Coffee in Edinburgh, like everywhere else in Britain, is a question of luck. Where to go for the cup that delights? The failure rate is high. Read a local cafe guide and you will find that the places it recommends can be as disappointing as those it condemns.
How to describe the perfect cup? In terms of volume, it should be of modest size, which puts most of Britain’s cafe chains, with their double espressos (which I would term quadruple) and huge cappuccinos straight into my personal jeopardy. The very sight of them is a deterrent. Is it only the Italians who know know that an espresso, as its name implies, should be tiny?
Other factors, before you think about the taste, are the shape and look and feel of the cup, which should be an aesthetic pleasure before you raise it to your lips. I don’t need to write about this. You should know it for yourself.
Don’t be ashamed to add sugar.The Italians certainly do it. The foam on your cappuccino, or more discreetly on your flat white, should be of the finest texture. The floral patterns that are nowadays added are things I personally can live without, though they are nice to see because they tend to guarantee a quality coffee.
But if the accompanying pastries and cakes are up to scratch, that’s important also. The fashionable English essayist and DH Lawrence authority, Geoff Dyer, in more than one of his books describes his constant search for the perfect coffee/pastry combination which, in a city he does not already know, keeps him trudging onwards until he finds it. Since Dyer has got the whole thing right, read him and see for yourself.
As for the actual coffee, I shall not try to describe it in detail. You know, or should do, how it should taste, how utterly fresh it must be - which also means not thin or murky or tepid, and never mouth-puckeringly bitter. Espresso machines are a mixed blessing in these respects because, for all their shiny good looks, they are so often abused.
Avoid coffee in restaurants, which is only common sense because it is inevitably overpriced and seldom made with the devotion it needs (Centro Tre in George Street, Edinburgh, is an exception). Ask for the bill before accepting coffee, and drink your own at home. At the moment, as a constant experimenter, I employ an AeroPress, a simple but clever non-electric device which you can find on the internet and which makes, in my experience, unfailingly good coffee so long as you use it right - though the pressure aspect demands a strong arm.
Otherwise a good French press, or cafetiere as it used to be called, should serve you well - some are more intricate than others - or else the sort of espresso pot (steel or aluminium) which you put on the gas and which produces better coffee than many a small domestic espresso nachine. But all things are relative. The kind of coffee you buy, its freshness and what you do with it, are what matter in the end.
But to return to where I began, with Edinburgh cafes. The two I currently like most are both in Bruntsfield, an arrondissement for coffee drinkers. One is French, La Barantine at 202 Bruntsfield Place, as cramped as its tiniest Parisian equivalent, serving its own excellent soup, crunchy French bread and delectabe French cakes. The other is German, Falko at 185 Bruntsfield Place across the road. A long, narrow room and counter, it’s twee in the nicest sort of way, with deftly served lunches, interesting soups, home-made ice-cream and splendid German cakes and bread. Project Coffee at 196 Bruntsfield Place, though in appearance more industrial, rightly buzzes with life and is likewise worth trying. The coffee, in each case, is what it should be.
21 May 2014
You are indeed a constant experimenter. Our kitchen cupboards are full of gadgets just like your father's were.
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