How to Make Traditional Roman Espresso? Lemon Coffee Making Guide - What Are the Parameters and Ratios?

Lemon is a fruit with a fresh fragrance but an extremely prominent sour taste. This flavor description also exists in coffee! When we taste a bright, uplifting acidity with a fresh aroma in a single-origin coffee, we describe this flavor profile as "lemon."

However, this flavor is merely our association. In Italy, the homeland of espresso machines, there is actually an espresso that includes lemon! By directly adding lemon juice, we can genuinely experience the fresh fruit acidity of lemon in coffee. This is Italy's "Espresso Romano"!

The origin of Espresso Romano traces back to when Italians invented coffee machines and moka pots, making coffee a part of their daily lives. However, Italy at that time had just experienced an economic crisis and was dealing with the negative impacts of world wars. Consequently, they were forced to use low-quality, dark-roasted coffee beans for coffee preparation. Harsh and bitter were the negative experiences these dark-roasted inferior beans would bring. Many people couldn't accept such impactful flavors, so they began trying to add other substances to their coffee to neutralize the bitterness.

(For reference only) We know that flavors influence and blend with each other. When one flavor dominates others, it reduces the expressiveness of other flavors, making them serve as supporting elements. Therefore, sour, sweet, and salty flavors can all suppress bitterness. Coincidentally, the Campania region in southern Italy is rich in lemon production, which led to the practice of adding lemon to espresso. (This also gave rise to the rumor that although Espresso Romano has "Rome" in its name, it might not have been invented in Rome.) Although citric acid can reduce harsh bitterness, the overly prominent sour taste became another troublesome "issue," so people then thought of adding sugar to balance it. Eventually, in addition to lemon, sugar also became an essential component of Espresso Romano. To this day, this espresso remains popular in southwestern Italy. Although there might be variations in naming, the preparation method is basically consistent. Now let's take a look at how to make this Espresso Romano!

Espresso Romano

The materials we need to prepare are simple: one espresso, one lemon, and 10g of white sugar. For the espresso, we can extract it using normal parameters! Extraction parameters are as follows: Use 20g of Warm Sun Blend coffee beans, with a powder-to-liquid ratio of 1:2, and an extraction time of 30 seconds.

After extracting the espresso, pour it into a cup containing sugar.

Then you can choose between two methods to add lemon: one is to directly squeeze out lemon juice; the other is to place a lemon slice directly into the cup, allowing the warm espresso to extract the lemon juice.

The difference between the two methods lies in the amount of lemon juice content. This choice can be made based on your coffee's roast degree. The darker the roast, the more lemon juice needed (along with increased sugar). FrontStreet Coffee uses medium-dark roasted Warm Sun Blend beans, where bitterness is not prominent. Therefore, not much lemon juice is needed for neutralization—4ml will suffice. After preparation, stir the espresso to mix all ingredients evenly, and you can start drinking!

When properly prepared, this Espresso Romano is actually quite enjoyable. The bitterness of the espresso is suppressed by the acidity, while the sharp sourness is softened by the sugar. The overall drinking experience is a pleasant sweet and sour espresso with flavor notes of whiskey aroma, butter cookies, and caramel sweetness. Friends who enjoy sour flavors should give it a try, but for those who don't like sourness, it might be best to just admire it from afar!

Important Notice :

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