Espresso coffee
意式濃縮咖啡
In search of a perfect cup
尋找一杯完美的咖啡
Espresso coffee requires as much technology and taste as fine wine. Where to find the finest?
與優質的好酒一樣，意式濃縮咖啡也需要一定的技術和品鑑方法，那麼，從哪裡去尋找最合適的呢？
Dec 20th 2001 | PARIS, PAUDEX, TREVISO AND TRIESTE | from the print edition
譯者：薄荷味道0
LOOK into a small, elegant cup of espresso coffee and examine carefully the top layer of foam, known to aficionados as crema. Made of tiny gas bubbles trapped in a liquid film, the foam seals the coffee's intense aromas and flavours and locks in heat. A good crema depends on the quality of the coffee and on the skill with which it is prepared. In a perfect espresso it is velvety, with a warm and characteristic hazel-brown or 「tiger-skin」 colour. It is also persistent, lasting as long as the drink, and with sufficient body to support the weight of granulated sugar for a few seconds.
透過小巧優雅的意式咖啡杯，細觀上層的細沫，這就是咖啡發燒友狂熱追捧的克麗瑪。由細微的氣泡凝聚成一層液態膜，包裹住了咖啡濃烈的香氣，同時也鎖住了熱氣。一份優質的克麗瑪取決於咖啡的質量以及製作時的精良程度。完美的意式濃縮，它帶有醇和綿柔的口感，和淡褐色的「虎斑」。通常，克麗瑪將一直保持這種形態，並且可以讓砂糖支撐在上面幾秒鐘不下沉。
Perfect espresso is the ultimate coffee. It ranks with fine wine for the complexity of its chemistry. Unlike wine, however, it does not improve with age. 「Espresso」 means prepared on the spur of the moment, and it has become the trademark of rich, intense coffee that must also be consumed at once. Its taste is so dense, though, that it can remain in the mouth for up to half an hour after drinking.
完美的意式濃縮是未經調製的咖啡。它擁有和好酒同樣豐富的有機物質。但是和酒不同的是，它不會因為年份的久遠而變得更加醇和。「濃縮咖啡」往往意味著瞬間的萃取，並且，優質醇香的咖啡必須儘快飲用。意式濃縮的口感相當醇厚，在飲用半小時後仍舊回味無窮。
For decades, making espresso was either an art or a lottery. The artists were trained baristas, skilled operators who worked big espresso machines in the coffee bars of Europe. For amateurs trying to make their own espresso it was more a matter of luck, the occasional success a reminder of the reason for the quest. In the early 1990s, only one household in every five then owning an espresso machine used it regularly, because the results were so unreliable.
在過去幾十年，濃縮咖啡的製作是一門藝術，同時也需要運氣。它們的製作者往往都是接受過培訓的咖啡師，在歐洲咖啡館大型的咖啡機前熟練操作的技術員。對於業餘愛好者來說，自行製作一份濃縮咖啡則更多地依賴於運氣，偶成之功詮釋了追求的意義。在20世紀90年代初，由於較低的成功率，每五個擁有咖啡機的家庭中僅僅只有一個家庭會經常使用它。
Today, however, perfect espresso can be found almost anywhere. It can even be made at home thanks to clever new machines that produce consistently good coffee with a minimum of fuss from neatly-packaged individual portions. Among the most influential pioneers have been illycaffe, an Italian family firm based in Trieste, and Nespresso, a division of Nestlé, a Swiss food giant. Nespresso has combined simple-to-use espresso machines with clever marketing to transform consumption at home. Greater reliability has made espresso one of the fastest-growing segments of the otherwise troubled world coffee market.
然而現在，上好的意式濃縮已隨處可見。通過精巧的新款咖啡機，僅用少量的袋式包裝咖啡，就可以持續穩定地製作出上好的咖啡。義大利裡雅斯特的家族企業Illy咖啡，和瑞士食品巨頭雀巢的子品牌Nespresso是其中最具影響力的兩個代表。Nespresso將一體式自動咖啡機與高明的營銷手段相結合，將咖啡的製作帶到了家庭。
The bean before steam
蒸汽製法出現前的咖啡
By the middle of the 19th century, coffee was well established in Europe as an important trade commodity. Despite growth in the market, however, there had for centuries been little change in the way that coffee was made—either by the so-called Turkish method or by infusion. In both preparations, roasted coffee beans are first ground and then placed in water. The Turkish method requires that the water be boiled three times before the grounds are allowed to settle and the drink is poured. Infusion is simpler—ground coffee is steeped for a few minutes in boiled water and the resulting liquid is then strained before serving.
在19世紀中葉，咖啡已經成為歐洲重要的日常貿易商品之一。儘管咖啡市場在不斷增長，然而其製作手法卻幾個世紀都沒有太大變化，無外乎土耳其式或者浸泡式。在這兩種製法中，烘焙過後的咖啡豆均先是經過研磨，後置於水中。土耳其製法需要將水煮沸三次，而後咖啡渣沉澱，將上層咖啡倒出飲用。浸泡式則要簡單一點，將咖啡粉浸泡在沸水中幾分鐘，接著在飲用前把咖啡過濾即可。
These methods produced acceptable coffee, but each had serious drawbacks. Multiple boilings replaced the Turkish coffee's delicate flavours with a strong, astringent drink that was routinely sweetened and often further flavoured with cardamom. Steeping, on the other hand, was too feeble to extract more than around 20% of the oils and volatile substances that give coffee its distinctive aroma and flavour.
這兩種方法都可以製作出相對滿意的咖啡，但是都有各自的缺點。多次的沸騰使得土耳其咖啡缺乏清爽之感，取而代之的，是厚重苦澀的口感。通常人們會在咖啡中加入糖，或者進一步用小豆蔻進行調製。而浸泡式則顯得要清淡一些，少了20%左右的油脂和香氣，卻賦予了咖啡與眾不懂的香氣和風味。
Late in the 19th century, a new method of preparation, known as percolation, offered an improvement and laid the foundations for the espresso revolution that began around 1900. Percolation involved passing boiling or near-boiling water through ground coffee, using either gravity or the light pressure created by steam.
在19世紀後期，新的製作方法產生了。在原來浸泡萃取的基礎上，作了一些改進，為20世紀的濃縮咖啡奠定了基石。採用重力或者由蒸汽產生的輕壓使沸水或者接近沸騰的水通過咖啡粉。
More important as a technological breakthrough was the mocha method. In this, water is boiled in a lower chamber and forced by steam pressure through a metal filter containing the ground coffee into an upper chamber from which it can be served. The contact between the coffee and the water is relatively brief, lasting around a minute. This produces coffee that is strong and sometimes sufficiently bitter that it needs sweetening.
虹吸式是一項更加重要的突破性進展。該種製作方法，是通過水在下方的容器中沸騰，產生壓力使水通過過濾裝置進入上方裝有研磨咖啡的壺中。咖啡和水的接觸時間很短，大概持續1分鐘左右。以此製作出來的咖啡口味比較濃厚，有時候會因為苦味過重而需要加糖進行調和。
Espresso coffee also relies on pressure, but whereas a mocha pot produces only one atmosphere of pressure, espresso machines require at least nine and ideally ten. Drunk immediately, espresso transcends other coffees thanks to the greater extraction of essential coffee aromas and flavours. The first recognisable espresso machine was exhibited at the Paris fair of 1855. However, it is generally accepted that the inventor of the modern espresso machine was Luigi Bezzerra, an Italian entrepreneur who began commercial manufacture of espresso machines in 1901.
意式濃縮和壓力密不可分，虹吸式咖啡只需要普通的大氣氣壓，咖啡機則需要至少九倍甚至10倍的大氣壓。濃縮咖啡在萃取上更加充分，也更好地保留了咖啡原本的風味，因此在快飲時口感要優於其他咖啡。第一臺可追溯的咖啡機於1855年在巴黎展會上出展。隨後，它很快被大眾接受，它的發明者Luigi Bezzerra在1901年開始將其投入商業生產。
His were cumbersome beasts that relied on steam to create the high pressure required, and they demanded skilled operators to control a series of taps. But they were a hit in bars and brasseries, and they changed Italian coffee-drinking habits for good. Espresso takes a mere 2% of the world market for roasted coffee, but it accounts for half the Italian market.
Luigi Bezzerra的咖啡機比較笨重，主要採用蒸汽來產生所需高壓，還需要技術熟練的咖啡師來操控一系列的龍頭。但是他們還是在咖啡館中取得了不小的市場份額，同時改善了義大利咖啡的飲用習慣。意式濃縮僅消耗了世界烘焙類咖啡不到2%的使用量，卻在義大利的咖啡市場創造了一半的銷量。。
Others soon followed Bezzerra into production, and some of the newcomers made important innovations. In 1933, Francesco Illy founded illycaffe in Trieste and two years later produced the 「Illetta」, the first machine to measure the quantity of water automatically, and the first to use compressed air rather than steam to create pressure. In 1945, a new machine made by Gaggia, another Italian firm, greatly simplified the overall design, introducing a spring-loaded lever to drive a piston and compress the water.
其他製造商也逐漸跟隨Bezzerra進入到這個行業，同時一些新加入的廠商在原來的基礎上作了巧妙的改進。1933年，Francesco Illy在Trieste（義大利東北部港市）成立了illy咖啡，並且在兩年後開始投產「Illetta」——這類咖啡機首次採用了自動取水技術，並且用壓縮空氣代替了蒸汽來產生壓力。1945年，另一家義大利公司Gaggia推出了一種新型機械萃取式咖啡機，大幅度簡化了其總體構架，通過置入一組彈簧槓桿裝置來推動活塞從而產生水壓。
These elegant machines were much easier to use than their predecessors and some are still in use today, especially in southern Italy. A few connoisseurs insist that they are superior to rivals, and it is true that in the right hands they can produce a perfectly balanced coffee.
這些設計精巧的咖啡機相比之前的產品使用更加簡便，有的甚至現在還在使用，尤其是在義大利南部。一些內行的鑑賞家堅信這些咖啡機相比其同類產品更有優勢，這個說法得到了驗證，因為它們更有助於製作品質優良口感穩定的咖啡。
A further burst of innovation came in 1961 when Ernesto Valente, yet another pioneering Italian, set out to re-think the design of the espresso machine from first principles. He wanted to replace the spring of the lever machine with an electric-powered rotating pump, but no pump could handle hot water. So Valente decided to compress cold water, which would then pass across a heat exchanger before reaching the ground coffee at the optimum temperature of 90°C. His Faema E61 machine was revolutionary, and the main elements of its design define most espresso machines today.
在1961年，Ernesto Valente——義大利的另一咖啡巨頭，帶來了一場更具革命性的創新，它試圖從意式咖啡機的基本原理著手，重新進行考量設計。Ernesto Valente試圖採用電動旋轉水泵裝置來取代風靡一時的的槓桿式機器，然而不存在耐受沸水的水泵。於是Ernesto Valente決定用冷水替換熱水，採用壓縮裝置使其通過一個熱交換裝置，在遇到咖啡粉之前到達90°C。旗下Faema E61改頭換面，其設計的主要元素為現代多數的咖啡機奠定了基礎。
The hard grind
艱巨的研磨
It takes roughly 50 coffee beans to make a single cup of espresso. After roasting and grinding, the coffee weighs around 6.5 grams. A cup of espresso will contain a rich variety of solids, though in minute quantities, whereas a cup of filter coffee contains almost none. But then espresso coffee is full of chemical and olfactory surprises.
一杯意式濃縮需要大概50粒咖啡豆。通過研磨和篩選，咖啡粉的重量大概在6.5g左右。一杯經過過濾製得得咖啡，其咖啡粉顆粒含量微乎其微，而意式濃縮中卻包含了豐富的顆粒物質，它所含的化學物質非常豐富，並且給予人無限的驚喜。
One is that it contains less caffeine than almost any other form of prepared coffee. True espresso must be made entirely from arabica beans, which have half the caffeine of the alternative robusta variety. In the making of a perfect espresso, too, the hot water and the coffee combine only briefly—ideally, for 30 seconds. That limits the amount of caffeine that can pass into the water. By contrast, steeped or percolated coffee made with robusta beans is very strong in caffeine.
其一是意式濃縮的咖啡因含量要少於其他任何形式製作的咖啡。真正的意式濃縮採用100%的阿拉比卡咖啡豆，這種豆子的咖啡因含量是另一咖啡品種羅布斯塔的一半。並且，在一份上好的意式濃縮製作過程中，水和咖啡粉之間的融合理論上僅持續簡短的30秒。這一過程較好地控制了咖啡因融入水中的數量。因此，若是羅布斯塔的咖啡豆，採用浸泡式或者過濾式，所製作的咖啡其咖啡因含量就相當地高了。
A second surprise is the sheer variety of chemical substances inside a single roasted coffee bean. Scientists reckon there are more than 1,200 of them, of which perhaps 700-800 are volatile compounds responsible for aroma. The espresso process releases more volatiles than other methods of preparation.
另一驚奇之處是它所含的化學物質僅存在於經過烘焙的咖啡豆中。科學家們估計它含有超過1200種物質，其中700~800種為揮發性物質，形成其特有的香氣。意式濃縮咖啡相比其它方式製作的咖啡，要釋放更多的揮發性物質。
The aroma is a vital part of perfect espresso. 「Roughly 70% of what we perceive is aroma,」 says Furio Suggi Liverani, director of research at illycaffe, 「while the remaining 30% is received by taste receptors on the tongue.」 Perfect coffee requires excellent preparation, but it also requires top-quality beans. If just one of the 50 is a dud, then that cup will be perceptibly less than perfect. The roasting must be even, and the grinding process must be finely calibrated so that the resulting coffee allows smooth passage of the hot water that extracts the flavour.
香氣是意式濃縮不可或缺的一部分。「我們所感知到的東西70%來自於香氣，」illy咖啡的調研主管稱，「剩下30%的感知來自於舌尖上的味蕾」。上好的咖啡需要卓越的技術，同時還需要精品的豆子。即使只有50/1是劣質的豆子，那也是害群之馬，會使製作出來的咖啡大大掉價。咖啡豆的烘焙亦需要適當，研磨時更需要準確地把握研磨精度以保證萃取時水流可以穩定緩慢地通過。
It has taken manufacturers decades to sort out each element in this exacting process. The biggest challenge remains avoiding dud beans. It is quite normal for a fair quality batch of green coffee (that is, coffee before roasting) to be 1-2% defective. But if two beans in 100 are duds, the chances of a bad espresso are unacceptably high. Few plantations, however, can afford the sophisticated equipment needed to create defect-free supplies. Instead, coffee companies such as illycaffe and Hausbrandt, a rival based in Treviso near Venice, have developed electronic detection systems. These use light waves to scan individual green beans, which are rejected by a puff of air if they show up as defective. Illycaffe's scanners can assess 400 beans every second.
製造商們在這個精確的過程上花了幾十年的時間來明確步驟的順序。、，而最大的挑戰是減少劣質咖啡豆的數量。在同一批次的生豆中，正常情況下劣質豆所佔比例為1-2%。但是如果100顆豆子中有2顆是壞的，那麼所製作的咖啡失敗的可能性非常大。然而，幾乎沒有一個種植園可以供得起尖端設備來創造100%優良品質的供應。反而是像illy咖啡，浩世咖啡之類的大型咖啡公司，威尼斯水城邊的特雷維索城中兩個競爭對手，擁有發達的電子檢測系統。一旦檢測出生豆有瑕疵，便會被噴出的氣流推回，然後系統便會採用光波對豆子進行掃描。Illy咖啡的掃描系統每秒鐘可以對400粒生豆進行檢測。
The final hurdle overcome by the manufacturers was the packaging and storage of espresso. Like all coffee, espresso quickly deteriorates in air. Leading companies began to experiment with making air-tight individual doses. A system developed by illycaffe uses paper pods to hold a single dose of coffee. The pods are then packed under pressure using carbon dioxide to seal out damaging oxygen. So technically demanding is the sealing process that the company had to create its own welding expertise—no supplier was up to the task.
製造廠們最後克服的困難是意式濃縮的包裝和存放。和其他的咖啡一樣，意式咖啡會在空氣中迅速變質。咖啡製造巨頭開始投資研發真空包裝的獨立包裝。之後成品將在二氧化碳環境下進行真空包裝以排出氧氣。因此在真空包裝過程中技術要求公司必須建立自身的焊接技術——而沒有供應商可以承擔起這項任務。
By contrast, Nespresso's doses are neat aluminium capsules, also kept under pressure using carbon dioxide. When inserted into the machine, the punctured capsule acts as a membrane, allowing water to flow evenly through. More ingenious still, the capsule itself has been designed to regulate the pressure pushing the water.
Nespresso公司推出了方便使用的咖啡膠囊，同樣需要在二氧化碳環境下進行壓縮。將咖啡膠囊置入咖啡機，被刺破的膠囊丸作為一層薄膜介質，使水流緩慢均勻通過。值得一提的是，咖啡膠囊本身可以控制壓力大小來推動水流。
Quality pays
質量成本
In the past two or three years, the market for espresso coffee has been growing strongly: by more than 10% a year, Nespresso reckons. But 「household penetration is low,」 says Daniel Lalonde, its commercial director, 「so there is enormous future potential.」 For instance, 70% of French people drink espresso every day, yet only 10% of French homes boast an espresso machine. Penetration in big markets such as America and Britain is far less, at around 1%.
在過去的兩到三年，意式濃縮咖啡的市場不斷壯大：Nespresso估計其每年的增長量超過了10%。「意式濃縮在家庭的普及率還是很低，」 Nespresso的主管Daniel Lalonde說，「這是一個極具誘惑的潛在市場。」比如，儘管只有10%的家庭擁有引以為傲的咖啡機的情況下，70%的法國人仍然每天都喝意式濃縮。而在美國和英國，只有1%的家庭擁有咖啡機，因此將市場滲透到這兩個國家依舊路途漫長。
The context for the growth of espresso is a big shift in the coffee market away from cheap coffee towards specialty products. Amid tales of woe from growers in developing countries, overall coffee prices have declined to record lows during 2001. Observers say a glut of cheap robusta coffee, much of it from Vietnam, which has quickly emerged as a big producer, has been largely to blame.
意式濃縮的成長背景意味著咖啡市場從廉價咖啡豆向精品豆轉變的過程。從而導致了發展中國家種植者的悲劇，所有的咖啡豆價格在2001年將到了歷史最低點。調研員稱供過於求的廉價羅布斯塔咖啡豆大部分產自維也納，由於它大量種植供應咖啡豆，然而品質卻並不讓人滿意，因此受到了大量的質疑。
The quality end of the market, however, has continued to thrive. Big buyers woo individual coffee growers, paying above-market prices to encourage quality and reliability of supply. They can afford this because margins on drinks like espresso are high. A single capsule of Nespresso contains some six grams of coffee and retails for roughly 28 cents, equivalent to around $46 per kilo. A kilo of fair-quality green coffee costs less than $1.
上層人士停止了廉價咖啡豆的採購，然後廉價咖啡豆的銷量依舊巨大。大型採購商們熱捧個體咖啡種植者，向他們支付高於市場的價格鼓勵種植並提高供應的質量和可靠性。他們願意支付這個價格因為意式濃縮的高回報率。每份Nespresso膠囊咖啡的重量大約為6g，售價在28美分左右，這意味著每千克咖啡的售價達到了46美元。而市場上這個品質的咖啡生豆每千克的採購成本低於1美元。
So where to go for guaranteed espresso perfection? Having sampled coffee all over Europe, this correspondent finally found perfection where it might be expected to reside: in the Italian home of espresso. In the heart of old Trieste is the Caffe illy, a coffee bar developed as a laboratory. The atmosphere is cosmopolitan, and the espresso is as near perfect as you can hope to find.
因此，去哪裡尋找上好的意式濃縮？在到處都是速溶咖啡的歐洲，代理商們最後找到了上好的咖啡也許會尋在於意式濃縮的故鄉——義大利。Illy咖啡，位於 Trieste城的中心，像一家咖啡實驗室。在這裡，你可以感受到世界性的氣息，並能享受到你所能遇到的最好的意式濃縮。