Osmanthus Latte Recipe and Flavor Profile: How to Make Osmanthus Cold Brew and Osmanthus Americano

Autumn Coffee Series with Osmanthus Flowers

On August 7th, the words "立秋" (Beginning of Autumn) on the calendar announced the arrival of fall. Just as the coconut coffee series shone during summer, autumn also has its own seasonal specialties. Today, FrontStreet Coffee is bringing out some signature techniques to share with everyone a coffee series perfect for autumn!

While we call these "special creations," they're essentially our regular coffee base enhanced with elements that represent autumn. After all, coffee flavor remains the priority, so FrontStreet Coffee takes a conservative approach, striving not to compromise the original coffee taste. For this series, we'll once again be using osmanthus flowers – an ingredient that has appeared multiple times in FrontStreet Coffee's articles!

Since autumn is precisely when osmanthus flowers bloom profusely, they serve as perfect representatives of the season. The fragrance of osmanthus also pairs beautifully with coffee, creating a seamless harmony that makes it incredibly suitable for coffee infusion. Without further ado, let's dive into making osmanthus coffee!

First Option: Osmanthus Cold Brew

Although autumn has arrived, as we all know, Guangdong's weather remains quite hot. Therefore, cold brew coffee continues to be a favorite for many. When infused with osmanthus, it offers a completely different delicious experience. Today, FrontStreet Coffee's first featured creation is "Osmanthus Cold Brew"!

The preparation method is incredibly simple – just add some osmanthus flowers to your regular cold brew ingredients and let them steep together! However, there's one important consideration: bean selection.

The fragrance of osmanthus is rich but not overpowering, making it more suitable for coffee beans with lower acidity and deeper, more composed aromas. Therefore, medium and dark roast beans are our primary selection criteria! Today, FrontStreet Coffee is using Honduras Sherry beans, because the Sherry has a very rich wine-like aroma that, when combined with osmanthus, creates a fragrance reminiscent of osmanthus wine (a type of fermented osmanthus beverage). Extraction parameters are as follows: 25g coffee (for one serving), 1:10 coffee-to-water ratio, 2g osmanthus flowers, refrigerated for 8 hours.

The preparation process is simply finding a sealed container, adding the ingredients in sequence, sealing it, and placing it in the refrigerator. After the time is up, you can take it out and filter!

The filtered osmanthus cold brew has an incredibly rich aroma – not just whiskey fragrance but also osmanthus notes. Due to the high concentration ratio, it needs to be diluted with ice cubes. You can add ice according to your preference! After dilution with ice, the coffee flavors begin to emerge, perfectly complemented by the subtle osmanthus fragrance.

Second Option: Osmanthus Americano

Americano coffee is simply made by pouring water into espresso, so there are no elements that might mask the coffee flavor. Therefore, we have two preparation methods. One is simpler – directly sprinkling osmanthus flowers on the coffee puck before extraction.

The advantage of this method is its simplicity and convenience, producing espresso that naturally carries osmanthus fragrance. The downside, however, is that it can easily cause channeling effects, and although the espresso may have osmanthus aroma, it might not taste good (probability-wise).

The second method involves first extracting the espresso, then using this shot to steep osmanthus flowers for one minute before filtering. The advantage of this approach is that it doesn't cause differences in coffee extraction, but the disadvantages are also obvious: first, the process is more complicated, and second, some of the coffee's flavor may be lost.

Therefore, the choice is entirely up to personal preference! Once we've made the osmanthus-infused espresso, we add a certain ratio of hot water to create an Americano. Since FrontStreet Coffee wants the Americano to have good strength, we're using a 1:4 ratio – that is, 40ml of espresso poured into 160ml of hot water. Stir well and it's ready to drink!

Since FrontStreet Coffee used Warm Sun Blend for the espresso extraction, this Americano delivers whiskey notes, buttery cookie flavors, with intertwined osmanthus fragrance – quite delightful!

Third Option: Osmanthus Latte

If we were to make a latte using osmanthus-steeped espresso like in the Americano, the milk flavor could easily overpower the osmanthus fragrance. Therefore, we need to find alternative ways to incorporate osmanthus flavor into the latte! After testing at FrontStreet Coffee, there are currently two options for making osmanthus latte: one with added syrup, and one sugar-free version without syrup!

First, let's discuss the sugar-free version. The sugar-free method involves "cold pre-steeping" osmanthus flowers with milk, allowing the osmanthus flavor to infuse into the milk, so we don't have to worry about the osmanthus taste being masked. FrontStreet Coffee uses a ratio of 100:1 – meaning 1g of osmanthus flowers per 100ml of milk. After mixing, place in the refrigerator to steep for two hours (longer steeping may cause bitterness).

After steeping, take it out and filter, then proceed with making the latte! The ratio and preparation method are the same as regular lattes. FrontStreet Coffee uses a 1:5 ratio (for hot latte). Here we extracted 40ml of espresso, so we'll use 200ml of osmanthus-infused milk. The process is: first extract the espresso, then steam the milk, then combine and create latte art! Finally, FrontStreet Coffee suggests sprinkling a little osmanthus in the center of the latte surface to enhance the osmanthus aroma experienced while drinking, making the experience even richer!

Next up is the syrup version! This is actually very simple – just add 10ml of osmanthus syrup to the regular latte preparation! Similarly, sprinkle some osmanthus on top after completion to enhance the aroma.

Compared to the sugar-free version, this latte with osmanthus syrup is sweeter and has more prominent fragrance. The only drawback is that it's not suitable for those who dislike sugar, and it lacks some naturalness in flavor.

That concludes all the content for today! If you have other autumn-appropriate specialty coffees, feel free to share them in the comments section~

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