Cuban Coffee | Bodega Coffee
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- Опубликовано: 11 янв 2024
- I'll be the first Cuban to admit that our culture has plenty of shortcomings, but if there's something we got right it's coffee. Cuban coffee (or cafecito) is more than just a drink you order; it's a sociocultural tradition that breeds camaraderie.
RECIPE:
Medium to finely ground dark roast coffee beans, suitable for espresso
Granulated white sugar, to taste
1. Fill moka pot reservoir with water up to the pressure release valve. Hot water will yield a shorter extraction time.
2. Place filter in reservoir and fill until heaping with ground coffee. Do not tamp down. Place on high heat.
3. In a separate vessel, add sugar. As soon as coffee begins extracting from the moka pot, remove from heat and add a few drops to the sugar. Whip vigorously until it reaches a thick, viscous consistency.
4. Return moka pot to high heat as it finishes extracting. Remove from heat once it has quieted down and is no longer extracting.
5. Carefully pour coffee over sugar, stirring gently so that the foam rises to the top. Portion and serve.
Caefecito is made in a moka pot (referred to as a cafetera in Spanish), an innovation borrowed from the Italians. It's more similar to espresso than it is to actual coffee, and it's got the same caffeinated kick to back that up. The main difference between a moka pot and an espresso machine is that it doesn't generate nearly the same amount of pressure. As a result, it doesn't normally produce any crema, the foam you see floating on top of a quality espresso. Cuban coffee works around that by producing its own through the use of sugar.
By whipping sugar with the first few bits of coffee your cafetera produces, you can get a rough approximation of that crema. Naturally, it'll sweeten your cup too. You can play around with the amount of sugar to taste, but even if you normally take your coffee black, I'd argue you need a little bit...to give it mouthfeel, to make it more visually appealing, and most importantly, to properly transform it into actual cafecito.
Cafecito serves as the base for many other Cuban coffee based drinks, like cafe con leches and cortaditos. Its main differentiation from its Italian espresso cousin is the taste. Cuban coffee is often richer, earthier, and more robust, as opposed to the bright, citrusy acidity of most Italian espressos. This is due to the fact that Cuban coffee is more darkly roasted.
Taste aside, the most important element to Cuban coffee is the ritual surrounding it. In Miami, Tampa, and New York, you'll often get your Cuban coffee (or colada as its sometimes called, referring to the whole batch produced from a cafetera) served with a stack of tiny demitasse cups. While one of those things won't be enough to satiate me and my other fellow caffeine junkies, it is symbolic. This is a drink that is made to be shared. Whether it's family, friends, coworkers, acquaintances, or total strangers doesn't matter. What does matter is the time you spend with your chosen tribe, sipping what my mentor calls the nectar of the gods.
Enjoy in good company and good health, particularly of the cardiovascular kind. 
Хобби
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This stuff is why crystal meth never took off in north Bergen.
No need when you can get the best stimulant of all with a nice side of ham croquetas…
i just started using my moka pot, very helpful
It's such a great workhorse for all your coffee needs. Cheers, enjoy!
Just got a mocha pot after a Cuban coworker started making us Cuban Espresso during break time…good video, thanks, thumbs up.
Cheers, thanks for the support! The Cuban coffee break during the work day is a sacred ritual in my mind, enjoy!
Bravo!
Cheers, appreciate you!
Brazilians make their coffee sweetened like this too. It's really good. If you take it unsweetened w/no milk like I do they think you've lost your mind lol. When I was in Fortaleza, Brazil they had the most incredible tasting coffee that I have not been able to find here in the US unfortunately. I only drink mochas sweetened though. I do love a good latte w/nonfat milk though when I go out to a coffee shop. But I usually make my coffee in a moka pot at home as you did but I prefer to use freshly ground dark roast coffee. No canned ground coffee for me thank you. This was an interesting watch.
That's really interesting! I took a coffee tasting class recently where we had a whole bunch of different varieties of green coffee beans that were freshly roasted and ground. Bustelo is just nostalgic to me at this point, this stuff was miles ahead in terms of nuanced flavors. Really interesting to compare the different regions and roast levels in its aroma and flavor profile. Thanks for watching and sharing your Brazilian experience!
"leave this mound be though rather than tamping it down, you want it loosely packed"
you are effectively tamping it down by screwing the top onto the pile rather than smoothing off the top flush with the top of the filter.
You're absolutely right! It's all a matter of finding the sweet spot of maximizing the amount of coffee you can get in your filter while making sure it's not so much that the water can't pass through to the reservoir on top. There have been times where I've packed so much coffee in that only a tiny bit actually brews, which is why I specified not to tamp down. The right process will ultimately depend on your coffee and grind size, for this Bustelo I had no problem loading it fully heaping over the top.
@@BodegaG I've brewed it with your method a couple of times now and I have found that keeping the grounds on top like that inconsistently causes problems. The problem that it causes is that when the edge around the top of the filter and water reservoir is not clean and cannot smoothly and cleanly contact the rubber seal, it can cause water to leak out of the gaps in the seal and create a pressure leak. The last time that I tried it like this just now, the brew stalled partway through because there's wasn't enough pressure to continue pushing water up through the grounds and it just stopped.
@@nobody2021 Hmm, interesting. Packing the filter overly full definitely can create issues where the brewing process will stall as you mentioned. As shown I've honestly never had any problems with it though. The few times it's happened to me has been with coffee other than Bustelo, and whenever that happens I pack the filter flush rather than heaping as you suggested. I do like packing it as full as possible to make it strong batch, but that doesn't do me much good if it doesn't brew in the first place haha. Like I said there is a sweet spot of making it as strong as possible while also not running into the problems you described. You mentioned the cleanliness of the moka pot potentially being a factor in that it prevents it from creating a good seal, maybe my luck is due to how well I scrub it afterwards. I try to get in each of the nooks and crannies when I'm rinsing. I don't use soap though.
If I'm going to be making moka pot coffee sweetened anyway, may as well follow this method. Thanks for the lesson!
Glad you enjoyed! Play around with how much sugar you use. If it's just for me I'll often use less, but most people like and expect their Cuban coffee to be sweet. If you use less, the foam will be thinner though and may not hold. Happens too if you use a mug that has a wide surface area. Find that right balance for you.
@@BodegaG Now I'm wondering about the effect of adding a miniscule amount of a hydrocolloid, such as xanthan gum, to the mix. If you're unfamiliar, it's often used in stabilizing culinary foams and blended coffee drinks. I imagine one could use a tiny quantity in this application (less than a pinch dispersed in the sugar before adding liquid) to help increase bubble size and permanence.
The benefit, if it works, would be more of a milk foam texture such as that of a latte. I think I'll try it now with some of my leftover French press from this morning. BRB
@@BodegaG I expected more foam than I got in my recent test. It does slightly improve quanity and foam permanence, but not enough that I'd call it worth the trouble for your daily cup.
@@christopherkarr1872 still, love the experimental approach and thanks for reporting back with your results! I have some xantham gum in the pantry, might try it for myself. Thanks for the inspiration, cheers!
@@BodegaG Cheers! Let me know if you have better results with mokapot than I did with medium-cold french press!
Add condensed milk
Condensed milk is a great addition! I have another video that uses it to make the Spanish cafe bombon. There are plenty of good coffee drinks involving condensed milk though, you really can't go wrong!
Sugar murdered coffee!
I do like it without sugar too, whenever I make Cuban coffee at work and I don’t want to share I do it that way. It’s usually a much smaller crowd of takers, sometimes it pays to be selfish 😉
Too much sugar
I definitely use less when I make it for myself! Tastes vary, but a lot of people expect their cafecito to be on the sweeter side.