Yeah, if you're using coffee that's been pre-ground god knows how long ago may as well use the cheapest drip machine you can find because there's only so good it can get.
I second Expressoworks, he is a good guy and does the maintenance on my double boiler system. Very reasonable prices as well.
I noticed some recommendations for online coffee, the most important thing is that the beans are fresh, a fresh of any bean I have tried tops out any intended flavouring. I either go local, or have returned from trips with fresh Kona or various San Fransisco roasts.
Last edited by Flamenspiel; 03-23-2021 at 11:02 AM.
What often gets missed, both in the filter and espresso world, is that the grinder is generally speaking, much more important than the machine you are using to brew/produce. A good grinder will take you a lot further than a high end machine.
When you hit a certain point, there is undoubtedly a point of diminishing returns. For some that is earlier than others (much like types of alcohol ).
I have gone extremely extremely down the rabbit hole, both in filter and espresso, so happy to answer any questions!
Often, the issue with high end grinders, is, generally speaking, they are built for either pour-over/french/etc or espresso. *Very* few grinders can do both well, and even these, they are better on one than the other.
I have both the french press and aeropress, never liked either.
Well, feel free to send them my way then, I can use them.
__________________ "The great promise of the Internet was that more information would automatically yield better decisions. The great disappointment is that more information actually yields more possibilities to confirm what you already believed anyway." - Brian Eno
Oh, I know different brewers and brewing methods get different results, I had a crappy Cuisinart that didn't get hot enough too! But my Braun for $100 makes excellent coffee.
My question was more related to the different ways of pouring hot water in a pourover. Does a gooseneck kettle really make a better cup than pouring hot water in? Does blooming really provide any benefit? pre-wetting the filter? I dunno, it seems at that point you probably aren't able to taste the difference in a blind test. Diminishing returns.
IMHO rapid fire:
Gooseneck in conical brewer - yes. due to varying coffee bed depths and water can "bypass" at the edges of the cone. So would want pouring accuracy.
pre-wet: Probably not. I can't tell any "papery taste" in the cup.
Bloom: I can taste the difference adjusting the size of the bloom, haven't done "sans-bloom".
Kettle Temperature: I would say minimal, but depends on flow rate and contact time with the grinds
Whether it's bloom, sans-bloom, pulse pour, continuous pour it is invariably adjusting of water flow rate through (and agitation) of the grinds, which ends up changing the taste in the cup.
Whether its "better"? who knows? It basically YMMV. I would say once you found your "preference" you want to be able to repeat it.
Last edited by Discoste; 03-23-2021 at 12:00 PM.
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I have one of those but my take is that one actually isn't idiot proof. I mean I guess a French press requires some measuring but it's pretty simple, a chemex you can actually do wrong.
__________________ "The great promise of the Internet was that more information would automatically yield better decisions. The great disappointment is that more information actually yields more possibilities to confirm what you already believed anyway." - Brian Eno
Okay, here was my experiment tonight. Roasting some beans. I started off with 30 grams, so as to not waste them all if something went horrifically wrong. The process wasn't too bad, just unsure of specific temperatures, so just going until the beans were relatively close in colour to my reference bean and the chaff was gone. I can see why people do this outdoors. The chaff that was sloughing off was pretty bad. It's light and it just flies everywhere.
So after letting it cool down sufficiently, I ground it and tried it out. It smelled pretty good.
Unfortunately though, the resultant coffee was pretty weak. I screwed up my recipe, and used 15g coffee and 300g water. I also did the reverse method where you fill up with water and then dump the coffee in and give it a stir. This eliminates the need for any special kettles with goosnecks.
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Oh, I know different brewers and brewing methods get different results, I had a crappy Cuisinart that didn't get hot enough too! But my Braun for $100 makes excellent coffee.
My question was more related to the different ways of pouring hot water in a pourover. Does a gooseneck kettle really make a better cup than pouring hot water in? Does blooming really provide any benefit? pre-wetting the filter? I dunno, it seems at that point you probably aren't able to taste the difference in a blind test. Diminishing returns.
Agreed on the unlikelihood of knowing the difference in a blind taste test in an exceptionally close set up. For me though, my brews in a pour over can be vastly different due to issues in control/errors in brewing with the equipment I am currently using.
A gooseneck can help with super accurate water amounts poured in, but vs a traditional kettle, the margins are negligible with the most basic level of dexterity. The issue I have is that I use this for hot water:
The V60 cannot turn in a full 360 and the water doesn't quite reach the middle. Rather than drop $30+ on a traditional kettle which takes room or $60+ on a gooseneck kettle, I opted for a $15 ish long gooseneck teapot to transfer water from the vacuum kettle and use on pour over. Accuracy level of where I want the water in my case is significant enough to have a significant difference in this situation. For the average other person, probably not.
For me, wetting the filter isn't about paper flavour, but getting the grinds to stick and stay low so that less grinds float on the water. I attempt the same with attempting to bloom so there's more brew time. The main issue I run into using the vacuum kettle is that the grinds can float and thus too much water goes through with very little contact with grinds resulting in a weak watery coffee. I'm not trying to claim I am extracting some super amazing secret flavor in a bean using a goose neck.
Temperature wise, there is a difference between 100C, 90C and 80C I can identify. The differences are relatively minute and miniscule and you only really notice it if you've consumed that coffee bean like a dozen times with only this as a tweaked variable. The differences are basically very slight differences in tangy, bitter and chocolate flavors.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Discoste
IMHO rapid fire:
Gooseneck in conical brewer - yes. due to varying coffee bed depths and water can "bypass" at the edges of the cone. So would want pouring accuracy.
pre-wet: Probably not. I can't tell any "papery taste" in the cup.
Bloom: I can taste the difference adjusting the size of the bloom, haven't done "sans-bloom".
Kettle Temperature: I would say minimal, but depends on flow rate and contact time with the grinds
Whether it's bloom, sans-bloom, pulse pour, continuous pour it is invariably adjusting of water flow rate through (and agitation) of the grinds, which ends up changing the taste in the cup.
Whether its "better"? who knows? It basically YMMV. I would say once you found your "preference" you want to be able to repeat it.
Gooseneck doesn't change anything at all IMO. It's just more easily accurate. Like the difference in flavor of chopping up an onion with a chef knife or a cleaver. If you can pour accurately without a gooseneck, the difference is basically zero. I have doubts that the shape and length of a spout contribute to any additional meaningful differences such as temperature. The aeropress is fine with my vacuum kettle, but with the V60 pour over, the limitations of the vacuum kettle due to the size and mobility of the cone is like trying to use a mezzaluna to thinly slice something. The gooseneck teapot will likely be pretty noticeable for me for the vacuum kettle for the pour over, but likely zero for the aeropress.
Wetting paper is unlikely to change flavor on its own, but flow rate of wet vs dry paper is slightly different. I believe part of the bloom is basically how a wet sponge absorbs more water than a dry one. Wet paper along with bloom, there are minor differences in flavor that can be attained here that likely summarize simply to the duration of the water in contact with the grinds or strength of brew.
I think better in terms of flavor is a bit of a misnomer. These controlled variables ultimately relate more in terms of a "better" repeatable flavour. Kinda like the difference between throwing ingredients into a recipe based on "feel" which is hard to repeat and easier to mess up vs someone putting specific quantities of ingredients in a repeatable manner for a relatively repeatable taste.
My bro measures the crap out of everything. I eyeball it. I can easily tell the difference the majority of time between his and my brews. Give us identical grinds and water temp/volume and I doubt I'd be able to identify any additional flavor attributes from things like wetting paper and bloom.
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I prefer the aeropress over the french press due to how coarse you have to have your grinds for the latter, and then you still end up with some silt at the bottom. And cleaning the aeropress is a definite winner. Still like the french press though.
I prefer the aeropress over the french press due to how coarse you have to have your grinds for the latter, and then you still end up with some silt at the bottom. And cleaning the aeropress is a definite winner. Still like the french press though.
I feel like the Espro might be something you'd be interested in. I find I get less silt in an Espro than a French press. The main issues/differences will be in price and serving size. A typical French press is like 2-3 cups. An entry level Espro is around 1.5 cups and there's a bigger one at around 2-3 cups I think.
I bought it as a gift for my bro who is pretty into coffee. He used it a few times and settled back on using his pour over. He said that the American Press isn't bad overall, but there's a serious PITA design flaw. The cleaning of the grinds isn't easy when you have hot coffee grinds. That and dousing it in cold water/letting it cool first to open it to clean is a PITA.
I may have a pressure gauge lying around...if so you can borrow. Let me try to find it.
I am good actually. I had a 600psi / 40 bar gauge at work that I was able to get to fit, barely, with a bunch or different adapter fittings to the portafilter. It was reading roughly 13 bar, and I am pretty sure I am down to about 9 +/- .5 bars. I imagine this is why, for the longest time, no matter how fine I ground the coffee, I would still get a reasonable flow out of it.
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