katie parla

Cappuccino and espresso are part of Italian culture just like pizza and pasta. But where are they from and what’s the true way to caffe’ Italiano?

Coffee is, perhaps after wine, the beverage most associated with Italy. In spite of it being synonymous with Italian culture, the caffeinated drink didn’t really take off until the early twentieth century, due to its foreign origins and status as a luxury good. This talk will chart coffee’s arrival in Italy, the aristocratic cafe culture that it fueled, and the ways in which Italian colonial campaigns in coffee’s ancestral home of Ethiopia shaped coffee’s problematic and effective marketing and publicity in Italy, catapulting it to the supremely popular drink that it is today.

Led by food writer and Italian culture expert, Katie Parla, this interactive seminar will explore coffee culture in Italy. Designed to inform curiosity as well as future travels, participants will come away with an increased understanding of how coffee came to be Italy’s national drink.