Caffè americano (Spanish: café americano; lit. 'American coffee'), also known as americano or American, is a type of coffee drink prepared by diluting an espresso shot with hot water at a 1:3 to 1:4 ratio, resulting in a drink that retains the complex flavors of espresso, but in a lighter way. Its strength varies with the number of shots of espresso and the amount of water added. The name is also spelled with varying capitalization and use of diacritics: e.g., "café americano". In Italy, caffè americano may mean either espresso with hot water or long-filtered coffee, but the latter is more precisely called caffè all'americana (lit. 'American-style coffee').

Origin

Americano means 'American' in Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese. Some assert the term entered the English language from Italian in the 1970s. Caffè americano specifically is Italian for "American coffee". There is a popular belief that the name has its origins in World War II when American G.I.s in Italy diluted espresso with hot water to approximate the coffee to which they were accustomed. However, the Oxford English Dictionary cites the term as a borrowing from Central American Spanish café americano, a derisive term for mild coffee dating to the middle of the 1950s. Its first use in English appears in the Jamaican newspaper, the Sunday Gleaner, in 1964. The term caffè americano entered Italian later than the English or Spanish uses, perhaps as a borrowing from one of the two languages.

Preparation

The drink consists of a single shot of espresso mixed with added water. Typically about 120 ml-180 ml of hot water mixed with the espresso. Long black is an Australasian drink similar to the americano (in contrast to short black for espresso), with an emphasis being placed on the order of preparation, adding water to the cup first before pouring one or two espresso on top. In the western U.S., Italiano sometimes refers to a short americano with equal amounts of espresso and water (lungo). The hot water can be drawn directly from the machine used to brew the espresso, as water or steam, or from a separate water heater or kettle.

Variations