As brisk fall weather rolls in, tenders of the bar reach for subtle, warming elements to keep drinks comforting. And what elixir has the perfect balance to start a day or end a night? Coffee.
From the age old film tropes of a grizzled detective spilling some unidentifiable booze into their morning cup of joe to Irish coffees developed in a San Franciscan bar in the 1940s, coffee and cocktails have a long standing history as drinking companions. After all, mixology is all about finding that sweet spot of balance in a cocktail—one in which the flavors complement each other, build and meld together into a cohesive sip, and coffee offers complexity and craveability ideal for a cocktail input.
These days it’s not just bars experimenting with espresso shots, cold-brewed coffee and nitro on their menus. Coffee shops and bespoke roasters are getting in on the action, offering creative takes on everything from Irish coffee to Black Russians. So we sat down with innovative bars and coffee houses developing programs on both fronts that leverage the caffeine-laden potion in signature sips at their establishments.
Caffeine Come-up
Deeply understanding coffee as a flavor component is a difficult undertaking due to incalculable variations in bean roasts and regions from which the beans hail. Add this intricacy to the seasonally-inspired trends in the cocktail industry, and you’ve got a recipe for something special. “Coffee is such a unique ingredient — different roasts vary in respect to acidity, brightness, floridity, earthiness, I mean, there are a million different variations of different roasts and it’s up to the bartender to choose what in that roast they want to showcase and how to use it in an interesting way,” says Lozano.
Take the recent uptick in affinity for cold press and nitro coffee that has caffeine aficionados clamoring to experience the best. “There’s endless ways to derive flavor in liquid format, and most of those ways haven’t been explored in a coffee drink yet. I’m always interested in finding new ways to pull flavor that work in the context of coffee,” says Lee Carter of Five Watt Coffee in Minneapolis, MN. Carter goes on, “Cold press is a fantastic use of coffee in cocktail and can be used in various levels of strength as a perfect cocktail mixer.” Nitro coffee is also a hot number as seen at Atlanta, GA craft cocktail house, Ration & Dram. Bar manager Kysha Cyrus is proud that they were the first in the city to make nitro coffee in-house and to use it in their cocktail creations. “[Nitro] gives the drink the creamy texture people might look for without the addition of milk or cream. No shaking. The cocktails are about showcasing the nitro coffee and not losing the spirit,” says Cyrus.
There’s even a cadre of establishments that have nixed booze in favor of virgin plays on coffee-tails that leverage syrups, shrubs and bitters to add a level of complexity. “The coffee cocktails I make at the shop are non-alcoholic and built around the naturally occurring flavor notes in each coffee,” says Lindsey Pitman of The Daily Press in Charlotte, NC. Although they intend to add some alcoholic versions in the future, Pitman notes that, “The alcohol is a flavoring ingredient – not a main focus.”
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