The long black: will this soon be the UK’s favourite coffee order?
Fans of the drink, brewed differently from an americano, say its taste is vastly superior – and are turning a niche product into a bestsellerIf you’re a regular at specialist coffee shops in the UK – the kind where baristas carefully weigh out your grounds on tiny hypersensitive scales and practically frogmarch you from the premises if you order syrup – you may have noticed that americanos have fallen out of favour. In these fancier coffee spots, everyone’s dependable, unfussy go-to is being eclipsed by a newer import from Australia and New Zealand: the long black.Conducting an unofficial survey of coffee spots, I noticed nearly every barista had a slightly different explanation of the drink. “It’s basically exactly the same as an americano,” one whispered conspiratorially. “It’s a shorter black coffee, the same size as a flat white,” explained another. The final barista I spoke to just shook her head in quiet disappointment when I asked if long black was just a more pretentious way of asking for an americano. Continue reading...
![The long black: will this soon be the UK’s favourite coffee order?](https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/d19115395feef9de38c061807df6ec06f7f16e43/28_290_4914_2948/master/4914.jpg?width=140&quality=85&auto=format&fit=max&s=be5901575f48fdd35b1d09d4f2ae1ac8#)
Fans of the drink, brewed differently from an americano, say its taste is vastly superior – and are turning a niche product into a bestseller
If you’re a regular at specialist coffee shops in the UK – the kind where baristas carefully weigh out your grounds on tiny hypersensitive scales and practically frogmarch you from the premises if you order syrup – you may have noticed that americanos have fallen out of favour. In these fancier coffee spots, everyone’s dependable, unfussy go-to is being eclipsed by a newer import from Australia and New Zealand: the long black.
Conducting an unofficial survey of coffee spots, I noticed nearly every barista had a slightly different explanation of the drink. “It’s basically exactly the same as an americano,” one whispered conspiratorially. “It’s a shorter black coffee, the same size as a flat white,” explained another. The final barista I spoke to just shook her head in quiet disappointment when I asked if long black was just a more pretentious way of asking for an americano. Continue reading...