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Rating: Standard, mid to low end Roman coffee
The Roma Lazio Bar Caffè gives me the impression that it’s a place where people come together. Like the fans of the Roma and the fans of the Lazio football teams here in Rome. It was packed with Italians and tourists and its right next to the Manzoni exit of the metro in the Esquilino neighborhood. The cashier was a young stylish lady with a few tattoos to put an edge to her look, and the barista was a bit harder, more tougher woman who appreciated when I ‘could I please’ and ‘thanks’ to her service. She was concentrated on kicking out all the espresso possible in the shortest amount of time. A simple ‘thank you’ got her to relax and realize that some folks appreciate her work. It’s like that here in Rome, cafes are ultra fast, no lounging about, nothin’ of that… The interior of the local offered some seating room, it’s somewhat L-shaped interior having a few tables here and there towards the right hand side of the place, on the outside there was a table with some empty chairs, it was darn hot and too much street traffic to want to sit right at the foot of busses passing buy.
This is what she gave me:
Presentation: Nice cup, barrel shaped and a bit think. I looks dirty, but that’s the spiddle from the espresso machine after the ‘off’ button has been pressed. This will give us some clues to the stuff in the cup.
Temperature of Cup: Cup was warmer than usual, I had to wait a bit for it to cool down.
Quantity: It was a good 5ml shorter than a 30ml (1 ounce) espresso. I was glad, it wasn’t ristretto because it should have been a tad shorter, but boy, I was glad she kept it short. If you look so closely, just above where the crema line is, there’s another faint line in the cup that says where the ‘espresso’ should be cut off. That’s the Negresco folk helping out baristas who don’t weigh their espresso (nobody weights the espresso here.)
Temperature: By the time I had it, temperature was good and drinkable.
Volume/Consistency: It was a thin, silky and somewhat powdery consistency, not bad, but neither ultra slick either.
Crema: The crema was dark, persistent, not very thick, and not very oily. I didn’t feel it added to the drinking experience.
Odor: No real coffee odor that I could sense. A hint of darkly roasted coffee but not much more.
Taste: It had a strong bitter punch, that immediately opened to a tangy sweet-like sensation. It was flat at the mid taste, and then finished with a somewhat rancid-like taste at the end. It wasn’t rancid, just very bitter drop off.
Overall: It was an OK coffee, the beans don’t give much for a barista to do. I think that this coffee was light as it was because the beans are so darkly roasted, and also because there was not enough coffee in the porta filter. This is pervasive here in Rome. Skim on the grinds. But it wasn’t a bad coffee, I would say straight mid to low end.
The setup: They had a Faema E-nova espresso machine that I don’t find particularly good looking, but gets the job done. The had a Mazzer Super Joly grinder which is very dependable, and the the coffee is Negresco Caffè, a local Roman roaster of very dark-roasted coffee.
Roma Lazio Snack Bar Caffè
Viale Manzoni 35
00185 Roma
Tel. 06 7725 0925