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Rating: Standard, mid-range Illy coffee
Valorani’s Caffetteria is right at the end of Via Cavour, where one meets the Roman Forum area. It’s always packed with tons of tourists, and surprisingly, a good amount of Romans that do business or still live in the vicinity. It’s name, as you see on the photos, is the quintessential definition of what a Roman café is, if you look on the right hand side of the entrance you get the following list: Caffetteria, Snack Bar, Breakfast, Drink, Gelateria, Pasta, Pizza, Tabacchi (Cigarettes), Wi-Fi. Yup, there it is, anything and everything. Nothing bad in that! The interior is quite small and just greets you with a bar that takes up all of the right hand side of the small bar. The Baristas are all roman and are glad to be speaking ‘romanaccio’ among themselves. The barista, upon hearing a fellow local just walk in and yell his order, turned around, gave him a stern look and said, how about a ‘good morning’ before that. And to me, without having he already had an espresso prepared for me, when I asked him, he turned around and pulled the espresso just shot and put it on my plate- he had me covered.
This is what he gave me:
Presentation: Yeah, look at that saucer, I can have a meal on it! It somehow reminded me of a top hat or some type of summer hat. I don’t’ know. It was fun. Obviously they ran out of saucers. No water, but since it was indeed all Roman baristas, they ‘know’ that this is kosher to ask. So I’m sure it would’ve been given.
Temperature of Cup: It was good, not scalding.
Quantity: Solid espresso, looked like a studied 30ml one ounce.
Temperature: Very good, I wasn’t burnt and I could taste it all.
Volume/Consistency: It was chalky, not necessarily thin, and yet oily.
Crema: It was dark, bitter, and non persistent. It was uniform, and didn’t look over extracted.
Odor: No odor here.
Taste: It was very bitter, almost rancid, but didn’t get there. It started off strong, then opened to a flat chalky like dark-roasted coffee taste, and then the finish, was interesting, it opened up to a buttery-nutty taste. Not bad.
Overall: It was decent Illy. It wasn’t rancid, and the finish was very cool, at least for a coffee that had all bitter punchiness at the beginning. The temperature facture was great, and well, I pleasantly surprised. My bar is very low in these touristy areas, and anything slightly above it is a major feat in my book.
The setup: Well the coffee was Illy Caffè, and the machine was what one expects, a Xp1 La Cimbali, a machine that can be honed in very finely if given the will, patience, and well… culture to do this. The grinder was a La Cimbali that is, in my opinion, quite ugly.
Valorani’s Caffetteria
Snack Bar Gelateria Valorani’s Forum S.R.L.
Largo Corrado Ricci 30
00184 Roma