this is getting very geeky, but yes most folks take the single origin thing too far. it’s actually very akin to wine world with some of the natural wines being too edgy and just weird. there’s a fascination for it, but it’s suited best to folks that are in the industry - it’s all very interesting, but not very pleasurable.
i’ve rarely truly enjoyed single origin/state coffees compared to great blends.
i’m not sure what you mean by burned - another thing that confuses people is the roast. think of it like oak; there are truly great wines that use tons of new oak, but it works. and tons of wines where it doesn’t.
one more thing about “fresh” coffee - it seems like the right thing to do is use freshly roasted coffee, but that’s not the case. coffee gets best around day 4-6 after roasting (assuming whole beans and stored correctly).
what i tell people is find a blend you like that’s easy to brew (meaning you can get consistent results fairly easily) and stick with that until you’re completely bored. the more you experiment, the more you’ll get frustrated. after 15 years of making espresso at home, it still takes me half a pound to dial in something that i haven’t tried before. so now i go through a rotation of a very small repertoire.
i think you’re blaming the method for what is being driven by the barista. there’s a very wide range of styles you can achieve with pourover (which is just a more controlled drip).
I don’t mean anything technical, just referring to horror-stricken exclamations on my poor taste i coffee. Specifically, I like Peet’s Major Dickasons. Coffee geeks have often told me it’s over roasted, and a few have used the word “burned.” I can even happily drink some of the darker Starbucks blends, like Sumatra, and I get told all the time those are over roasted, charred or burned. I don’t really care.
I do like a great espresso on occasion, and JR pulls a mean one.
I find this true only of the darkest roasts. Most third wave coffee needs 10-14 days to peak, with some of the lighter roasted Central Americans peaking 14-20 days. YMMV.
yes, you’re correct. my point was “fresh” in the context of coffee isn’t what we typically think. you see a lot of roasters roasting and shipping on the same day which sounds great, but isn’t necessarily ideal.
Have a Bonavita at home, but it would work with any drip machine. We weigh the coffee and water. We subtract the amount of water used for the bloom; the rest goes into the machine. We bloom for the allotted time and let the machine do the rest*. Still like to do pour over, but it works for weekdays and is a great cup.
*While an extra step, the bloom allows us to use our regular ratio of water to coffee used for pour over, so it saves us quite a bit in beans, roughly 1/4 per brew, compared to the machine ratio we used when we first got it, and it allows for more even extraction.
we used to feel that way re coffee but now that I have been roasting for more than a year, it is a whole world of coffee flavor several steps above prior experience. Your “aha moment” awaits.
Since I truly hate all the “good” coffee I’ve had, and really like what I’m drinking now, I can’t imagine why I’d want to do anything new, “aha moment” or not.
Sarah I think we’re in similar boats – I too tend to grab the major dickinsons when I’m out and about. I will say that my favorite beans are the intellegencia house blend – that was an aha moment for me. I haven’t found a bean I like better. I just bought some for the first time in a while and I’ll see if that still holds true.
For me the aha moments have been those beans, a technivorm (I’m sure a Chemex would have done the same for less), and grinding the morning of.
I think that might be enough aha moments for coffee
i just bought my Technivorm about a week ago. I agree with you two. Freshly ground, good beans, and I am thrilled with the results. No desire to go further down the rabbit hole.
Slayer single group espresso machine. hand build in Seattle. slightly more than the Ratio machine at around $9k…but it actually works the way it’s supposed to!
insanely precise machines and massive achievements in design and function.
There are a few in NYC. I think Blue Bottle brooklyn has one. And apparently a cafe in Chelsea with a gold-plated one!
under $1k is probably the silvia from rancilio. proven, built strong, also retains a lot of value. in fact, i’d probably look at a pre-owned one since it’s the default starter machine and it’s been on the market forever.
but at a little over $1k (i think maybe $1200 with discounts?), the breville double boiler gets you results and features that were previously only available from machines costing $2400+ (PID, double boiler, pressure profiling, temp settings, etc.). i have this machine and love it. i tell people that if you’re in the market for a solid machine, just buy it at BBB and return if you don’t like it. can’t do that with other serious machines since it’s a much more specialized market, but in this case Breville made a sick machine and you have the benefit of buying from a large CE company with real support, etc.
to be clear, you must have a very good grinder for these machine to make sense, so that adds at least another $350++
there is zero point in having a good machine without pairing it with a sufficient grinder.
As a primary course, I would encourage you to decide what brewing method you prefer. It sounds like you like pour overs but now you’re thinking an espresso machine that takes a few pulls to warm up. If you’re only going to pull a shot or two at a time, that might not be the best option. Maybe this “reality check” is unwarranted, but I do encourage you to think first very seriously about what method you want, then you can go after the device, not the opposite.
