Which espresso would you like?
The classic espresso is made from dark roast beans with a certain Robusta content and may taste more bitter and chocolatey-nutty. Now, however, 100% Arabica, light roasts and thus fruitier notes are currently the order of the day for other coffee specialties and preparations.
What does that do to the espresso? Will its taste profile change? What flavors must/may a modern espresso have?
Stefanie Heidemann, Manager Training at Melitta Professional and international juror of the Specialty Coffee Association (SCA), answered questions from Kaffee & Co. magazine (September 2024 issue). Here you can read her detailed answer.
"For the preparation of traditional espresso, a blend is usually used, i.e. a bean mixture often of Arabica and Robusta. This blend is usually relatively dark roasted to achieve the desired flavor profile of a traditional espresso: nutty, chocolaty with a slight to dominant bitter note. The focus here is on the art of the master roaster to put together the right beans and roast them accordingly and achieve a consistent taste profile.
More and more often, however, there is also a modern interpretation of espresso. Here, the focus is no longer on roasting and the associated roasted aromas, but rather on the origin of the beans. Modern espressos are often so-called single origin coffees, so the beans come from a growing region or from a farm. Rather, the aim here is to emphasise the special taste profiles of the individual origins, different varieties or different forms of preparation and also to preserve them through a light roasting profile. These types of modern espresso roasts tend to have acidic flavor profiles, such as aromas of citrus, berries or stone fruit, or floral flavors such as jasmine or bergamot and black tea, depending on where the coffee comes from, how exactly it was prepared and then roasted. In more traditional, dark blends and roasts, there are more aromas of dried fruits such as date or plum, more nutty characters such as hazelnut, almond or walnut and chocolaty notes in the direction of dark chocolate.
Traditional or modern espresso are not fundamentally mutually exclusive, on the contrary, they allow us as consumers to enjoy a wide range of different tastes and aromas, thus emphasizing how diverse coffee can be."
Steffi's espresso selection:
Traditional:
- Melitta® Bacio d'Oro®
- Caffè Corsini, Silvano Corsini Riserva
- Melitta® Terra Attiva Espresso
Modern:
- Melitta® La Tazza Verde Selection
