Coffee Drinks
Every drink has a definition, a ratio and an argument about it. This is where we settle what a cortado actually is, how a red eye differs from a black eye, and why the same espresso becomes four different drinks depending on what happens next. Each one links to the equipment that makes it properly.
What Is a Doppio Espresso?
Two shots pulled as one, in a bigger basket. It is the default in most cafes now, and the reason has more to do with the grinder than with strength.
Flat White vs Cappuccino: What Actually Differs
Not the size, and not the amount of milk. The difference is the texture of the foam, and it changes everything about how the coffee comes through.
What Is a Café au Lait?
Brewed coffee and hot milk in roughly equal parts. The thing that makes it distinct is the one most recipes get wrong: there is no espresso in it.
What Is a Gran Lungo?
A Nespresso cup size rather than a coffee tradition. What the 150ml button actually does, and why longer is not the same as bigger.
Americano vs Latte: Water or Milk
Same espresso, two different things added to it. Which you want depends on whether you are trying to lengthen the coffee or soften it.
What Is a Macchiato?
An espresso with a spot of foam on it, and one of the smallest drinks on the menu. Not to be confused with the two larger things sold under the name.
Cold Brew vs Iced Coffee: Not the Same Drink
One is brewed cold for half a day, the other is brewed hot and poured over ice. The difference is not temperature at the end, it is which compounds ever left the coffee.
Why Oat Milk Curdles in Coffee, and How to Stop It
It is not spoilage. Two things make oat milk split in a hot cup, and both of them are under your control.
What Is a Red Eye Coffee Drink?
Drip coffee with a shot of espresso in it. The name comes from the flight you drink it on, and the family it belongs to goes darker from there.
Caffè Shakerato: Italy's Iced Coffee, Made in a Cocktail Shaker
Espresso, ice and sugar shaken hard and strained into a cold glass. No milk, no syrup, and no ice in the finished drink.
Cappuccino vs Frappuccino: Not the Same Family
One is a hot Italian espresso drink with a definition. The other is a blended trademark. The similar names are a coincidence of marketing.
What Is a Cortado?
Espresso cut with an equal amount of warm milk. No foam to speak of, no latte art, and a glass rather than a cup.
What Is a Piccolo Latte?
An Australian invention: a single shot in a small latte glass, designed so baristas could taste their own espresso all day without drinking a litre of milk.
Christmas Coffee Drinks Worth Making
Six that work at home, without a syrup pump or a cafe's equipment, and the two that are better in theory than in a cup.
How to Make Bulletproof Coffee, and What It Actually Does
Coffee, butter and MCT oil, blended. Simple to make, heavily marketed, and worth understanding before you replace breakfast with it.
Hard Coffee: The Alcoholic Coffee Drinks, Sorted
A canned category, a cocktail canon and a set of liqueurs all go by the same name. They are not interchangeable.
Super Coffee: What Is Actually in It
Coffee with protein and MCT oil added and the sugar taken out. A real product category with a specific use, oversold as an upgrade to coffee.
Turkish Coffee vs Espresso
Both are small, dark and strong, and almost nothing else about them is the same. One is filtered by pressure, the other is not filtered at all.