While I write this blog I am sipping on my cafecito. It takes me back to my roots; clears my head and puts my thoughts at ease. I don’t do lattes, frappuccinos nor café con leche. In coffee terms a cafecito is Traditional, Cuban-style espresso is made using the darker roasts, typically either Italian or Spanish Roasts. It is identical to Italian pulls, except for the addition of sugar directly to the espresso pitcher. The heat from the coffee-making process will hydrolyze some of the sucrose, thereby creating a sweeter and slightly more viscous result than a normal pull or adding sugar at the table. I do my cafecito 75/25. 75 espresso and 25 warm milk.

I was introduced to this great drink by my uncle David who is a fanatic of the Cuban culture and not to mention their rums and ever since my first cup I’ve been hooked on this magical drink. I’ve been drinking coffee most of my life, mostly instant coffee and homemade coffee from the mountains of Nicaragua hand roasted in my grandmother’s comal but un cafecito is hands down greatest and I recommend it to everyone if you have an espresso machine try it, even if you don’t.

At any rate I am getting a little carried away. I wanted to write about this new song. Have you guys heard the new Pitbull song titled “FUN” featuring Chris Brown? The song is from Pitbul’s new album Globalization. The song is epic; it has MIAMI written all over it and you cannot talk about MIAMI without the Cubans or all the other Latin American people that reside in MIAMI , like Haitians, Nicaraguans, Brazilians, Argentineans, Dominicans, Colombians and others. Each culture apported a spice in the musical GUMBO of what we call now the MIAMI sound.

The first time I heard the song “FUN” was on television at the Billboard awards when Pitbull performed it live with Chris Brown. It reminded me of Gloria Estefan and the Miami sound machine “CONGA” song. The song FUN has rhythm, flutes, and catchy lyrics all in one bag of MIAMI swagger.
But to understand this sound is to know the history behind this sound what we call CONGA, according to the urban dictionary CONGA is a Cuban ballroom dance that consists of three steps forward followed by a kick, characteristically performed by a group following a leader in a single line but also Conga is also a drum a tall, conical, Afro-Cuban drum played with the hands. CONGA is the essential pillar of any Afro American music whether is Salsa, Merengue, or Cumbia. Any where you go in the Americas you will see how similar the sounds are because of this instrument. I can take you to Colombia, Venezuela, Brazil, Panama and Dominican Republic and you will see how the sounds are so alike.