About Rowland Coffee Roasters
Rowland Coffee Roasters traces its roots to 1961, when Cuban immigrant Jose "Pepe" Souto began selling espresso door-to-door in Miami. Souto and his sons built the company into one of the largest Hispanic-owned coffee businesses in the United States, acquiring Café Bustelo in 2000 and building Café Pilon, El Pico, and Medaglia d'Oro into some of the most recognized Latin and Italian-style coffee names on American shelves. In 2011, The J.M. Smucker Company acquired the consumer packaged-goods side of the business; Rowland itself continues to operate today out of Doral, Florida, distributing coffee and espresso equipment across the state.
Medaglia d'Oro, the espresso-style instant coffee Rowland built into a household name, has been a fixture in Italian-American kitchens since 1924 and is still called for by name in decades-old tiramisu and coffee-cake recipes. Amazon's own listing for the 2 oz jar credits Rowland Coffee Roasters as the manufacturer of record, and its dark, double-roasted profile is built for exactly that traditional style: intense enough that the coffee flavor still comes through once a tiramisu soak is folded into mascarpone and sugar, which is why it remains the name bakers reach for by habit even as newer jars have entered the category.
Brand website: rowlandcoffee.com
What Rowland Coffee Roasters makes
Rowland Coffee Roasters's range runs wider than the products we review. The lines we know best from our own testing are marked with a star:
Medaglia d'Oro Espresso (instant & ground)
the Italian-style espresso brand Rowland built into a household name -- our featured pick comes from this line — featured on Brew Gazette
Café Bustelo
acquired by Rowland in 2000; ground and instant Cuban-style espresso, still distributed regionally by Rowland across Florida
Café Pilon
Cuban-style espresso Rowland acquired in the 1960s and continues to distribute across Florida today
El Pico
another Latin-style coffee brand built by Rowland alongside Bustelo and Pilon
Espresso equipment leasing
Rowland's current Florida business also supplies and services commercial espresso machines for restaurants and coffee shops
Why we recognized Rowland Coffee Roasters
The Brew Gazette Top Brand recognition isn't paid for and can't be applied for. We award it to the brands whose products consistently stand out in our hands-on category reviews. Rowland Coffee Roasters earned it on the strength of the products below, evaluated the same way every product on this site is: bought, brewed with daily, and judged on what lands in the cup.
Rowland Coffee Roasters products we rated highly
Medaglia D'Oro Instant Espresso Coffee, 2 oz Jar
Medaglia d'Oro is the name that shows up in the greatest number of older tiramisu and coffee-cake recipes, and it has been the default Italian-American instant espresso in American kitchens for decades. Its double-roasted profile is genuinely dark and bitter in the traditional style those recipes were written around, and that intensity is exactly what keeps the coffee flavor from disappearing once tiramisu's mascarpone and sugar are folded in. It's spray-dried for quick dissolving in hot liquid, and the small screw-top jar keeps well between the occasional bakes many households use it for.
Read the Best Instant Espresso Powder of 2026 guide →What earned Rowland Coffee Roasters the recognition
- Founded in 1961 in Miami by Cuban immigrant Jose "Pepe" Souto and grown into one of the largest Hispanic-owned coffee companies in the United States before its consumer brands were acquired by The J.M. Smucker Company in 2011.
- Medaglia d'Oro has been a fixture in Italian-American kitchens since 1924, and it is still called for by name in decades-old tiramisu and coffee-cake recipes.
- Amazon's own product listing credits Rowland Coffee Roasters as the manufacturer of record for the Medaglia d'Oro instant espresso jar featured in our review.
- A dark, double-roasted profile built for traditional heavy-dose applications like tiramisu soaks, where the coffee flavor has to hold up under mascarpone and sugar.
- One of the founding names that established Latin and Italian-style espresso coffee in mainstream US grocery, alongside sibling brands Café Bustelo and Café Pilon.