Siliconslave's how to make espresso thread

As longa as you don't mind its shortcomings (basically the difficulty of moving from espresso to pour over) the MC2 is very hard to beat for the price.

Other grinders to look at are the Sage one (may not grind fine enough and is about £200 retail - lakeland seem to have it at £140 at the moment though) and the Baratza Encore which is around £140. Both should be able to handle espresso fine, but may need a bit of faffing with shims to change the bur spacing and thus grind.
 
Forgot to mention that Silicon, good point.

I had the MC2 for a while, and it was an utter pain in the arse to switch between 'spro and brewed. So yeah, brilliant for a first designated espresso grinder but don't count on being able to switch methods easily.
 
My first order from Rave should be waiting for me when I get home. Looking forward to trying their signature blend.

I've been very impressed with the Aeropress so far. Although you don't get many cups out of a 250g bag of pre-ground coffee do you? I was assuming going the ground coffee route would work out cheaper per cup than the Tassimo machine I had previously been using. Can't fault the quality of the coffee produced, streets ahead of the Tassimo, but surprised by the price.
 
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Siliconslave said:
As longa as you don't mind its shortcomings (basically the difficulty of moving from espresso to pour over) the MC2 is very hard to beat for the price.

Other grinders to look at are the Sage one (may not grind fine enough and is about £200 retail - lakeland seem to have it at £140 at the moment though) and the Baratza Encore which is around £140. Both should be able to handle espresso fine, but may need a bit of faffing with shims to change the bur spacing and thus grind.
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I have the Sage one and it's actually an improvement over the MC2 I would say. Possibly I'm just being less lazy about things though. Definitely grinds fine enough.
 
Egon said:
My first order from Rave should be waiting for me when I get home. Looking forward to trying their signature blend.

I've been very impressed with the Aeropress so far. Although you don't get many cups out of a 250g bag of pre-ground coffee do you? I was assuming going the ground coffee route would work out cheaper per cup than the Tassimo machine I had previously been using. Can't fault the quality of the coffee produced, streets ahead of the Tassimo, but surprised by the price.
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250g per bag.

7g single shot
14g double shot

Normally I go for double shot. That works out at 17.8 cups. Let’s round that down to 16 cups as I like my coffee strong.

£4.20 per bag for the signature blend, 16 into £4.20 = 26p per cup. That's not bad.

I prefer to compare it to coffee from a café, that's about 1/10th of the cost of that so in that regard, I am saving £2 every time I have a cup at home. Cup half full mentality !
 
Scottland said:
In what sense, dialling it in or grounds retention?
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simply in terms of effort expelled turning the dial - its probably about the same number of rotations and the grinder is significantly easier to turn :)

My Dad got himself the Sage grinder and it does seem pretty nice, he doesn't tend to buy great beans though so not had a proper play with it
 
Raymond Lin said:
250g per bag.

7g single shot
14g double shot

Normally I go for double shot. That works out at 17.8 cups. Let’s round that down to 16 cups as I like my coffee strong.

£4.20 per bag for the signature blend, 16 into £4.20 = 26p per cup. That's not bad.

I prefer to compare it to coffee from a café, that's about 1/10th of the cost of that so in that regard, I am saving £2 every time I have a cup at home. Cup half full mentality !
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Oh, if comparing it to café costs there's no comparison.

I'm using the aeropress scoop, as per the instructions, I could weigh it next time to see how much is being used though. But it doesn't look like I'm going to get 16 cups out of 1 bag.
 
Siliconslave said:
simply in terms of effort expelled turning the dial - its probably about the same number of rotations and the grinder is significantly easier to turn :)

My Dad got himself the Sage grinder and it does seem pretty nice, he doesn't tend to buy great beans though so not had a proper play with it
Click to expand...

Ah right :), my current grinder doesn't take much effort but retains quite a bit - one of the reasons I'm interested in the Sette 270.
 
Egon said:
Oh, if comparing it to café costs there's no comparison.

I'm using the aeropress scoop, as per the instructions, I could weigh it next time to see how much is being used though. But it doesn't look like I'm going to get 16 cups out of 1 bag.
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You should get about 15... Definitely weigh the beans (and water). I use 14-16g to 230-250g water (full, inverted). Even with top end bags (£7/250g), it's still under 50p a cup - is this not cheaper than your other method?
 
/\/\/\/\/\ Hells teeth, what size is your portafilter, I'd never get that much ground coffee in mine - 18 Grams at a push max. (I usually weigh out 16 Grams)

On a side note I went to the Cafe culture show today, better than the London coffee festival in some respects (more space & less noise) but its aimed at the trade so I wasn't really interested in starting up my own coffee shop - too much hassle. I left after a couple of hours to get a burger. :p I did get a couple of freebies though, but i'll give it a miss next year now I know what its about.
 
Grimley said:
/\/\/\/\/\ Hells teeth, what size is your portafilter, I'd never get that much ground coffee in mine - 18 Grams at a push max. (I usually weigh out 16 Grams)
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it does depend slightly on the portafilter & beans though - I had some taylor street beans (not great tbh) that were incredibly dense for some reason, 18g were about half the volume of the redbrick i've got in now :S
 
Weighed it last night, one level scoop of the Rave signature blend was 14g. I ordered the aeropress grind.

However, I also have a confession, the first bag I was referring to when I checked last night was only 200g and not 250... oops :o

So yeah, I'm definitely going to get less cups from it! It is also much more finely ground, than the Rave I tried last night, probably meaning I'm using more per cup.

Edit: I think I made a mistake buying the aeropress grind. Aeropress themselves recommend an espresso grind and I did find the first cup a little weak. I haven't tried the inverted method yet, that might help, or just adding a little more coffee.
 
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.. .espresso process improvement ...

knock-box - I do not want to spend a fortune what do folks recommend as either an improvised knock-box or a specific purchase ? [I have been cutting top off of old foil juice cartons but they are often not robust enough for the impact]

Also when you move portafilter from machine to grinder how do you deal with the drips I guess I have not watched enough Baristas, but after running some water through the portafilter (HX machine) into cup, I need to first move PF to the sink to loose water and then on to the grinder - I have to use a dish cloth under the portafilter .
 
Grimley said:
/\/\/\/\/\ Hells teeth, what size is your portafilter, I'd never get that much ground coffee in mine - 18 Grams at a push max. (I usually weigh out 16 Grams)

On a side note I went to the Cafe culture show today, better than the London coffee festival in some respects (more space & less noise) but its aimed at the trade so I wasn't really interested in starting up my own coffee shop - too much hassle. I left after a couple of hours to get a burger. :p I did get a couple of freebies though, but i'll give it a miss next year now I know what its about.
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Officially it's a 20g basket, but I could easily fit 24g into it with a little room to spare. Not that I want to, mind. :)
 
Egon said:
Edit: I think I made a mistake buying the aeropress grind. Aeropress themselves recommend an espresso grind and I did find the first cup a little weak. I haven't tried the inverted method yet, that might help, or just adding a little more coffee.
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I've tried an espresso grind for aeropress and it tasted too bitter, so I grind a little coarser. Obviously it will vary from bean to bean though, but with a slightly coarser grind you can increase the time you leave it sit in the tube before plunging.

jpaul said:
.. .espresso process improvement ...

knock-box - I do not want to spend a fortune what do folks recommend as either an improvised knock-box or a specific purchase ? [I have been cutting top off of old foil juice cartons but they are often not robust enough for the impact]

Also when you move portafilter from machine to grinder how do you deal with the drips I guess I have not watched enough Baristas, but after running some water through the portafilter (HX machine) into cup, I need to first move PF to the sink to loose water and then on to the grinder - I have to use a dish cloth under the portafilter .
Click to expand...

I've got a Dreamfarm Grindenstein, it's pretty small but that suits me with limited worktop space.
 
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