In 2010, a buddy and I spent two weeks exploring southern Mexico by motorcycle. It was a fantastic experience that I can’t recommend enough. A continual highlight of the trip was the consistently great food. Every morning we started our days with Café con leche (coffee with milk). No one ever asked how we liked our coffee or what we wanted in it. In a small Mexican restaurant, you are served your coffee the way that particular family makes it, and you’d be a fool to second guess your hosts.
This has become a staple of our weekend morning routine.
Café Con Leche
Serves 2
Ingredients
- ¼ cup unground coffee beans (enough for two strong cups)
- 2 cups water
- 1 ½ – 2 Tbsp honey
- Milk (we use 2%)
- Dash of cinnamon
Directions
We use a French press coffee maker, so if use something else, you’ll have to adjust accordingly.
- Grind the beans
- Add hot water and let sit longer than normal (you want the coffee strong)
- Put ¾ to 1 Tbsp of honey in each mug
- Fill each mug 2/3 to ¾ full of coffee
- Stir well
- Fill rest of mug with milk
- Add dash of cinnamon (optional)
- Stir well
- Place both mugs in microwave and reheat for 30 seconds
- Enjoy your awesome Saturday morning
Choosing the right beans
You really have to use a very strong very dark coffee for this. Currently we are using Kicking Horse 454 Horsepower, but previously we used Kirkland espresso beans. I think the espresso actually worked slightly better, but since we aren’t Costco members, the Kicking Horse will do (it also makes better ‘normal’ coffee than the Kirkland espresso).
Choosing the right honey
This recipe simply doesn’t taste right with generic big brand honey. You want something with a strong honey flavour. President’s Choice does a line of special honeys, and we found the Manuka honey worked really well with this. Right now we’re buying local honey at the farmers’ market and it works pretty well. Next time we’ll try buying a jar of local dark honey to see if it is even better.