If you have the luck to visit Tuscany, do not miss this bar located in Lucignano in Arezzo provincia. The barrista and owner is a very cool guy and he will provide you not only a perfect espresso cup but even his new and home made Tris caffè which is a blend of coffee cream, espresso and panna... He uses coffee from a reknown Arezzo roaster, Sandy caffèhttp://www.sandy.it. A fantastic 2 groups Faema E61 reedition is helping him to achieve the drinks. We had a "little" talk about how the weather and the water affects the quality of the espresso and how he is playing with the grinder all day long to maintain the perfection of the shot. It was like if TMC was no more a virtual group
Oh and he is using a tamper and most of the bar where I had a good espresso are too. So I was wrong when I said the opposite some months ago in a discussion. A little kick on the portafilter and then a not so big push on the grounds, they all do it the same way. Another good bar is in Monte Sansavino but can't remember, he's using illy beans and a La Cimbali machine.
As we were in a bed and breakfast room for one week, I had to eat in restraurants 2 times a day and I found a rule. You only drink good coffee in bars. Restaurants don't care, their coffee is as bad as in France and in some cases it is even worst as the roast is more appropriate to espresso.
Another thing that makes me mad is the new cup you tend to find more and more in bars. I didn't take a picture but are like a plate, instead of making a circle of 3cm of diameter they are 6 or 7 cm of diameters and then shorter. Everytime I encountered these cups, the coffee was crap, coincidence ?
Anyway, I am very happy to have met this barrista (Andrea) in Lucignano and hope he'll be able to take a look at TMC, but he has problems with english, so... I'll write a littlle article about the bar and maybe we could create the italian section with it ?
