Is smaller ultimately better?
Have you noticed there is a movement in the coffee cafe culture to get rid of 16 and 20 ounce coffee cups?
If you go to Starbucks, Dunkin and 7-Eleven for your coffee - bigger will always be better (in terms of the dollar). But if you go to a coffeeshop that is focusing on Espresso drinks - you’ll notice that some of them don’t go above 12oz., some even set a cap as small as 8oz.
Is smaller better? Are they trying to cheat us? What’s going on here???
The point these coffee shop owners are making (which we totally agree with) is that historically espresso drinks in Italy are “pulled” short. A single portafilter (the basket-thing with a handle that holds the espresso) will hold about 11 grams of coffee.
“The ideal cup for Italian espresso is a white china cup, free of any inside decoration, elliptical in shape, with a capacity of 50-100 milliliters (1.7-3.4oz).” – Istituto Nazionale Espresso Italiano
The trick is to find the correct brewing ratio, which is the proportion of dry coffee (in grams) to water (in grams) to make your cup of coffee.
A good ratio for a ristretto (a very short espresso) would be about 1:5 (one gram of coffee to 5 grams of water), and espresso would be 1:8 and a lungo would be about 1:22.
Now if you add a milk to make that espresso into a cappuccino you would need 1:5 ratio then you would add about 8 grams of milk (plus foam). So the total volume for the cappuccino comes out to about 6oz.
So an 8oz. cup will be plenty of space to house a golden ratio of milk to espresso — that lets the espresso taste like it should, without being drowned to obscurity in milk.
Of course one of the problems with this approach is consumer intent... we buy coffee in different amounts for different reasons. If you walked into Starbucks and asked for a Grande cappuccino and they handed you an 8oz cup - you would probably walk out.
Their goal is to sell tons of coffee - so the more they sell the better. Also, you may want more because you flat out need it (especially on a Monday morning when your 9-month old woke up at 5am). So what is the harm in ordering a double or triple espresso and making 2-3 times the size of the drink? Technically the espresso changes character as it loses or gains heat, plus the amount of milk is always made too hot to keep the cup hot for longer. Espresso is a drink best made short and neat, and drunk on the spot. So while making a bigger Cappuccino will give you more volume, it’s also making the potentials detriments bigger as well.
