(Modern day espresso setup)
Hello 16ozDays Fam! Welcome to this week’s post. We hope you’ve all had an amazing week; we’ve been hard at work on building relationships to further expand out Coffee Club! If you haven’t heard yet, this past month we introduced our brand new membership program, the Coffee Club.
This program gives members 10% off on all coffee drinks at participating locations. We currently have 8 shops, but we are working to provide you even more options to get your daily brew from. So, hop on now, on the ground floor and ride all the way to the top with us! For more information, check out this page on the Coffee Club or our previous post: Inside the Coffee Club Membership.
We’ve really been getting into the history of drinks recently, so for this week’s post we’ve decided to bring you the history of our 3 favorite coffee drinks. As it turns out, they’re a whole lot cooler than just espresso and milk.
Espresso
(Portafilter ready to brew a fresh espresso shot)
Before the days of modern machines, coffee was a long and difficult process to master. It wasn’t until the 19th century when anything resembling espresso hit the scene.
According to the Smithsonian Magazine, a man named Luigi Bezzera, Milanese manufacturer and “maker of liquors”, was the main pioneer of espresso. A maker before him, Angelo Moriondo of Turin, Italy, had come up with an original prototype for an espresso machine. Bezzera made several modifications to the design and in 1903 a man named Desiderio Pavoni purchased the designs and made them more mainstream.
In these times, the process of brewing espresso relied heavily on a constant stream of hot, pressurized steam. As said by Smithsonian Magazine, “[using steam] had the unfortunate side effect of imbuing the coffee with a burnt or bitter taste”. It wasn’t until after WWII when a machine was released that did not solely rely on steam but also much higher levels of pressurized water.
Espresso machines continued to evolve and improve over the following century and are still today. These three men are some of the pioneers of the drink we all know and love.
The Latte
(Beautiful latte art)
As said by Achilles Coffee Roasters, “Europeans have been mixing coffee and milk since at least the 17th Century”. The first latte adjacent drink was called a caffe e latte, appealing in 1867. However, at this point espresso hadn’t been invented and coffee brewing techniques were still very rudimentary.
When steam wands were added to machines in 1903, the process of reinventing the latte began. It wasn’t until 1980 when baristas in Seattle began drawing with their foam that the true latte we know today came into existence.
The Cappuccino
(Fresh foamy cappuccino)
The Cappuccino first appeared under the name of Kapuziner in Viennese coffee houses in the 1700s as stated in an article by The Spruce Eats. When the drink was first introduced in Italy, the name Cappuccino came from the Capuchin friars, a renowned group of monks in Italy. The color of the foam and espresso was reminiscent of the friar’s distinct robes.
In a post about the word, Webster said, “The name, whimsical in a world of utilitarian coffee-drink names, stuck; we borrowed it into English in the late 1800s”.
Wrap up
There you have it Coffee Addicts, now hopefully we all know a little bit more about some of our favorite drinks! This was a super fun post to dive into, and if you like reading things like this, be sure to let us know. Feel free to email us at 16ozdays@gmail.com, or DM us on instagram @ 16ozDays. We love hearing from you. If you’re looking for fun stuff to do this week, check out some of our previous posts, we even recently did one on the best patios, read it here: 7 Minneapolis Cafes with Amazing Patios. As always, have a great week, and don’t forget to tip your barista.
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