The Whisking Tip To Give Your Espresso Martini A Dalgona Coffee Upgrade

We love a good espresso martini cocktail, but it doesn't hurt to upgrade it. All it takes is some fun whisking to give your next espresso martini a dalgona coffee upgrade. Dalgona coffee is a whipped coffee made with just a few ingredients: Hot water, sugar, and instant coffee powder. Using a whisk, blender, or stand mixer, whisk the ingredients until a foamy, whipped coffee "cream" forms. Then, add the dalgona cream to cold milk or plant-based milk to make dalgona coffee. To upgrade your espresso martini, simply make the dalgona cream and add it to your cocktail in dollops, as if it were whipped cream. Feel free to also pipe the dalgona cream onto your espresso martini. 

Dalgona coffee recipes went viral on social media around the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. While the recipe originated in Macau, the drink got its name because it resembles and tastes like dalgona, a type of Korean street candy.  Fans of the Netflix show "Squid Game" may be familiar after seeing people lick dalgona on the show. Creatives would whip up almost any ingredient, like matcha with coconut milk, and turn it into a "dalgona." Riding on the dalgona coffee wave, even Alton Brown had to share an easy way he amplifies the flavor of dalgona coffee. Instead of using instant coffee to make dalgona coffee, Brown uses instant espresso powder.

Making dalgona coffee usually involves using a 1:1:1 ratio (by volume) of instant coffee, hot water, and sugar. To whip it, we usually use about 2 tablespoons of instant coffee powder, which will add quite a jolt to any drink. For this reason, we advise adding just a dollop or two of dalgona coffee cream to your espresso martini so it doesn't overpower the cocktail. 

If you like to stir your drinks, mixing the dalgona coffee cream into your espresso martini would make it look more like a latte cocktail than an espresso cocktail. The cocktail is also sweeter due to the sugar added to make the whipped dalgona coffee cream. 

Variations on a simple dalgona espresso martini can include adding a truffle to the coffee cream to give the cocktail a dessert aesthetic and make it Instagrammable. Riding on this aesthetic, you can also add edible coffee bean chocolates or a coffee bean cookie on top of the dalgona coffee cream. Mix extracts or flavorings, like vanilla or hazelnut extract, into the whipped dalgona cream. For the experimental and brave souls who love sweet-savory treats, try making the viral parmesan espresso martini and top it with dalgona coffee cream. And as always, enjoy your boozy drinks responsibly.