JOHNNY CAFE, VIA PIETRO MARONCELLI 72, 00047 MARINO (RM)

Rating: Standard, serving a good version of Lavazza espresso

Here’s an interesting place, on the very outskirts of Rome, in Santa Maria delle Mole, just hugging the town of Ciampino. I passed by it, and thought that it might be the perfect candidate that will finally be following the Third Wave coffee trend. It’s called Johnny Cafe, has a cool retro-like US logo and the local is small, quaint and a perfect candidate to make into a coffee lab. Let’s see what they actually did with it.​

Asking for a coffee gets you the following:​

​Presentation: Nice fluted cup, short, and also a shot glass full of water. Almost the same quantity of water served as that of coffee, I liked this a lot. Yet the logo on the cup let me know immediately that this wasn’t any kind of third wave establishment… yet let’s see what they do anyway.

Temperature of Cup: The cup was warm, not scalding, and we’re off to a good start.

Quantity: The espresso was just right. It wasn’t a ristretto, but it wasn’t a double. It was spot on.

Temperature: Tasting the shot, it was good, a bit below too hot, but on the mark. It let me focus on the taste of the actual coffee.

Volume/Consistency: Ah, great. Creamy espresso. It was thick, and honed in.

Crema: The crema was persistent, and not thin. This all reflects somebody paying attention to what they’re doing. However, given that this is Lavazza coffee, the crema was quite consistent, and without much visual character.​

Odor: Dark-roasted coffee, not very fragrant, but present. This is positive.

Taste: Strong, not rancid at all, bitter, deep, and because of the consistency, quite pleasant. This was before noon, and packed quite a kick.​

​Overall: This was a good espresso, short, to the point and thought out. You’re not getting fruit, vegetables or any crazy nutty fireworks in your damned cup, but instead, a controlled dark coffee experience. Definitely worth stopping by.

The setup was nice. They had a brand new Faema semi-automatic three-group machine with Faema grinder. The above comments show that whoever honed this in, knew what they were doing, and gave a crap about the quality of the end product. ​

While not in any way a progressive coffee house, Johnny Cafe is serving good ‘Roman styled’ coffee. Way better than most things downtown.​

Johnny Cafe, JC S.R.L.

Via Pietro Maroncelli, 72

00047 Marino (RM)