Espresso - From the Moka Pot to Janis Joplin

In Honor Of Italy’s National Espresso Day – April 11, 2014

Bean or Roast?

Is it a bean?  A roast?  This nectar of 1950’s and ‘60’s beatnik coffee houses in Soho, Greenwich Village, and San Francisco fueled a cultural revolution.  But its definition is frequently blurred since it’s neither a bean nor a roast.  Espresso (/ɛˈspɹɛsəʊ/ italian: /eˈsprɛsso/) is both a brewing method and a name of a much-coveted beverage.  Made right, it’s a glorious, concentrated burst of flavor.  Made wrong, it's a rough, bitter liquid slug.

Any type of coffee bean can be used to produce espresso.  What turns a coffee bean into an espresso is the method: close-to-boiling water is forced under heavy pressure through finely ground coffee beans that have been tamped down to help water penetrate the grounds more evenly.  Espresso is generally thicker than coffee brewed by other methods, has a higher concentration of suspended and dissolved solids, and has crema (a foam with a creamy consistency) on top.  As a result of the pressurized brewing process, the flavors and chemicals in a typical cup of espresso are very concentrated.[1]

Beginnings

The earliest contraptions forcing water through tightly packed coffee grounds using the force of steam were built in France in the early 1800s, employing a rough technique that remains in use today in almost all Italian homes in the stovetop moka pot.[2] 

The two founding fathers of the commercial espresso machines are Luigi Bezzera and Desiderio Pavoni, although it’s claimed the very first patent for a steam-driven "instantaneous" coffee beverage making device was filed by Angelo Moriondo in 1884 (No. 33/256).[3]  His device was designed to brew a large quantity of espresso at once, but not “expressly” for individual customers.

Bezzera invented the espresso coffee machine in Italy in 1901 to decrease his employees' coffee break time and increase their productivity.  His patent was sold in 1903 to Pavoni who made a few improvements and began commercially producing and distributing the espresso machine throughout Europe.  He’s also the first to market the name, espresso. 

Pavoni’s company, La Pavoni, is still highly successful today and you’ll find his patent cited in every espresso machine marketed today. [4] [5]

Giovanni Achille Gaggia created the next revolution in espresso machine design by looking for a way to produce espresso without relying on steam, which could make the coffee taste burnt or bitter.  In 1947 he patented a revolutionary lever-operated piston that eliminated the need for steam and also resulted in one of the most crucial elements in espresso, the crema.  This creamy, thick foam is created when oils from the ground coffee beans are emulsified, which doesn’t happen in other brewing methods.  Gaggia’s lever design remains the core blueprint for manual espresso machines to this day.[6]

Best Espresso

The best espresso should be extraordinarily sweet, have a potent aroma, and flavor similar to freshly ground coffee.  The crema should be dark reddish-brown and smooth, yet thick.  A perfect espresso should be enjoyable straight with no additives, yet bold enough to not disappear in milk.  A pleasant and aromatic aftertaste should linger on the palate for several minutes after consumption.[7]  The best espresso is roasted light to preserve the flavor and aroma.  Unfortunately, there’s an overwhelming penchant to roast beans until they’re too dark which destroys the flavor and results in a bitter, charcoal-tasting shot.

How to prepare a perfect espresso courtesy of Gaggia:

Best Bean Blends

While any type of coffee bean can be used to produce an espresso, it’s best to use beans that have been specifically selected and blended for this brewing method.  The best espresso blends result in a sweet, smooth brew with luscious aromas.  If beans are used that were blended for the filter coffee method, the result may be an overly strong, unbalanced drink.

Most espresso blends are based on one or several high quality Brazil Arabicas, some washed, some dry-processed. They often involve some African coffees for winey acidity or enzymatic flowery /fruitiness, or a high grown Central American for a cleaner acidity.

Dry processed coffees are responsible for the attractive crema on the cup, among other mechanical factors in the extraction process. Wet-processed Central Americans add positive aromatic qualities. Robustas, or coffea canephora, are used in cheaper blends to increase body and produce crema and in a few decent blends. They add crema and a particular bite to the cup.[8]

Coffee House Culture and Espresso Bars

One of the most alluring things about coffee and espresso is how they were intricately woven into societal fabric across all cultures and time.  The very first coffee houses, known as kaveh kanes, were opened in 1454 in Mecca and then in Constantinople in 1475 (which were claimed to have been the first).[9]  By the end of the fifteenth century coffee houses were in place across Persia, Egypt, Turkey, and North Africa.  The picture of Arabic coffee houses as dens of iniquity and frivolity was exaggerated by religious zealots. In reality the Muslim world was the forerunner of the European Café society and the coffee houses of London which became famous London clubs. They were meeting places for intellectuals, where news and gossip were exchanged and clients were regularly entertained by traditional story-tellers.[10]  

Once espresso machines became commercially available in the early 1900’s, espresso became the feature player in coffee houses across Europe.   

Many of the art nouveau and deco cafés, at least in Paris, look much the same today as they did in Bezzera and Pavoni’s time. The solid, dazzling espresso machines of polished copper, brass and steel are still manufactured as a retro-look today, and they afford a sense of the aesthetic effects they must have made on patrons a century ago: Sleek, angular metal set against lush velvet in elegant cafés, industry tamed and polished, steam-locomotion civilized in the salon, piston progress welded to fashion and desire. 



The glamour and avante garde component of the espresso history was exhibited in many ways.  One was possibly Gaggia’s first espresso maker for use in homes which was called the GILDA.  The story goes that Achille Gaggia named it after seeing the 1946 film noir classic Gilda, starring glamorous Hollywood actress Rita Hayworth.  

The sleek, silver espresso machines were established fixtures in trendy nightclubs.  Club Astoria (at right), a legendary 50s nightclub for fashionable young Italians in downtown Milan, sports a Gaggia machine.[12]

Famous Italian actress Gina Lollobrigida opens London's first espresso bar – Moka – at 29 Frith Street in 1953. Located in the heart of bohemian Soho, it fast becomes the meeting place of famous writers and poets, including Naked Lunch author and Beat legend William Burroughs. At its height, the bar serves over 1,000 cups of coffee a day.

After the Second War, espresso became totemic; sharing with wine, tobacco, and sugar the status of what Barthes called “converting substances.” They were bio-technes to cultivate desired relations of interior states with the external world, or even occasionally blurring them, as in the unmediated Whole of the godshot.[11]

This 1959 film, part of the “Look at Life” series by Rank, explores London's burgeoning coffee culture of the 1950s.

Coffee shops in the United States arose from the espresso- and pastry-centered Italian coffeehouses of the Italian American immigrant communities in the major U.S. cities, notably New York City's Little Italy and Greenwich Village, Boston's North End, and San Francisco's North Beach. 

From the late 1950s onward, coffeehouses also served as a venue for entertainment, most commonly folk performers during the American folk music revival.  Both Greenwich Village and North Beach became major haunts of the Beats, who were highly identified with these coffeehouses.  As the youth culture of the 1960s evolved, non-Italians consciously copied these coffeehouses.

The political nature of much of 1960s folk music made the music a natural tie-in with coffeehouses with their association with political action. A number of well known performers like Joan Baez and Bob Dylan began their careers performing in coffeehouses.  Blues singer Lightnin' Hopkins bemoaned his woman's inattentiveness to her domestic situation due to her overindulgence in coffeehouse socializing in his 1969 song "Coffeehouse Blues". Starting in 1967 with the opening of the historic Last Exit on Brooklyn coffeehouse, Seattle became known for its thriving countercultural coffeehouse scene; the Starbucks chain later standardized and mainstreamed this espresso bar model.

[1] wikipedia retrieved 4/3/14  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Espresso

[2]  http://www.coffeeresearch.org/espresso/potential.htm retrieved 4/3/14. Moka pot image retrieved from www.vintage.it 4.4.14.

[3] Bersten, Ian (1993). Coffee Floats Tea Sinks: Through History and Technology to a Complete Understanding.

[4] http://www.wholelattelove.com/articles/founding_fathers_of_espresso.cfm

[5] Image from www.lapavoni.com retrieved 4/5/14.

[6] ibid.

[7] http://www.coffeeresearch.org/espresso/potential.htm retrieved 4/3/14

[8] Espresso Blends, Tom Owen of Sweet Maria's, http://www.coffeeresearch.org/espresso/espressoblending.htm, retrieved 4/3/14

[9] The History of Coffee, http://www.gocoffeego.com/professor-peaberry/history-of-coffee, retrieved 4/8/14

[10] Ethiopia: The Origin of Coffee  Adapted from Selamta, the in-flight magazine of Ethiopian Airlines, edited by Professor Nkiru Nzegwu, January 20, 2010,  http://www.africaresource.com/house/index.php/news/our-announcements/21-the-history-of-coffee retrieved 4/8/14

[11] 9/29/2011 espresso by Paul Christopher Johnson, http://freq.uenci.es/2011/09/29/espresso/ 

[12] www.gaggia.com retrieved 4/3/14