Is Black Coffee the Same as Americano? Differences in Taste and Flavor Between Americano and Long Black

What does Americano coffee taste like? The answer is quite simple—the flavor of Americano coffee comes from the coffee beans.

Americano coffee is simple to prepare, emphasizing convenience and freedom. Compared to espresso, Americano coffee tastes relatively cleaner and better restores the original flavor of coffee beans. Therefore, Americano coffee is basically the "standard" at every coffee shop.

Some shops serve sweet and delicious Americano coffee, while others are bitter and hard to swallow. Why? What causes such huge differences? FrontStreet Coffee believes there are two main factors:

1/ The quality of coffee beans;

2/ The barista's extraction level

Americano coffee consists of espresso and water. Water is colorless and tasteless, only serving as a diluent. The quality of the taste depends on the espresso, and the flavor quality of espresso mainly depends on the coffee beans and extraction. Since the taste of Americano coffee depends on the beans used to extract espresso, a good Americano coffee should be balanced and mellow overall, without watery, bitter, or sharp acidic situations.

PS: When we taste bitterness in Americano coffee, we should consider whether the espresso was over-extracted. Sharp acidity means under-extraction, while watery taste means too much water was added.

How is Americano coffee made?

We understand that Americano coffee contains only espresso and water, so there are two main methods:

1/ Adding water to espresso;

2/ Pouring extracted espresso into water.

The former is often called Americano, while the latter is called Long Black.

Americano coffee contains only espresso and water, better restoring the coffee's flavor. The taste is not as rich and mellow as espresso, nor as difficult to accept as espresso.

Differences between Americano and Long Black

Americano coffee is made by extracting espresso first, then adding water for dilution. The ratio of espresso to water is 1:5 to 1:8. When water is added, the crema of the espresso gets dispersed, so from the first sip to the last, each sip of coffee has a similar concentration.

Long Black, on the other hand, involves adding water to the cup first, then pouring in the extracted espresso. This preserves the espresso's crema, with an espresso-to-water ratio of 1:3. Due to the different densities of espresso and water, without stirring, the richness of a cup of coffee presents a gradual process. Therefore, Long Black is most mellow and rich at the first sip, with a smooth texture from the crema, and the subsequent flavor表现 are clearer and cleaner.

Different Flavors of Americano and Long Black

At FrontStreet Coffee's stores, we use Sunflower Sunshine Blend coffee beans for daily espresso extraction. Extraction parameters are 20g of coffee grounds, extracting 40g of coffee liquid, extraction time 28 seconds. The espresso flavor shows: sherry wine aroma, soft berry acidity, vanilla cream-like texture, and hazelnut chocolate aftertaste.

Made into hot Americano coffee with a 1:6 coffee-to-water ratio, the flavor performance is: obvious and active sherry wine aroma, less noticeable berry acidity, with hazelnut and vanilla chocolate aftertaste.

Made into Long Black with a 1:3 coffee-to-water ratio, the flavor is: creamy smoothness at entry with strong sherry wine aroma, clear caramel and chocolate aftertaste, rich at entry, clean in the later section.

FrontStreet Coffee stores use double espresso when making espresso.

Choosing the Right Espresso Blend

Selecting a suitable espresso blend is also very important. Blend coffee, also called mixed coffee, involves mixing various single-origin coffee beans to fully bring out the strengths of each single-origin bean. Blend beans are made from coffee beans of different origins to create a more balanced taste.

For example, if one coffee bean has a smooth texture but lacks aroma, another bean with rich aroma can be added to complement the individual advantages of each coffee bean, either complementing or strengthening in taste, thus creating a richer new texture for espresso.

FrontStreet Coffee uses the Feima E98 espresso machine with extraction parameters:

Pressure: 9 bar

Temperature: 90.5~96 degrees Celsius

Time: 25~33 seconds

Coffee-to-water ratio: 1:1.7~1:2

Coffee amount: 12g (single espresso) 20g (double espresso)

Espresso extraction amount: 20ml (single) 40ml (double)

Next, FrontStreet Coffee will introduce you to the details of several espresso blend coffee beans from our stores.

FrontStreet Coffee believes that before blending coffee beans, one must first understand the different flavors of coffee varieties from around the world, as beans have different characteristics based on their origins. Because different coffee beans have different personalities due to different varieties and origins, with subtle differences in acidity, bitterness, sweetness, aroma, and body, single-origin coffee beans often focus more on expressing the unique characteristics of a particular type of coffee.

The advantage of post-roast blending is that it allows for complementing the flavors after roasting is complete, with the ability to fine-tune the proportion weights of coffee beans based on actual situations, presenting a stable coffee flavor.

Detailed Introduction to Espresso Bean Blending Plans (Including Specific Formulas)

What are blend coffee beans? Depending on the coffee types, blended espresso beans will have different characteristics in taste and flavor. Blend coffee beans mix coffee beans from various origins. What is the purpose of blending? One is to create a stable taste, and another is to produce flavors not found in single origins. FrontStreet Coffee currently sells several types of espresso beans, all of which are blends: Basic Blend, Specialty Blend, Commercial Blend, and Sunshine Blend coffee beans.

1/ Basic Blend Espresso Beans

Flavor: Cream, Nuts, Chocolate

Formula: 60% Brazilian coffee beans, 40% Yunnan coffee beans

FrontStreet Coffee's basic coffee beans offer excellent value for money. FrontStreet Coffee selects balanced-tasting Brazilian coffee beans and adds Yunnan coffee beans with weaker flavor than Brazilian beans for harmony. This presents the most popular taste and flavor. Whether you're new to coffee or a serious coffee enthusiast, you can easily accept this espresso bean.

This blend coffee bean is roasted medium-dark by FrontStreet Coffee. When making espresso, it has slight acidity, sweet aftertaste, and nutty notes. The overall feeling is gentle and not too stimulating. The crema is medium, which can meet most shops' daily requirements for latte production.

As mentioned above, FrontStreet Coffee's specialty espresso beans are a very stable and high-quality espresso blend, very suitable for independent coffee shops as their daily offering. FrontStreet Coffee's basic espresso beans are the second high-value choice provided by FrontStreet Coffee.

Coffee shop operations cannot be separated from costs. While reducing costs as much as possible, providing stable coffee products is what every operator hopes for. FrontStreet Coffee's basic coffee bean is a very cost-effective bean. Brazilian and Yunnan coffee beans were chosen for blending. Coffee beans from both Yunnan and Brazil origins tend toward nutty notes. Brazilian coffee beans make this basic espresso bean appear more solid in texture and rich in crema.

2/ Commercial Blend Espresso Beans

Flavor: Mellow, Nuts, Strong sweetness when paired with milk

Formula: 60% Brazilian coffee beans, 30% Colombian coffee beans, 10% Robusta

This blend tastes rich in crema and texture with caramel sweetness, also featuring nut and cocoa-like, dark chocolate flavors, with balanced sweet and sour, slightly bitter, and lasting aftertaste. The addition of a small amount of Robusta coffee beans enhances the richness of the crema, but due to the small amount, it doesn't change the flavor too much.

The reason FrontStreet Coffee named this blend "Commercial Blend Coffee Beans" is that it performs well whether making Americano or milk-based coffee, plus its price advantage makes it very suitable for commercial coffee shops. The espresso crema is very rich, with smooth and slightly bitter taste, and very mellow texture.

3/ Sunshine Blend Coffee Beans

Flavor: Dark cocoa, Citrus, Fermented wine aroma

Formula: 60% Ethiopian natural processed Red Cherry coffee beans, 40% Honduras Sherry coffee beans

In addition to the specialty blend and basic blend, FrontStreet Coffee provides a blend coffee bean with more unique flavor characteristics. FrontStreet Coffee's roasters mixed Honduras sherry barrel-aged coffee beans with natural processed Yirgacheffe Red Cherry Project coffee beans, and separately developed roasting curves for each. The ratio of the two beans is 7:3, re-presented as a blend coffee bean through post-roast blending, named "Sunshine Blend."

As specialty coffee gradually became popular, FrontStreet Coffee's baristas discovered during store operations that many customers were no longer satisfied with the stability brought by specialty blends. FrontStreet Coffee reconsidered that perhaps it was time to bring more fresh blends to liven up the store's offerings.

In 2019, this Sunshine Blend coffee bean finally made it onto FrontStreet Coffee's bean list after multiple adjustments, replacing the store's specialty blend with Sunshine Blend coffee beans. FrontStreet Coffee's baristas believe that among these three blend coffee beans, the specialty blend is for pursuing stability, the basic blend is for high value, and the Sunshine blend is for flavor choices. With different goals, they naturally suit different customers.

The unique taste of Sunshine Blend comes from its Honduras sherry barrel-aged coffee beans. After partial washed processing steps, the coffee cherries are placed in sherry barrels for low-temperature fermentation, then finally dried. This processing method gives sherry coffee beans a obvious wine aroma, while FrontStreet Coffee's roasters mixed in forty percent natural processed Yirgacheffe coffee beans to provide more acidity to the Sunshine Blend, increasing the complexity of the entire blend.

4/ Specialty Blend Espresso Beans

Flavor: Mellow, Nuts, Strong sweetness when paired with milk

Formula: 70% Brazilian coffee beans, 30% Colombian coffee beans

For customers who don't like overly strong flavors, don't love single-origin coffee, but pursue coffee quality, this specialty espresso bean would be the first choice. FrontStreet Coffee uses medium-dark roasting for this blend. With balanced-tasting Brazilian beans as the main component, complemented by Colombian beans with soft fruit acidity and nutty aftertaste, the flavor is classic.

This blend bean is also used in our own store. It has been in use from about six months after opening until now. When discussing this blend, we wanted to use American beans as the main component to enhance the nutty, sweet taste of the blend, while trying to reduce overly bitter flavors.

What is Americano Coffee?

Americano coffee originated during World War II when American soldiers in Europe couldn't get used to the extremely strong espresso, so they added water to dilute it. Therefore, Americano coffee is essentially meant to dilute the coffee concentration to a level suitable for Americans at that time.

Later, Italians immigrated to America, and Italian-style coffee shops became popular in the United States. They promoted and developed Americano coffee with espresso as the base, and also expressed the concept of diluting strong coffee by adding coffee first, then water. Until now, there isn't much emphasis on the order of making Americano coffee—it's just about whether to preserve or disperse the crema.

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Important Notice :

前街咖啡 FrontStreet Coffee has moved to new addredd:

FrontStreet Coffee Address: 315,Donghua East Road,GuangZhou

Tel:020 38364473