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| Espresso machines have been around for a long time, but how did they were invented? |
The espresso: the base drink of every non-filter coffee. The purest state of the beverage, and the key to understanding Italy’s (and most Europe’s) coffee culture. By giving us the espresso shot, Italy is the progenitor of both the second and third wave. This beautiful country redefined what coffee means.
Yet drinking coffee in Italy differs from doing so in the rest of the world: specialty coffee has struggled to take hold and big chain cafés have failed to gain a foothold. And to understand the reasons behind this, we need to look at how the modern espresso came into being and how that reshaped Italy’s culture and identity.
That Coffee Roasters Presents: An Espresso History
Back in the 19th century, coffee was a major flourishing business in Europe with cafes sprouting across the continent. But coffee brewing was a slow process around that time and, as is still the case today, customers often had to wait for their orders. Seeing this necessity as an opportunity, inventors all over Europe began to explore ways of using steam machines to reduce brewing time, this was, after all, the age of steam.
Though there were surely countless patents and prototype gadgets, the invention of the machine and the method that would lead to espresso is usually attributed to Angelo Moriondo (Turin, Italy), who was granted a patent in 1884 for “new steam machinery for the economic and instantaneous confection of coffee beverage”. This machine consisted of a large boiler, heated to 1.5 bars of pressure, that pushed the water through a wide bed of coffee grounds on demand, with a second, smaller boiler producing steam that would flash the bed of coffee and complete the brew. Though Moriondo’s invention was the first coffee machine that used both water and steam, it was purely a prototype brewer created for the Turin General Exposition.
Not much more is known about Moriondo, there aren’t even photographs of his work. With the exception of this patent, Moriondo has been almost lost to history. The two men who would improve on Morinodo’s design to produce a single serving espresso would take a different approach.
Luigi Bezzerra and Desiderio Pavoni (also Italians) were the real inventors of espresso. Milanese manufacturer and a “maker of liquors” of sorts, Luigi Bezzera had the intel in this matter. He invented single-shot espresso in the early years of the 20th century while researching for a method of quickly brewing coffee directly into the cup. He made several improvements to Moriondo’s prototype, introduced the portafilter, as many other innovations still associated with espresso machines today.
On the other hand, Bezzera’s original patent, also compound of a big boiler with a built-in burner chamber filled with water was heated until it pushed water and steam through a tamped batch of ground coffee. For the first time, a cup of coffee was brewed to order in a matter of seconds. But Bezzera’s machine was heated over an open flame, which made it more difficult to control pressure and temperature that it is nowadays, and almost impossible to produce a consistent brew. Looking for funds to further develop his inventions, Bezzera turned to his friend Desiderio Pavoni.
Pavoni bought Bezerra’s patents in 1903 and improved many aspects of the design. As of his first improvement, he invented the first pressure release valve. Pavoni also created the steam wand to access the built-up steam that collected inside the machine’s boiler. Bezzera and Pavoni then worked together to perfect their machine, which Pavoni dubbed “The Ideale”.
At the 1906 Milan Fair, the two inventors introduced the world to “Cafeé Espresso”. Bezzera, despite he may have even built Pavoni’s first machines, lost the spotlight as Pavoni continued to familiarize Italy with his new brand “espresso”. After the Milan Fair, similar espresso machines began to appear throughout the country, and Bezzera’s early prototype machine evolved into the elaborately gilded titans that look almost otherworldly.
These machines could produce up to 1000 cups of coffee per hour, but relied on steam and steam alone, which had the unfortunate side effect of imbuing the coffee with a burnt or bitter taste and could only accumulate, two bars of atmospheric pressure at some cases, far from what is to be considered espresso by today’s standard.
As electricity started to replace gas and Art Deco was the chicest thing, substituting the chrome-and-brass aesthetic of the early 20th century, the espresso machines became smaller and more efficient, but no coffee innovators managed to create a machine that could brew with more than 1.5-2 bars of pressure without burning the precious brew.
Among Pavoni’s growing competition was Pier Teresio Arduino. Arduino was an inventor determined to find a method of making espresso that didn’t depend exclusively on steam. Even though he thought of incorporating screw pistons and air pumps into the machines, he was never capable to implement his ideas to the extent he intended.
Arduino was a pretty good businessman and marketer, more so than Pavoni himself. He built a marketing machine around espresso, which included directing graphic designer Leonetto Cappiello to create the famous espresso poster that captured the very essence of espresso and the speed of the belle epoque. In the 1920s, Arduino had a much larger coffee shop than Pavoni’s in Milan and, as a result of his production capabilities and marketing wisdom, was largely responsible for exporting machines out of Milan and spreading the espresso across the rest of Europe. Meanwhile, the man that resolved the two-bar brewing issue was Milanese café owner Achille Gaggia.
Gaggia introduced the lever-driven machine. In Gaggia’s machine, invented after World War II, steam pressure in the boiler forces the water into a special cylinder where it’s further pressurized by a spring-piston lever operated by the barista.
Not only did this obviate the need for massive boilers, but it also increased the water pressure from 1.5-2 bars to 8-10 bars, a major advance on this matter. The lever machines also standardized the size of the espresso. The cylinder on lever groups could only carry an ounce of water, limiting the volume that could be used to make an espresso. With the lever machines, also came some new vocabulary: baristas operating Gaggia’s spring-loaded levers coined the term “pulling a shot” of espresso.
But perhaps the game changer was that with the invention of the high-pressure lever machine came the discovery of crema, that is the foam floating over the coffee liquid that is the defining characteristic of a quality espresso. A historical anecdote claims that early consumers were dubious of what they called “scum” floating over their coffee until Gaggia began referring to it as “cafe creme”, suggesting that the coffee was of such quality that it produced its own creme, thus making it even more original and exclusive. With high pressure and its golden crema, Gaggia’s lever machine marks the birth of the contemporary espresso.
The rest is history. Brought up for you directly from That Coffee Roasters, all questions are important in our community, and we are glad to answer all of them, so don’t be shy and leave them in the comment section as well as don’t forget to follow us on our social networks.
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| An espresso has crema, a body, and a heart! |
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