Flowing Flavors -- With A Good Deal Of Science, Seattle's Da Vinci Is Performing The Art Of Making Flavored Syrups

Nov 11, 1998

Judith Blake

Seattle Times Staff Reporter

The door is plain, unmarked, giving no hint of what's behind. Greg Davenport pulls it open and instantly a rich, sweet fragrance engulfs us: the scent of almond syrup.

It is the aroma of small pleasures. We've entered the domain of Da Vinci Gourmet Ltd. in South Seattle, where today shiny steel machines are filling bottles with clear almond syrup. Another time, the flowing flavor might be raspberry, hazelnut, peppermint, lime or any of numerous others.

If you've ever set foot in an espresso bar you've seen and maybe tasted what they make here: flavoring syrups that go into countless lattes and other coffee drinks in Seattle and across the country.

They're the jewel-hued liquids in elegant bottles you see lining the barista's counter. And they are more: part of the aura of affordable pampering that lures us into coffee bars, as well as testimony to the hidden art of flavor "building."

Da Vinci, which Davenport and company president William Cotter co-founded nine years ago, is one of the country's top manufacturers of flavoring syrups, along with such competitors as San Francisco-based Torani Italian Syrups and Monin Inc. syrups, made in Florida.

Though Da Vinci expects its sales to exceed $10 million this year, not all companies will release sales figures, so who's at the top is uncertain.

What is certain is that the syrups' success is stuck fast to fancy-coffee sales - even though they also flavor Italian sodas and

are promoted for home use, too, as in shakes, smoothies, desserts, cocktails and more.

Torani got started in 1925, but the company's most amazing growth surge came after espresso hit the big time; sales multiplied by 15 times between 1990 and 1996, says a Torani spokeswoman.

Da Vinci was launched in 1989 - just in time to ride coffee's rising wave. Now, the company is a major Torani rival, says Davenport, Da Vinci's vice president.

Not every java junkie wants flavoring syrup splashed into a double-tall latte. In fact, most don't. The Specialty Coffee Association says customers request a syrup in about one out of five espresso orders - and that includes mochas, which by definition are made with chocolate syrup. Still, it's enough to keep syrup flowing in the factories.

Hidden within the syrups are the secrets of making these flavored liquids, whose chief ingredients are water, sugar, flavorings and sometimes colorings and preservatives.

"People think it's glorified Kool-Aid, which it is, but it's not easy to do," says Davenport, dressed casually this day in gray shorts, a gray-and-white print shirt and tennis shoes.

Getting the right mix

One of the trickiest parts of the trade is making a super-clear syrup whose ingredients will stay in solution - neither sinking to the bottom nor rising to the top - for at least two years.

Most flavorings come from oils, which want to float. Some others, such as cinnamon, are relatively heavy and sink.

The Da Vinci people solved this problem with multiple filterings that reduce the ingredients to ever-finer particles that won't separate out.

Davenport is clearly proud of the results, pointing out that you can see a cloud of particles near the bottom of some other brands' syrups, but never in a Da Vinci bottle.

"I have the very first bottle of almond-flavored syrup that I made (10 years ago), and it's still good," with no sign of separation, he says.

Just as tricky is the art and science of building a perfect flavor - Davenport's specialty. He comes by the knack naturally, as part of a Seattle family known for its flavor talents, particularly in the realm of chocolate. Greg's brother, Dana, heads the locally famous Dilettante Chocolates, which Greg helped him start in the late 1970s. Later, he moved on to co-found Da Vinci.

A hands-on executive, Greg Davenport spends about five hours a day in a lab working on new syrup flavors. "That's when I'm most beneficial to the company," he says. Da Vinci already makes 59 different flavored syrups in its regular line, plus 18 sugar-free varieties, and is always looking to add more.

The top-sellers? Vanilla, hazelnut, almond and Irish cream, in that order. Some of the other intriguing flavors: chocolate fudge, butter pecan, mango, toasted marshmallow.

Chemists do the concocting

Acting on flavor requests from espresso and Italian-soda bars and their customers, Davenport hires food chemists around the country to concoct specific flavors, then, with others, tastes what they produce and devises syrup formulas using them.

Merely requesting a flavor demands tuned-in taste buds. With toasted marshmallow, do you want a burnt taste or only a mildly toasted one, and what did the customer really have in mind? Davenport opted for the mildly toasted effect.

Creating a flavor is another matter. Natural flavorings - raspberry, lime, etc. - rule in most of the syrups, but artificial ones sometimes stand in. Da Vinci's Butter Rum syrup contains neither butter nor rum, yet its rich, butter-rum aroma alone would warm you on a winter night.

Butter's oil would separate out in syrup, and alcoholic beverages aren't used, so the flavorings were pieced together from various sources, including a bit of butter's essence. Distilled oils of clove and lemon joined other essences in creating the rum flavor.

Davenport says his tasting talents are pretty much limited to sweets - he loves pies, candy, ice cream - but in that realm he's a master. When tasting a competitor's unlabeled syrup, he can usually identify all the ingredients that went into it.

He also knows morning is best for tasting. "If I'm going to work on a flavor, I don't eat breakfast. The first thing you taste in the morning is the thing you taste the best."

Though Da Vinci promotes non-coffee uses for its syrups with recipes on its Web site - and will soon diversify with its own line of candies - Davenport says the syrups' close ties to espresso sales don't make him jittery.

"I have absolute faith in the coffee business," he says. He's convinced espresso has lots of room to grow, since it now accounts for only 2 to 3 percent of all coffee sales nationally.

Espresso is a small luxury most people can afford, he says. And as they order up their double-talls, he's hoping more and more will want that little 25-cent extra, a splash of flavored syrup.

----------------------------------------------- Mix it up, tweak some tastes, fiddle - have fun -----------------------------------------------

Though most of us know flavoring syrups best in espresso bars, you can use them at home, too, and not just for coffee drinks. Other possibilities abound.

Grocery stores carry the syrups, often in the coffee section but sometimes in the bakery area. You'll usually find about nine or 10 flavors - far fewer than those available for drinks in espresso bars.

Today's recipes, on Page XX, use hazelnut, caramel and almond syrups. Hazelnut syrup shows up in tempting Chocolate Hazelnut Truffles, a confection worthy of a place on a party plate during the upcoming holidays.

Another treat, Blueberry-Almond Bundt Cake, has almond syrup, orange juice and powdered sugar in the glaze that tops it.

We do offer a coffee drink as well - Caramel-Chocolate Coffee, flavored with caramel syrup and chocolate sauce.

Here are some uses for prepared flavor syrups you might want to try:

-- Italian sodas. Da Vinci Gourmet suggests this formula: Fill a 16-ounce glass 3/4 full of ice; cover the ice with sparkling water or club soda; mix in 2 ounces of flavoring syrup. Some possible syrup combinations: 1 ounce each of orange and vanilla syrups; 1 ounce each of pineapple and coconut syrups; 1 1/2 ounces chocolate syrup and 1/2 ounce raspberry syrup.

-- Smoothies and shakes. Mix ingredients in a blender. Da Vinci suggests Mocha Milk Shake, combining 2 1/2 cups vanilla ice cream, 2 ounces espresso, 1 ounce chocolate syrup. Also, Triple Berry Frappe, combining 1 3/4 cup ice, 1/4 cup blackberries, 2 ounces raspberry syrup, 2 ounces blueberry syrup and 1 teaspoon lemon juice.

-- Iced teas. Fill a 16-ounce glass 3/4 full with ice, cover the ice with brewed black tea and add flavoring syrups. Some possible combinations: cherry and almond; peach and raspberry; strawberry and kiwi.

You can also use syrups in main dishes, desserts, vinaigrettes and more. Da Vinci, Torani and Monin all have Web sites with recipes: