Markarian Senior Member Joined: 27 Jun 2012 Posts: 474 Location: Seattle Area Expertise: I love coffee
Espresso: Modded Nuova Simonelli Oscar Grinder: Vario-W, Mazzer Super Jolly Drip: Moka, Aeropress, Melitta 102 Roaster: Wear-Ever Popcorn Pumper
Posted Thu Aug 30, 2012, 7:26pm Subject: Crema Dilemma: Dialing in a grinder between roasts??
Okay, so I'm still very new to all this, but I recently purchased my first real grinder--a Baratza Virtuoso. I love it and it grinds all the way from French Press down to Turkish and can easily choke my machine at setting 4. I started out with dark roasts for my espresso but have recently moved toward single origin light roasts, like Tanzanian Peaberry, which I really enjoy. I got some fresh Columbia Supremo and even when grinding at a setting finer than usual and tamping it harder than usual, it still gushes out of the PF and the longest shot I got was roughly 22 seconds. The crema was thick and satisfying, but the shot was way too fast and blonded quickly with a thicker cone than usual. I'm using a Saeco SIN006/Barista with a bottomless PF. Any advice for how to keep my grinds consistent across different beans? Thanks!
CMIN Senior Member Joined: 14 Jun 2012 Posts: 508 Location: South FL Expertise: I like coffee
Espresso: Crossland CC1 Grinder: Baratza Preciso
Posted Thu Aug 30, 2012, 10:02pm Subject: Re: Crema Dilemma: Dialing in a grinder between roasts??
Grinding can actually differ depending on the bean (origin, blend, roast level etc). This is where grinders like the Preciso come in handy b/c you can dial in further and keep a relatively tweaked range only adjusting the micro arm. But once in awhile I can be on one bean and find I need to switch down a notch or up and adjust the micro to wherever, the micro arm makes a night and day difference. With the Virtuoso and similar your sorta stuck with the steps, so you can get a good grind at one point and then find it doesn't grind well enough at another point or as the beans age etc. Generally with a lighter roast your going to want to use a finer grind too.
Do you have the Virtuoso calibrated to the "fine" setting? How much (grams) are you dosing?
Markarian Senior Member Joined: 27 Jun 2012 Posts: 474 Location: Seattle Area Expertise: I love coffee
Espresso: Modded Nuova Simonelli Oscar Grinder: Vario-W, Mazzer Super Jolly Drip: Moka, Aeropress, Melitta 102 Roaster: Wear-Ever Popcorn Pumper
Posted Thu Aug 30, 2012, 10:18pm Subject: Re: Crema Dilemma: Dialing in a grinder between roasts??
I have my Virtuoso calibrated to Fine and it was actually done for me at Baratza's HQ in person. They even shimmed it so it would go finer. Setting 5 is my general go-to for dark roast Espresso, and I go down to 3 for Decaf dark roast. My light roasts vary widely, I find, which is frustrating. Incidentally, the step mechanism looks like it can be easily removed to make the Virtuoso stepless. I'm still new to this, so I haven't weighed my doses (any tips?). I generally grind to where I see little cube-shaped clumps (yeah, I know this is what you get with a $250 grinder. I'll get a Mazzer someday) and then I gently tap the PF to let the cubes break up and the coffee settle. Then I grind some more, level it off and give it a light tamp/twist. I have no idea how to grind and tamp and have been just winging it, though trying to keep things consistent.
CMIN Senior Member Joined: 14 Jun 2012 Posts: 508 Location: South FL Expertise: I like coffee
Espresso: Crossland CC1 Grinder: Baratza Preciso
Posted Fri Aug 31, 2012, 10:24am Subject: Re: Crema Dilemma: Dialing in a grinder between roasts??
For weighing your going to need a scale that measures to .1 grams and can at least "tare" out things so you can zero weight. I use this one Click Here (www.amazon.com) which is fairly small, and I flip the cover across it to "zero" out it's weight (11.9g) so I can then weigh beans in it with 11.9 already taken out. Then just pop the beans in the grinder and that's it, sometimes I'll weigh after grinding just to see if it's still in range. Don't know your machine or basket, but as an example I usually weigh 15-16g of beans for my double basket.
You'll want to look into WDT if your clumping as well, I just cut a yogurt container to fit so grind right into the PF and then use a needed to stir around. That'll break up any clumping and give you a nice even distribution http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=II8v2eEJlRY . With no scale you could try just grinding to the top of your basket and WDT from that point and adjust grind amount from there.
If your tamping light that could be your problem right there with gushing, try tamping harder, about as hard as you can evenly. I usually tamp slowly at first lightly to get the grinds sorta compressed, do a light spin to polish with no weight to get some loose grinds off the side, then tamp hard. If your just tamping lightly and leaving as is, your pry not compressing enough... you may actually have you grind right, so try harder and see what happens.
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