café con leche

English

Etymology

From Spanish café con leche.

Noun

café con leche (countable and uncountable, plural cafés con leche or café con leches)

1. Synonym of café au lait
   • 2000, Ivonne Lamazares, The Sugar Island, Boston, Mass., New York, N.Y.: Houghton Mifflin Company, →ISBN, pages 88 and 109:

     She made thick stews from leftovers and the smells drowned out the aroma of Melena’s café con leches. […] She was expensive, but Melena lived on café con leches and we paid her price.

   • 2004, Anita González, Jarocho’s Soul: Cultural Identity and Afro-Mexican Dance, University Press of America, →ISBN, page 106:

     One of the later scenes of the play has performers sitting in nine oversized rocking chairs, all facing the audience, while they wait for waiters to serve them cafe con leche. […] When drinking cafe con leche, it is customary to clink your glass with a spoon to call for a waiter, who arrives with the coffee and milk in two giant teakettles.

   • 2010, Alisa Valdes, The Three Kings: A Christmas Dating Story, St. Martin’s Press:

     We sit in puffy velvet armchairs near the fireplace, in a corner at Satellite Coffee across from the University of New Mexico, drinking cafés con leche.

   • 2012, A.Paul Dileski, After the Carnival, Trafford Publishing, →ISBN, page 39:

     Some were slumped over their café con leches in deep conversation; others were playing chess and some playing dominoes.

   • 2015, Eduardo Lalo, translated by David Frye, Simone, Chicago, Ill., London: The University of Chicago Press, →ISBN, page 64:

     I watched as she drank two café con leches, ate three different kinds of pastry, let me win our very quick, second chess game.

   • 2019, Kay Sellers, Outlier, Xlibris, →ISBN:

     The waiter refills their coffee cups with warm café con leches.

   • 2021, Azareen Van der Vliet Oloomi, Savage Tongues, Boston, Mass., New York, N.Y.: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, →ISBN, page 131:

     I was one of the only customers at that hour except for a few elderly men sitting morosely at the bar inside, busily reading their newspapers and dunking their croissants into their café con leches in semiautomatic movements.

Spanish

Noun

café con leche m (plural cafés con leche)

1. white coffee; café au lait