Guide to Italian coffee

Guide to Italian Coffee

Italian coffee is probably the most famous thing Italy is known for - second to pizza, pasta and supercars among other things *cough! Anyway below is a useful guide to Italian coffee, what to order and what you will get!

1- Caffe Ristretto - half an espresso! In Italy an espresso is almost always single shot, the Ristretto is half this shot, very very short drink.

2- Caffe Normale - AKA the espresso. probably the most common coffee drank by Italians, short sharp down the hatch. After a meal caffe normale is usually the drink of choice. This is a single espresso shot.

3- Caffe Lungo - This is an espresso with small amount of hot water added to it making it longer (lungo) imagine a baby americano. Sometimes it will be served with hot water on the side or sometimes with the water already added in, depends on who's serving you!

4- Caffe Doppio - This is a double espresso! nothing more nothing less!

5- Caffe Macchiato - This is an espresso with small amount of foamy milk, like a mini cappuccino.

6- Cappuccino - This is an espresso served in a large cup with foamy milk making up the majority of the drink, you're basically drinking foamy milk.

7- Caffe Americano - This is a single shot coffee within hot water, pretty universal this one! Why is it called Caffe Americano? good question: During the war...when American troops loitered around Italy their taste buds couldn't handle the espresso so they always asked for a lot of hot water to be mixed in, thus the locals started calling it caffe Americano which then stuck!

8 - Caffe Marocchino - This is like a Macchiato but with added awesomeness, I mean chocolate, often Nutella at the bottom of the cup covered with an espresso, foamy milk and chocolate powder on top for extra taste!

9 - Caffe Decaffeinato - As the name suggest it's decaffeinated coffee.

10 - Caffe Bombardino - Espresso mixed with egg liquor, brandy or rum then topped with whipped cream. Bombardino has several variations: with coffee (calimero), with rum (pirata) or whisky (scozzese). The calimero variation is one part Brandy, one part Vov (Italian egg liqore) and one part espresso