James Hoffmann has long had complicated feelings about the Americano. In this video, he shares techniques that make it dramatically better: heating water with the steam wand, removing the crema before dilution, and treating the Americano almost like a filter coffee. He also covers the Aerocano — a far better alternative to the iced Americano — and a filter-style espresso pull for people who like filter but only have an espresso machine.
1. Why the Americano Is Often Disappointing
Hoffmann admits the Americano is conceptually simple — espresso diluted with hot water — but rarely well-optimized. Other coffee drinks have been studied and refined for decades, while the Americano has been overlooked.
He notes that espresso uses a fine grind and very little water, which struggles to fully extract lightly roasted beans. Most espresso blends are roasted darker as a result. Diluting that espresso with hot water lowers the oil concentration and can make bitterness feel even stronger. That harsh, astringent bitterness is the heart of why Hoffmann has historically disliked the drink — and why he wants to fix it.
2. The First Optimization: Better Water
His first move is unexpected: don't use the hot water dispenser on the espresso machine. Steam-boiler water sits above boiling and concentrates over time, picking up scale and off-flavors. Hoffmann argues that fresh, just-heated water is far better — and surprisingly, water heated by the steam wand from cold is the best of all.
"Try steaming cold water hot and using it in your Americano. Just watch."
Steaming cold water to roughly 65–70°C produces an Americano with markedly less bitterness and astringency, a cleaner finish, and a smoother mouthfeel. Hoffmann hypothesizes that dissolved gases — possibly more oxygen entering the water during steaming — play a role, though he is careful to say the science isn't settled.
3. Remove the Crema: From Ridiculous to Sublime
The next trick is more controversial: remove the crema. Crema looks beautiful and signals freshness, density, and roast level, but Hoffmann insists it tastes worse than the espresso underneath. The bitterness comes from tiny coffee particles suspended in the foam, plus CO2 dissolved out of the puck under pressure.
"Crema tastes bad. It looks great, but it tastes bad."
Skim the crema before adding water and the resulting Americano is brighter, more complex, and more enjoyable. He suggests pulling a split shot, removing crema from one cup but not the other, and tasting them side by side.
4. The Vacuum Chamber Experiment
To test the dissolved-gas idea, Hoffmann puts an Americano in a vacuum chamber. As pressure drops, the boiling point falls and the drink visibly bubbles as CO2 escapes. The result tastes dramatically different — eerily silky and smooth, but he feels it actually ruins the Americano.
This contradicts the earlier finding that steamed water improves the drink, suggesting the role of dissolved gases in coffee flavor is more nuanced than "more = better." It's an open question worth more research.
5. The Aerocano: Iced Americano, Reinvented
Iced Americanos are usually too strong and too bitter. The Aerocano, which emerged in the coffee community around 2021, fixes this by steaming a mixture of espresso, ice, and cold water.
How to make one:
- Pull espresso and remove the crema. (A pinch of salt helps if bitterness is a worry.)
- Combine 85g of ice and 65g of cold water in a steaming pitcher.
- Steam for 8–10 seconds — long enough to froth, not so long that it gets warm.
- Pour into a chilled glass or over ice.
The result has a soft, foam-rich, nitro-cold-brew-like texture. Hoffmann calls the difference from a regular iced Americano "night and day," and notes it has even appeared on Starbucks Korea's menu.
6. The Steamed Hot Americano and the Filter-Style Espresso
If steam improves texture, why not use it for hot Americanos too? Hoffmann steams espresso with cold water to make a "hot nitro Americano." The result is sweet, complex, almost free of bitterness, and tastes a bit like a black coffee cappuccino.
He closes with a tip for people who love filter coffee but only own an espresso machine: combine all the tricks — steamed water, no crema — and pull a lungo with a coarser grind, getting around 60–70g of liquid from 18g of beans. The shot will be thin and watery, but that no longer matters because you'll dilute it anyway. Pair this with a lightly roasted, filter-style coffee and you get something that genuinely resembles filter coffee in cup quality.
7. Closing Thoughts
The takeaway is that small process changes — fresher water, no crema, the Aerocano method, filter-style pulls — can radically improve a drink that most cafés make on autopilot. Hoffmann encourages experimentation and reports back from anyone who tries the techniques (and anyone who knows more about dissolved gases in coffee).