Boston ? Dunkin’ Donuts, where regular Joes go for regular Joe, is starting to offer a brew more associated with yuppie coffee shops: espresso.

The idea is not to move Dunkin’ Donuts upscale. It is to bring espresso drinks — cappuccino, latte and the like — to the masses.

“The stereotype was that Starbucks and other fancy coffee houses, you had intellectuals and yuppies drinking their espresso drinks there. It’s not necessarily true,” said Steven Eckenhausen, president of Long Island, Calif.-based Schaerer USA, which sold the espresso machines to Dunkin’ Donuts. “Dunkin’ is pulling it out of that environment. They’re democratizing the beverage.”

Dunkin’ Donuts, based in Randolph, Mass., has 5,700 shops. A select group of shops already has the espresso line. Lawrence’s store at 521 W. 23rd St. doesn’t have the new product line yet, but will before the end of autumn, owner Dee Patel said.

“We’re ready for it,” Patel said. “It will be a really good deal because people are already asking for it.”

Chief executive Jon Luther said increasing customer requests for the high-brow coffee was a major reason the chain was adding it to its menu.

Still, customers will not find specially trained baristas or a change in Dunkin’ Donuts’ simple countertop atmosphere. No piped-in jazz here. Machines will make the drinks cheaper and more quickly than in boutiques, the company said.

A Dunkin’ Donuts large cappuccino will cost about $2.69, while the comparable Starbucks size — a “venti” — costs about $3.40.

“Anybody can drink espresso and we’re showing that you don’t have to wait seven minutes in line to get it,” Luther said. “We’ve removed the mystique around the cappuccino. We don’t have to be pretentious.”

Peter Mavromihalas pours frothed milk into a coffee cup as he makes a cappuccino at a Dunkin' Donuts in Boston. Dunkin' Donuts aims to bring the espresso line of beverages -- cappuccino, latte and the like -- down to the masses.

Starbucks said it did not comment on competitors.

Tommy Coye, a 39-year-old dance teacher, said he was not a fan of highbrow coffee shops but was becoming an espresso regular at Dunkin’ Donuts.

“I just tried it a few weeks ago, and I was hooked,” he said as he sipped an iced latte. “I like the taste here, but I really like the lack of pretense.”

But Massimo Castellano, 31, a Boston financial adviser, thinks Dunkin’ Donuts should stick to what it is known for. He said he would never drink a Dunkin’ Donuts espresso: “It just doesn’t sound right.”