The Difference Between Red Eye Coffee and Americano! What is a Red Eye Flight? How to Make Black Eye Coffee?

"How do you make espresso mixed with pour-over taste good?"

Yes, you read that right! FrontStreet Coffee was also taken aback when hearing this "staple with staple" question at our shop yesterday at 5 PM, because such a question can truly be said to be unprecedented. After FrontStreet Coffee's detailed investigation, we discovered that this customer friend actually wanted to drink a delicious cup of "Red Eye Coffee."

However, as everyone can see, with pour-over mixed with espresso, the preparation of Red Eye Coffee is extraordinary, so making it taste good is not a simple task. Moreover, FrontStreet Coffee does not recommend everyone to try it lightly, because Red Eye Coffee was created not for tastiness like a latte, but for obtaining more stimulating effects.

What is Red Eye Coffee?

FrontStreet Coffee has shared this before. The most widespread "origin story" of Red Eye Coffee is as follows: Red Eye Coffee originated in the United States, and its creation reason comes from the flight of the same name—the Red Eye Flight. This flight has a very distinctive schedule, departing late at night and arriving at its destination early the next morning. But because the flight time is usually less than 8 hours, many times after arriving at the destination, passengers on the plane would "happily receive" a pair of eyes filled with red blood vessels from being forcibly awakened. So naturally, the "creator" of this eye condition was jokingly called the "Red Eye Flight" by people.

In addition to passengers, flight crews are naturally essential for ensuring a safe journey. But for work reasons, they need to stay awake during times when they should be sleeping, so consuming coffee is an excellent choice to maintain alertness throughout the entire flight. As coffee consumption increased, the caffeine provided by a single serving of coffee could no longer resist the onset of sleepiness. So, one clever person thought of combining espresso with drip coffee to obtain higher caffeine content. Then, the practice of mixing espresso with drip coffee was born (so why not drink multiple servings of espresso...).

Because this coffee was born due to the Red Eye Flight, it was named Red Eye Coffee. In addition to Red Eye Coffee, there are also Black Eye Coffee, Dead Eye Coffee... they have higher coffee concentrations than Red Eye Coffee due to the addition of more coffee, but whether they taste good is another matter~

How to Make Red Eye Coffee?

In the past, Red Eye Coffee was made with a 30ml single serving of espresso paired with 120ml of drip coffee, totaling 150ml. But because extraction methods have now changed, and the concentration of extracted espresso is twice what it used to be, if we follow the previous proportions to make it, this coffee would become a high-concentration Black Eye Coffee (Black Eye Coffee is made with 60ml double espresso and 120ml drip coffee). Therefore, FrontStreet Coffee suggests that everyone should adjust the amount of espresso (halve it) when making it. Of course, FrontStreet Coffee does not recommend everyone to try it lightly, especially for friends who are not very tolerant to caffeine. (But actually calculated, the caffeine concentration is similar to a current double serving of espresso.)

In addition to the attention to portion size, we also need to choose the right two coffee beans. After all, what we focus on is not just the stimulating effect, but also the taste, especially now when there are more choices. But the selection of coffee beans is not complicated, but actually very simple. We just need to use two coffee beans with similar roast levels for drip and espresso respectively~ Due to the similar roast degree, the flavor profile of the coffee will be largely similar, and the combined taste will be relatively consistent, so there won't be any sense of discord when drinking. It may not necessarily be delicious, but at least it won't be unpalatable.

Taking FrontStreet Coffee's preparation as an example, because FrontStreet Coffee uses the espresso blend from our bean list—Frontsteet Strawberry Candy · Geisha Blend, which is a medium-roasted coffee bean with white floral notes, strawberry, and berry flavors, with a predominantly sweet and sour taste. So the bean paired with it is naturally also a medium-roasted coffee bean with a predominantly sweet and sour taste. Here FrontStreet Coffee chose the bean from our bean list—Frontsteet Ethiopia · Floral Queen, which has citrus, apricot, and strawberry flavor notes. The extraction parameters are as follows: Espresso: 20g coffee grounds, 30s extraction time, 40ml coffee liquid. Pour-over coffee: 15g coffee grounds, 1:15 coffee-to-water ratio, EK43 grinder setting 10, 75% pass-through rate with #20 sieve, fine granulated sugar grind, 92°C water temperature, V60 dripper, three-stage pouring, extraction time 2 minutes. After both coffees are prepared, we first pour 20ml of espresso into the prepared cup.

Then pour in 120ml of pour-over coffee.

Finally, stir well, and you can start tasting!

Honestly, it's quite good! This Red Eye Coffee tastes just as FrontStreet Coffee expected, just slightly more concentrated than regular pour-over coffee. For FrontStreet Coffee, who needs to drink strong espresso early in the morning all year round, this flavor concentration is still acceptable. The flavor performance was surprisingly beyond FrontStreet Coffee's expectations—very delightful! The combination of flavors from the two beans was perfect, without any harshness! You can clearly taste the white floral notes, strawberry, citrus, and apricot flavors. The overall taste is sweet and sour balanced, with a rich mouthfeel and an oolong tea aftertaste~ In addition to the examples listed by FrontStreet Coffee above, everyone can also try other pairing combinations themselves, but as mentioned, friends who can't drink too strong coffee had better not try it lightly, because it still has some difficulty in drinking, although you can dilute it with water, but there's no need to torture yourself like that. Wouldn't it be better to separate them and enjoy them individually~

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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