How to Make an Einspanner at Home or for Your Café
An einspanner is espresso topped with a thick layer of cold whipped cream, served in a glass. Here's the recipe, the iced version and how to make the cream in a dispenser.
An einspanner (Einspänner in German) is a Viennese coffee made of espresso topped with a thick layer of cold whipped cream, traditionally served in a glass. The name means one-horse carriage. It’s closely related to what Australian cafés call a Vienna coffee. To make one, pour one or two shots of espresso into a glass and spoon over cream whipped to soft peaks with a little icing sugar.
It’s about as simple as café drinks get, and the cream is the only part that takes any skill. Get that right and the rest is just coffee.
The short answer
Einspanner
Coffee
One or two shots of espresso
Cream
About 60ml of cold thickened cream per drink, whipped to soft peaks
Sweetener
Icing sugar in the cream, not in the coffee
Served in
A heatproof glass
Hot or iced
Traditionally hot coffee with cold cream, and plenty of cafés now serve it iced
Where the einspanner comes from
Einspänner is the German word for a carriage pulled by a single horse. The drink was made for the drivers of those carriages in 19th century Vienna, and the layer of cream on top kept the coffee warm for longer on cold days. It soon moved off the street and became a staple of Vienna’s coffee houses, and it’s still on their menus today.
The recent comeback started in South Korea. In the 2020s, Korean cafés built a whole range of cream topped drinks around it, from iced coffee to matcha lattes, and the style travelled from there. In Melbourne, Broadsheet traces the trend to early 2022, when Good Measure in Carlton had a hit on TikTok with its Mont Blanc, an iced filter coffee under a head of cream.
Einspanner vs Vienna coffee vs latte
Drink
What’s in it
Einspanner
Espresso with a thick cap of whipped cream, served in a glass
Vienna coffee
The name Australian cafés often use for strong coffee topped with whipped cream, sometimes dusted with cocoa
Melange
A Viennese espresso with a little water and milk foam, closer to a cappuccino
Latte
Espresso with steamed milk and no cream at all
The easy way to remember it is that an einspanner has no milk. All the richness comes from the cream sitting on top.
How to make an einspanner at home
What you need
One or two shots of espresso, or strong coffee from a plunger or moka pot
About 60ml of cold thickened cream per drink
Icing sugar
A few drops of vanilla, if you like it
Cocoa powder for dusting, also optional
A heatproof glass
Whip the cream
Use thickened cream at 35 per cent fat or higher. Light thickened cream won’t hold a foam, and if yours goes flat, our guide on why cream won’t whip covers the usual reasons.
Whisk the cold cream with a teaspoon or two of icing sugar and the vanilla until it reaches soft peaks. That means it’s thick and holds a shape for a second before the tip flops over. Stop there. Stiff cream sits on the coffee in a lump, while soft cream settles into a smooth, even layer.
Whisking 60ml by hand is fiddly, so it’s easier to whip a bigger batch and keep the rest in the fridge.
Build the drink
Pull the espresso straight into the glass.
Spoon the cream over gently so it floats instead of sinking. Pouring it over the back of a spoon helps.
Dust with cocoa if you want, and serve straight away.
Try it before you stir. Sipping hot coffee through a layer of cold, sweet cream is the whole point of the drink.
The iced einspanner
Cream topped iced coffee is what kicked off the trend in Melbourne. Pour espresso over ice, or use cold brew instead, and top it with the same soft whipped cream. Our nitro cold brew guide explains how to make cold brew at home if you want to go that way.
For a matcha version, swap the coffee for a matcha latte and top it with plain or matcha whipped cream.
Making einspanner cream in a dispenser
A cream dispenser takes the guesswork out of the cream. There’s no whisking and no risk of taking it too far, and the cream is ready to go straight from the fridge.
Pour cold thickened cream, a little icing sugar and a few drops of vanilla into a 500ml dispenser, up to the fill line.
Screw on the head and charge it with one 8g cream charger.
Shake it four or five times, then dispense a little to check. For a softer cream that settles onto the coffee like soft peaks, start with fewer shakes and add one at a time until it’s right.
Dispense straight onto the coffee and put the dispenser back in the fridge.
A 500ml fill makes around a litre of whipped cream. At about 60ml of liquid cream per drink, that’s roughly eight einspanners. Cream sealed in the dispenser gives you three to five days of good cream in the fridge, and our guide to how long whipped cream lasts explains why.
For a café, the cream is where time goes. Whipping small batches by hand in the middle of a rush is slow, and the texture changes every time. A loaded dispenser in the fridge means the cream is ready the moment the shot is, and the glasses come out far more consistent.
It’s a Viennese coffee made of espresso topped with a thick layer of cold whipped cream, traditionally served in a glass.
Is an einspanner the same as a Vienna coffee?
They’re very close. Einspanner is the Austrian name for espresso under whipped cream. In Australia, Vienna coffee is the café name for strong coffee topped with whipped cream, often dusted with cocoa.
How do you pronounce einspanner?
Roughly EYEN shpen er. The German spelling is Einspänner.
Is an einspanner hot or cold?
The traditional version is hot espresso with cold cream on top. Plenty of cafés now serve it iced too, with espresso over ice or cold brew under the cream.
What cream is best for an einspanner?
Thickened cream at 35 per cent fat or higher, whipped to soft peaks with a little icing sugar. It needs enough fat to hold a layer on top of the coffee without sinking.
How much cream goes on an einspanner?
About 60ml of liquid cream per drink, which whips up to a generous layer for one glass.
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