Italians love their coffee!  There is no doubt about it, especially when the most popular drinks in all the big coffee chains all have Italian derived names.

What we are going to talk about here are the 2 most popular Italian Coffee drinks; Espresso (properly known as Caffe Espresso) and Cappuccino.

Espresso.

Espresso is a concentrated cup of coffee that is normally served in a demitasse in amounts of about 1-1.5 oz servings.  This is about 1/5th of a typical cup of drip coffee that you would be served in a restaurant or that you would enjoy at home.   Espresso is made by forcing hot water through finely ground coffee beans under high pressure in specific machines designed for the sole purpose of making Espresso and Cappuccino.  The result is a coffee that is much stronger in flavour, thicker in consistency and has a higher caffeine content by volume compared to a typical cup of drip brewed coffee. 

Cappuccino.

Cappuccino is an espresso based hot beverage that starts off as an espresso shot served in a larger cup where hot milk and frothed milk is added to it.  When served it is very common that a dusting of chocolate or cinnamon is added on top of the frothed milk.  A traditional cappuccino serving size is about 6 oz, where coffee to milk ratio is usually around 25:75.