Carajillo how to make it perfect and traditional at home. A carajillo coffee is a drink that consists of mixing hot coffee with an alcoholic drink. The most common is brandy or cognac but it can also be made with rum, aniseed, pomace or whiskey.
In Spain, the consumption of this type of mixture is very common, so depending on the geographical area in which we are, we can find different versions of the traditional carajillo. In the Basque Country and Navarra they have the coffee patardun. In Catalonia it is known as scampi. In the Balearic Islands and Valencia as rebentat (popped) or creamet (burnt). The latter consists of coffee with rum or brandy, sugar, cinnamon sticks and citrus peel, and as its name suggests, the liquor is burned to evaporate the alcohol it contains.
Whether or not the liquor is burned to make the carajillo, the really important thing is to find the more balanced ratio of coffee and alcohol to make the experience as pleasant as possible. The ideal is to add around 2 parts of coffee to 1 part of alcohol, but these measurements may vary slightly depending on whether we like it more or less loaded.
For achieve that the 3 layers are perfectly differentiated that make up the carajillo, which are foam, coffee and liquor, one of the tricks is to dissolve the sugar in the liquor, previously heated. With this, we will be able to increase the density of the alcohol. Another trick is to pour the coffee over the liquor using a teaspoon, this way the coffee will not fall so hard and both liquids will be perfectly separated.
And finally, a note that I find interesting to emphasize, a carajillo is not a carajillo if you add ice. Did you know?
recipe information
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- Preparation time: 4 minutes
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- cooking time: 1 minute
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- total time: 5 minutes
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- rations: 1
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- Category: drinks
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- type of cuisine: Spanish
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- Calories per serving (kcal):98
Carajillo ingredients for 1 person
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- 35 ml of alcoholic beverage (brandy, cognac, whiskey, anise, pomace, rum…)
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- 1 spoon of sugar
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- 70 ml of coffee
How to make a carajillo
To make a carajillo in the most traditional way, without burning the alcohol, the first thing we have to do is heat 35 ml of the chosen alcoholic beverage. This time we are going to use brandy, along with 1 tablespoon of sugar. To do this, if we do not have an espresso machine with a vaporizer, we can heat the mixture of liquor and sugar for 30 seconds in the microwave. Next, we mix both ingredients well until the sugar dissolves.
Next, we make a coffee using the method that we like the most, either with an espresso machine, Italian coffee maker, drip or capsules. Once we have 70 ml of freshly made coffee, we pour it into the liquor glass, putting a teaspoon in the glass so that the coffee does not fall directly on the liquor. We do this step so that the layers of both liquids look well differentiated. We serve the carajillo coffee immediately
Easy preparation summary
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- Heat one part brandy with the sugar and mix until dissolved
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- Make two parts of coffee, add it to the brandy using a teaspoon and serve immediately
