Yes, soda, cheese, chocolate... I noticed all these things too, but I figured it was just "different" around here, just a matter of taste. I have the same problems with some other foods and drinks as well... what they call "chocolate milk" here (in the US) is a joke, same for mayonnaise and even coffee. (I realize that neither the US nor European countries are native producers of coffee, but somehow something seems to go wrong during the importing and processing.)
Coffee. You're not supposed to use roast that's more than 2 weeks old. The beans in the bags on the grocery store shelves is way older than that. And ground coffee? You're not supposed to let ground coffee sit around for more than an hour. No wonder office coffee in the US all tastes bitter, sour, and stale. The grounds in those little foil packets have usually been sitting around for several months!
The entire time I've spent in Italy -- not one espresso with any trace of bitterness. Every cup of coffee was excellent to my taste.
The entire time I've spent in Italy -- not one espresso with any
trace of bitterness. Every cup of coffee was excellent to my taste."
Italian espresso is good because of consistent dosing. If you go in a coffee bar in Italy, chances are they don't have a grinder in house. They're using vacuum-sealed pre-ground coffee, and dosing very exactly before making espresso.
The industrial grinders they use to pre grind all of that espresso you were drinking give extremely consistent grinds, and the packaging lets it sit on shelves for months at a time. It's not even particularly high-quality coffee.
Don't take my word for it though:
In Italy, espresso is a mass consumption item, mostly made from
coffees of the same low quality as is found in supermarkets
everywhere. Since the aromas of such coffees are not all that
great, staling is of little consequence, while keeping doses
precise and yields high is of great consequence, since one
needs to extract every iota of caramel to make the shots
palatable. So the ground coffee sits in dosers going stale,
but is precisely dosed, 6.5 grams into single baskets, 13
into doubles.
This makes a lot of sense. My home coffee has gotten better as I've gotten more consistent with my procedure. (Fill the same kettle to the exact same point. Take it off when the whistle is just audible, move it to a cold burner, set the timer for 2 minutes...etc...)
What this also means is that I should be able to buy the same packets and have access to Italian espresso.
This also makes bad American office coffee even more exasperating. Why is it that US office coffee is so often sour and trashy tasting? Why is it that Italians can do it, but Americans fail? I suspect it's because the former population doesn't care so much.
So true. That's at least one of the reasons we load up coffee with sugar & cream in North America. In Italy I never felt like adding anything to the espresso.
But Americanos from Starbucks in Canada taste like a cup of mud, without a flavour shot or something else to mask the real taste.
