, genericallv called a moka in Italy and ubiquitous in Italian kitchens, which makes thinner and weaker but not overextracted coffee, and more of it at a time (you can buy whatever size pot is convenient). Any steam machine produces richer and denser coffee than the usual American filter or drip machine does, and a moka is so cheap—depending on size, from $10 to $40, whereas good pump machines start at $250—that it’s a fine first step on the way to real espresso.

In steam machines water heats in a chamber, either on the stove or electrically, and when enough steam pressure has built up the water is forced through the ground coffee. You have to brew a full pot at a time in most machines, since you can’t turn the steam pressure on and off. The most commonly available moka has a wasp waist that unscrews, revealing a lower compartment for water, a perforated basket for coffee which goes in the middle, and an upper pot in which the brewed coffee emerges. As soon as the first coffee spurts into the top, like brown lava (you can hear it, or leave the hinged cover open and watch for it) the heat source should be turned very low. Otherwise the water in the lower chamber will boil (enough pressure builds up to brew the coffee before the water comes to a full boil) and the coffee will taste bitter; the bottom of the pot might burn too. Other stovetop machines, such as the Atomic and the Vesuviana, both of which look like biomorphic relics of the late-fifties dolce vita, work on the same principle.

So do moderately priced electric espresso machines, whose only advantage is that they include a milk steamer for making cappuccino—but the steamer is usually much too weak to make decent foam. An electric steam machine is what most people who balk at spending $300 for an espresso machine settle on. But to my mind, it’s a waste of $60 to $100, since you can find better and cheaper ways to foam milk, and the coffee is no better than what you can make in a moka.

TRUE ESPRESSO has that elusive crema, and the only way to obtain it is with a piston or pump machine. Steam machines, stovetop and electric, achieve a pressure of four to six atmospheres; filter and drip machines, which rely on gravity alone, achieve less than one. A piston or pump machine brews at about nine atmospheres.

The old top-of-the-line home espresso machine, the Pavoni, looks impressive and old-fashioned with its gleaming chrome or brass. It uses a piston; steam builds up in a chamber, and you force water through the coffee by pressing a big lever that activates the piston. (Piston machines gave rise to the expression “pull an espresso.”) A Pavoni is more expensive than mans pump machines—these days one costs at least $400—and not nearly so easy to work.

Pump machines arc modern in design, and with their array of switches they look as if they’d make perfect espresso at the push of a button. In fact, expensive as they are, they require a good deal of time, skill, and maintenance to operate successfully. A pump machine can be scary—when you press the switch to make coffee the machine rumbles so alarmingly that you may think it is about to explode. (Salton pump espresso machines come with stickers that say “I’M NOISY! IT’S OK, I’M JUST DOING MY JOB.”)

Home pump machines use one of two systems to heat water: boiler or thermal block. In either system the main switch activates the heating element and the brew switch turns on the pump. Water under pressure comes out a screen, called a shower head, and travels through the ground coffee, which is in a basket in a metal filter holder that latches onto the machine. The espresso drips out holes or spouts at the bottom of the filter holder, ideally in lazy, fat brown rivulets.

Boiler machines are far more common than thermal-block machines. The sturdiest boiler machine I have tried is made by Rancilio. A man who repairs espresso machines told me a few years ago that it was the best-built home machine, and I searched one out. (The Rancilio Rialto has recently come into wide distribution, for about $400; you can find out where to buy it by calling Xcell, at 312-644-7756.) For more than a year I used it every day, and was well pleased by its solidity and reliability and the layer of crema it produced—at least, I was when I remembered to preheat the filter holder by running hot water through it empty, a helpful step with any machine. (Cups should be heated too.)

In America thermal-block machines are marketed by the Swiss company Rotel and, on a much larger scale, by Krups. Instead of a boiler a thermalblock machine has a flat radiator-like heating coil with a tiny channel for water. When you turn on the brew switch, the pump forces a small amount of water through the coils and then through the ground coffee.

When filling the filter basket in any machine, it’s important not to compact the ground coffee too much, or the water won’t come through; the idea is less to pack than to level the top gently. Don’t use the round plastic tamper that comes with most espresso machines— the convex surface guarantees uneven extraction. Look for a cup or a juice glass with a fiat bottom. Many people overfill the basket, and struggle to latch the filter holder onto the machine. Leave generous head room.

IF ALL THIS scrutinizing grind size and filling and tamping sounds wearing, there are two easy ways out, the first of greater interest to the adventurous and the second a godsend to those in search of push-button espresso.

The Cappuccino Express machine, by the Italian company Spidem, is a normal pump machine with a boiler, and not nearly so solid as the Rancilio. But it features a great new invention— a filter holder with a valve of its own. After you press the brew button, you keep the valve closed for a few seconds, allowing pressure to build to a higher degree than in other machines—ten to twelve atmospheres — and the grounds to be saturated. (You can saturate the grounds in any pump machine, a good idea, by quickly turning the pump on and off before brewing.) As you open the valve, the coffee is forced through a needle-sized opening before coursing down the spouts. The Spidem machine makes the thickest and richest espresso of any home machine I have tried, with a head of crema as high and lightly effervescent as one could wish. If I were an expert at grinding and tamping and keeping everything hot, I could probably come close to these results using other machines, but that valve makes things simple. The Cappuccino Express is in limited distribution; it costs about $325, and you can order it by calling 408-429-1920 (you might have to wait several months for delivery).

Illy Caffè has developed a “pod” system of ground coffee in teabag-like packets, and has entered into an arrangement with Krups to market a thermal-block pump machine, called L’Espresso Plus, that uses the packets. The idea is old. Ernesto Illy, the innovative president of the company, says that the first patent for the idea was granted in Italy in 1922. But perfecting the method seemed beyond most manufacturers, and almost beyond his company, which did not market packets until ten years ago, and then did so only to restaurants. (Today other companies are marketing “coffee bags" for steeping and for brewing in microwave ovens.)

You make sacrifices with the Illy packets and the Krups machine. If you use the packets, you give up the fun of finding your own blend and roast. If you don’t, and use your own coffee in the normal filter basket that Krups provides, the crema is unimpressive and the texture of the coffee thin.

But the system is the only foolproof one I know, and even if the packets turn an exhibition sport into one anyone can play, they will encourage the everyday use of an expensive machine (L’Espresso Plus sells for about $350; you can call 800-526-5377 to find out where). The machine even comes with a video on how to make espresso and cappuccino. Most important, the packet espresso is very good, with a presentable layer of crema and a thick texture. It has impressed several of my Italian guests.

AHEAD OF WHITE foam turns espresso into a celebratory drink. Italians order cappuccino only for breakfast or as a midmorning snack—ordering cappuccino after noon is a sure sign that you’re a foreigner—and often with a cornetto, which looks like a croissant but isn’t flaky. But in America cappuccino is more popular than espresso, even after dinner. The formula for cappuccino is two thirds hot milk to one third coffee, with a generous cap of foam. Caffè macchiato is “stained” with two teaspoons or so of foam poured onto the surface, leaving a ring of coffee on the perimeter of the cup; caffè latte is mostly hot milk (no foam, classically).

Steaming isn’t easy. I took lessons recently from David Schomer, a young man who runs two espresso carts in Seattle called Espresso Vivace, and who is extremely serious about proper espresso and cappuccino technique. He explained that the goal of steaming is a combination of warm milk and smooth foam—neither loose, bubbly foam that will soon deflate nor tight, dry foam that’s no fun to drink.

Schomer told me the ground rules. Start with a cold, preferably metal, narrow pitcher about a third filled with cold milk. Some people say that skim milk foams better than whole milk; others swear by whole milk. I don’t find that it makes any difference. (Steam won’t foam cream.) Hold the pitcher under the tube on the espresso machine so that the nozzle is just below the surface of the milk, which will allow the steam shooting out to mix with air and create foam. As the foam rises in the pitcher, continually lower the pitcher so that the nozzle is always just below the surface of the foam, like the propeller of a speedboat. Schomer made me practice with my hand holding the bottom of the pitcher—if it’s too hot to hold, the milk will have an off, cooked taste. I wound up with a very red palm.

At home I took refuge with some of the devices Italians have been using for several years to mix air with steam and milk. These help overcome the limitations of home machines, which run out of steam after a minute or so (except thermal-block machines, which pump steam). Stovetop steamers cost about $30 to $40 and have more staying power than boiler machines; you can order one from the Coffee Connection, at 800-284-5282. Krups offers with all its espresso machines an attachment called “Perfect Froth,” which draws air into the steam and frees you from worry about where to place the nozzle. It fits over the nozzle and looks like a little periscope. You can buy the attachment separately to put on other steamers; Sur La Table, in Seattle at 800-243-0852, sells it for about $7.

All these steamers and attachments, though, are in some way difficult or disappointing. The first electric home steamer that is worth paying money for has just come on the market from Salton, whose subsidiary Maxim is selling it with a slightly different design. Working with it is the closest I’ve come to achieving professional results. Salton’s Café Cappuccino and Maxim’s Cappuccino Pronto! are plain sisters, squat cylinders of beige plastic. They steam milk—or soup, or sauces, or even eggs, in a dish of fat-tree scrambled eggs that the instructional video can’t resist calling “eggspresso”—and they do it extremely well. With these machines you can follow Schemer’s rules. Both will retail for about $70; you can find out where to buy them at 800-233-9054.

Or you can flout the rules by choosing a battery-operated whip. I first heard about the Moca Crema, one such device, from Tim O’Connor, a merchant in California who imports the Spidem machine. He told me that he takes it on camping trips to make his morning cappuccino. The little gadget arrived looking something like a flimsy, hand-held milk-shake machine. I doubted it could do anything of note, even on a camping trip. But it produces dense foam, provided the container is narrow and the milk is cold. It works so fast that you have to be careful to stop whipping before the milk turns to foam as dry as stiff egg whites.

The problem is that it doesn’t heat milk; steam alters proteins in milk and produces a taste quite different from that of cold milk. But the Moca Crema is effective and cheap (it costs about $15 and is available from Illy Caffè) and easy to use. You can heat the foamed milk in a microwave oven, which won’t deflate it, or gently on the stove, which will if you’re not careful.

COCOA POWDER is seldom seen in Italian bars, and cinnamon is an unknown embellishment. On a cappuccino there’s just beautifully creamy foam.

But could someone please tell me where the custom of serving espresso with a sliver of lemon peel came from? Not from the Italians, who regard this practice as a repugnant American aberration. Coffee aficionados despise it, because the acidity in the peel’s oil ruins the balance of the acidity in the coffee. Tony May, the owner of San Domenico, a New York restaurant, and an authority on Italian food, theorizes that Italian-Americans used lemon peel to jazz up espresso when they couldn’t afford the anise-flavored liqueur that is traditional, or maybe during Prohibition; a bottle of liqueur is still plunked on the table with espresso after a dinner in southern Italy. As far as I know, the mystery remains unsolved. Coffee in most bars in Italy is still offered “corrected” with a few drops of anisette. Lemon peel is anything but a correction. Good espresso is so rich that it needs no enrichment. □