That is a great site Big Stick. I was trying to overcomplicate it thinking "it can't be that simple". I'll definately have to pick up some cane sugar and one of the cookbooks from Three Guys in Miami.
I mistakenly took the undissolved sugar as an indication that I was doing something wrong. If that is the result in Honduras then it can't be bad in my kitchen.
Those guys are great, very nice. You can't go wrong with their cookbooks.
Never had to look up a recipie for cafe/cortadito/collado/cafe con leche/etc., but it's pretty straightforward. Get a stove top maker for it. Should be stainless steel, but can be aluminum. Fill the bottom with water up to the valve/release on the side of the maker. Then put in the insert and fill it, packing it fairly tightly, but not too tightly, with coffee. Any coffee will work, but some tastes way better than others. I generally use Baby's or Illy, but I also use La Llave, Bustelo, Pilon, etc. All is good. I've even ground up 8 o'clock to an espresso grind and used it (very good too).
You then put the top of the maker on, screw it on tight. Put it on the stove, with the lid up.
Then, you add your sugar to a separate, 2-cup pyrex type thing. How much sugar all depends on the size of your maker, but with my 6 cup maker, I put about 5 spoons of sugar (white) into the pyrex cup. Watch the coffee pot now. When it first starts to put out coffee, close the lid, take it off the burner and pour some of the coffee on the sugar. Just a small amount, like about two teaspooons. Put the coffee maker back on the stove and let it finish brewing.
Mix up the sugar and coffee mix you have in the pyrex. It might not look like enough to form a mix, but keep mixing it up. If you need more coffee, add it. But just mix it up until it forms a tannish-colored light paste. You scoop it up with your spoon and tilt it back into the pyrex, it shouldn't be too runny. It almost looks like frosting.
Then look back at your stovetop maker. When it finishes, pour the coffee from the pot into the pyrex thing with the mixture. Stir it up, getting all the coffee to mix with the sugar mixture. You'll get a nice, thick head on the coffee in the pyrex. Pour some into a little espresso cup, then scoop a little bit of the head into the cup too. Then enjoy.
After you get that mastered, you can start trying cafe con leche, cortadito, etc. It's some of the best stuff around. Enjoy brother, with a fine smoke and some tostada.
Edited to add - doing it the way referenced above, I've never had undissolved sugar in my cup. Only if I was given pure cafe, with no sugar, then tried to add it later did I get that result (usu. at restaurants that don't know any better).
