Heart Coffee and Roasting, Portland Oregon. Roasts and serves single origin espresso drinks, siphon pot coffee, selected teas and pastries. Fresh beans available daily.
The skim remains controversial. Crema has always been viewed as the best indicator of a good shot of espresso. I would encourage one to view a blog post from the coffee collective:
James Hoffman gives a wealth of information as well, so check out his blog too:
http://www.jimseven.com/2009/07/06/video-1-crema/
I’m definitely not going to argue with anyone who loves their crema. Crema can give the espresso body and definitely gives the espresso a beautiful color. However, crema can also give the espresso bitterness. I suppose it also depends on the sort of americano you are looking for. Some prefer to have their americanos resemble a ten ounce mug of drip or french press coffee. On the other hand there are those that prefer a cleaner, but softer, americano; the first skimmed americano I had resembled a fruit juice. We have conducted different triangulations involving skimmed and unskimmed americanos. Consistently we have found the cleaner americano to be the skim. I recommend the skim, but as mentioned before, I won’t force a skim on anyone. Furthermore, I do not recommend the procedure for any americano larger than eight ounces. To anyone that has received a skimmed americano and didn’t ask for one, we apologize, and to anyone who didn’t enjoy the skim, we apologize. But to those that loved the skim, boy isn’t that tasty?
The skim
The skim remains controversial. Crema has always been viewed as the best indicator of a good shot of espresso. I would encourage one to view a blog post from the coffee collective:
http://coffeecollective.blogspot.com/2008/04/does-good-espresso-need-crema.html
James Hoffman gives a wealth of information as well, so check out his blog too:
http://www.jimseven.com/2009/07/06/video-1-crema/
I’m definitely not going to argue with anyone who loves their crema. Crema can give the espresso body and definitely gives the espresso a beautiful color. However, crema can also give the espresso bitterness. I suppose it also depends on the sort of americano you are looking for. Some prefer to have their americanos resemble a ten ounce mug of drip or french press coffee. On the other hand there are those that prefer a cleaner, but softer, americano; the first skimmed americano I had resembled a fruit juice. We have conducted different triangulations involving skimmed and unskimmed americanos. Consistently we have found the cleaner americano to be the skim. I recommend the skim, but as mentioned before, I won’t force a skim on anyone. Furthermore, I do not recommend the procedure for any americano larger than eight ounces. To anyone that has received a skimmed americano and didn’t ask for one, we apologize, and to anyone who didn’t enjoy the skim, we apologize. But to those that loved the skim, boy isn’t that tasty?