Siliconslave's how to make espresso thread

I´m tasting this Brazilian Manaus,at the moment
very tasteful,but not too strong

nice price at around 10 Euro a kilo:)

I´m happy with the Zassen, I´m grounding a 14/15 grams (dual dose) in 30 seconds , more or less - but i´m building a great muscle in my arm,eheh







 
Just bought some preground Australian Skyberry from HasBean (Ordered yesterday at 10:00 AM, was on my front doormat 24 hrs later). Also got a Gaggia Classic for £140 from the 'bay a couple of weeks ago, so was looking forward to putting some 'real' coffee through it.

Anyway, first thing I noticed was the deliciously warm colour of the thick, rich crema forming as it was pouring. Steamed a little milk for me and the GF, and had a delicious Macchiato- lovely smooth, almost oaky taste to it, deliciously rich and deep. By God this is 10x better than the rubbish from Tesco/ Whittards, I'm never going back now :D

Now to get a grinder and do it myself!
 
Hehe I think I just godshot myself :D

Let the machine get up to temperature. Passed water slowly through the chamber to ensure a good heat transfer to the group head.

Ground as per normal but got a fork to break up the clumps. Then tamped with a very slight 'wobble' and finished off by rotating the tamp to polish.

I use a slightly modified pull - pull lever, 10 seconds, let lever go until first drops start then recock the lever to add additional water. Length of pour spot on too..

Result! No blonding in the entire shot!

The taste is phenomenal. No hint of bitterness or sourness.
 
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Well...my first air roasting test was...

...an abject failure.
Mmmm... The wonderfully refreshing taste of carbon.

I'll give it another go later once I've cleaned it out and have caffinated myself properly. :D

1 10oz cup. 2oz hot water, 2 double espresso's and a splash of milk. That'll do for now. :D
 
NickK said:
Using a popcorn roaster, drum roaster or a pan?
Click to expand...

Heavily modified popcorn maker.

All the safety cutoffs removed. :D Fan and heating element on different switches so one can be operated without the other, heating element on a rheostat...

I pretty much followed this except mine has more exposed cabling. It's a work in progress. :D
 
Skunkworks - neat :D

I'm comfortable at the moment with pre-roasted beans. I think next year I'll look into roasting my own.

I'll have enough on my plate with Beer and Chillies :D
 
Flibster said:
Well...my first air roasting test was...

...an abject failure.
Mmmm... The wonderfully refreshing taste of carbon.

I'll give it another go later once I've cleaned it out and have caffinated myself properly. :D

1 10oz cup. 2oz hot water, 2 double espresso's and a splash of milk. That'll do for now. :D
Click to expand...

So how did your retry go?
 
My kit consists of a red Gaggia Baby Dose and an Ascaso I-Mini grinder.
I find them both excellent for the home enthusiast :)

Finally getting to the point where every shot I pull is more than acceptable (always doubles)
Just working my way through some Indian Monsoon Malabar from Hasbean....Awesome stuff!
 
I'm working my way through some Monsoon Malabar as well. My main problem is that while grinding it is full of static and clings to every surface. I find the taste very smooth and almost chockolate like in the way it coats the mouth

IMG_0104.jpg
 
Bill101 said:
My main problem is that while grinding it is full of static and clings to every surface.
Click to expand...

you can get little anti static key ring things to de-static your grinder (and i guess your beans if you wanted)... i picked one up a while back and haven't had a problem since (try googling for anti static keyring)

others have tried earthing their plastics with varied success....

I do love thouse espresso glasses btw - had some tumblers of the same design but they all shattered over a year or so :(
 
Just switched off the machine - made a great morning cappuccino :)

One of those cups that ends up being drunk so quickly.. already down to 30% by the time post this :( perfect bubbles too.. shot very good with no blonding.

Nope - all gone :(

Coffee: Icatu precoce (here) makes a wonderfully smooth morning cappuccino without being overpowered by the milk. Imagine chocolate and chocolate-milk and you get the idea.
Hmm.. might make another :D

It's also occurred to me that I'm going to have to take my machine and grinder to my parents over christmas or face instant :eek:

Just one experiment for you folks to try next time you do a pour - use less coffee. For me it seems to be making a real difference with my pours. Here's what I've been doing:

1. Grind as per normal into the basket. I do all this outside of the portafilter - just with the basket itself.
2. take fork and dig the grounds as if you where digging the garden - go deep, lift the grinds up and break the clumps, repeat until you have a fluffy appearance. This is like the Weiss Distribution Technique (WDT) but my version of it but it's fluffing rather than stirring.
3. take a straight edge, and level off by ensuring grinds go over the edge so that there's no gap between the puck and the basket - this also means over the part of the basket next to the handle. Almost like spreading plaster - but don't angle the edge as if you were spreading butter, just keep it straight upright.
4. tamp by taking the tamper and lightly placing it on top first, then use finger pressure to compress completely level. we're attempting to keep the distribution even (as it was after fluffing). Finally apply even pressure straight down. Don't wobble the or turn the tamp.
The tamp may sink lower than it may have done before but that's ok.
6. Basket into portafilter.
7. Lock into your warmed machine and pour..

I'd love to hear how people get on with this. If need be I may make a short youtube video to show what I mean. Often I'll get considerably less blonding.
 
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According to wholelottalatte the Classic's a 58mm basket. This is a very common size - and yes this varies between machine model (MCAL=49mm, some are 52mm etc).

My 49mm Reg Barber tamper has a small gap at the sides. My view is that if it was air tight then the extraction of the tamper after tamping would act like an air piston and the air drawn through the puck would unsettle it and cause channelling.

The plastic one that came with the MCAL had so much gap that it was impossible to compress the grounds right.

Making one sounds like a good idea. All that's required is a hard flat surface that fits *almost* airtight against the basket and allows you to put pressure on the puck evenly. I've even read people have used glass jars that fit right!
 
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