walkerjohn Senior Member Joined: 15 Nov 2011 Posts: 4 Location: Prague, Czech Republic, Europe, Earth, Solar system of milky way Expertise: I live coffee
Hi folks, after endless googling, forum reading and obssessive analysis i joined the group of bezzera owners:) I am a proud owner of a BZ10 and i would like to share a few tips, some of you might find it useful.
As for my setup, i have an eureka mignon grinder, and i use various cofees (hasbean blake, jailbreak, squaremile blend and singel origin and doubleshot.cz yummy) previously i had Miss Silvia with Rocky, and aeropress with hario skerton, and a handpresso)
The good thing for anyone considering this machine is, that after two tries with gind setting, i poured one of the best shots i ever did. Then, starting to play with it a little bit, i can only confirm theese points:
- It has a low shower screen, thus the machine is very unhappy with overdosing - The steaming power is impressive. Such a supersonic performance, wow (more on that later) - solidly built, quite fast warm up time etc...
Now, to the shower screen, after some experimentation, i ended up with a noname triple basket taken from a bottomless PF i used with my silvia (though the bottomless PF itself doesnt fit on my bezzera). With this triple basket, i dose some "volumetric" amount - "stockfleth move to make it flat before tamping" and it performs wonderfully with warious cofees. That was for doubles. For singles, i use a VST 18g basket, and have to grind finer (not 100 satisfied with the process now) but the result is quite fine.
For steaming - whooo whooo, that intergalactic hypersteaming is not something i was used to with my silvia! wait... had to shut two holes with the toothpick trick described here:) now just a short puff to clean the water inside the wand and then hoorayy. Find the sweetspot, and after some 10sec. it is done. very fine microfoam mostly.
I am overall very satisfied with my purchase:) i have a programmable mains plug so the machine is ready in the morning for some flat whites:) I trained my spouse and she, being a complete noob mastered "ok" espressos in 5 minutes. As for steaming, we trained with soap water and now she is a fine home barista able to prepare just anything. (i do the grinder dialing in with new cofee)
I know, that the "some triple noname basket" approach in not replicable nor scientific enough, but may give you some guidelines or inspiration. The important thing is: never overdose, leave some space between the shower screen and the puck. The fivepence trick should do:) I prefer syrupy like shots and i usualy ed up with 29seconds and a usual amount of 25 or whatever. As for channeling - it mostly occured in the morning (bad tamping) or when overdosed.
And my grinder? oh yes - i have the non-timer version, but there is a microswitch so it grinds when you put the pf under it. very convenient. Superb stepless setting possibilities. And yeah, some clumps occur, but only with very fine grind settings, and some cofee sorts. and they can be destroyed with wdt easily.
Ok, thats all for now. some more scientific details will follow:)
IB Senior Member Joined: 24 Jan 2011 Posts: 49 Location: pittsburgh Expertise: I like coffee
Espresso: Kim Lever, Bezzera BZ07 Grinder: Vario
Posted Wed Nov 16, 2011, 5:36am Subject: welcome walkerjohn
Welcome and congrats on your purchase! I'm jealous of the dual gauge on the BZ10. I have the 07 with just boiler pressure. I did the toothpick trick at first, but then switched to a four hole tip with smaller 9mm holes, which I've been pretty happy with. I used the "no-burn" tip from chris coffee service, not that you would order parts from the US, but I think plenty of different tips are available with the male threads.
Hello guys, I am so frustrated and disappointed with my espressos. I have used 1kg of 4 different kinds of FRESH beans from hasbean and the taste of the espresso is overly sour/bitter. I read tons and tons of posts and articles on this forums. I have a brand new BZ10, purchased 3 weeks ago, set at 1.2bar, and during the extraction the extraction pressure is at 12 bars, factory set. My grinder is an Ascaso I2. I use this filter basket http://www.coffeehit.co.uk/synesso-doub...asket/p326 and I also tried the one that came with the machine. I am using a digital scale to measure my coffee after grinding them to be consistent with the dose. I use a bathroom scale in order to tamp at 15Kg every time. I tried doses from 14-18gr, adjusting the grind so I will be in the recommended guidelines of 30ml in 25 sec. I am using the WDT method I tried stopping the extraction before blonding, at blonding and way after blonding. I tried different flushing techniques read on this forum and other forums. Whatever I do the espresso comes out harsh overly sour/bitter. Nothing changes in taste. The only time that I noticed some change is when I extracted by volume. I used 17gr of coffee and extracted 34gr of espresso liquid. a 50% dry/liquid ratio. In this case the espresso was bitter.
I really dont know what to try next. I am clueless on what I am doing wrong. Is it soooo hard for a newbie to extract a decent drinkable espresso?
The beans are low acidity, medium roasted and asked the vendor before ordering, to suggest me some sweet low acidity beans.
I tasted the espresso during extraction today every 10 seconds, and I can say that my final shots pretty much taste like the first 10 seconds of the extraction. Which this tells me that the final extracted espresso is underextracted. What I dont understand is that I tried to solve the underextracted problem with various solution read from various articles, like slower flow rate, grind finer and the result is still the same. I am must be doing something wrong.
+1 on the above comment...seems like the main thing that stands out is that you mention your shots are extracting at 12bar. If changing the grind/tamp /dose has never gotten you a shot that extracts around 9bar, then maybe you need to adjust the OPV.
In a word, Yes. In fact I think it’s nearly impossible. It’s due to a practice many if not who all who start out reading these forums are guilty of at first. Until you quit trying so hard and stop changing things so desperately you can’t begin to learn.
Really? 4 different beans, 14 to 18 gm doseage differential, stopping the extraction at various stages, different flushing techniques, etc. etc. and the taste doesn’t change? Not ever or even a little bit? It’s very strange that it’s overly bitter AND sour at the same time, the usual wisdom is that those descriptors are at opposite ends of the extraction spectrum and usually indicate brew water that’s either too hot (bitter) or too cold (sour) and not likely to be both. I think perhaps your taste buds are a little confused, let me explain.
I followed the same path you seem to be taking; I read everything and tried everything with dismal results. Before I had even practiced the fundamental processes involved in prepping the coffee bed enough times to be sure I did it the SAME way each time, I deliberately introduced many other variables none of which seemed to work. Then I relaxed, stopped worrying about getting a perfect shot and instead concentrated on the fundamentals and, in time, every thing came together in a natural sort of way.
The fact is, if you use the same technique and the same water, coffee, machine, grinder etc., etc. the coffee will taste the same, period. It may taste bad but it will taste the same and that’s the secret first step to greatness; drink a lot of bad coffee until you can get it tasting the “SAME BAD” every time.
Until prepping the coffee bed becomes second nature you will introduce unintentional variables that WILL affect the results in the cup and the more things you intentionally change the less likely you are to recognize the affects of unintentional mistakes.
As things stand now, every cup you drink is in fact different even though BAD but your taste buds are so confused you think it all taste the same just because it’s all BAD. “This cup is bad; the last cup was bad so they must taste the same.” Right?.... Wrong! You just can’t recognize the differences because every cup is different and you have not developed a base line to judge the differences.
Pick a procedure and stick with the same procedure until you become super familiar with it and one day you may realize by what’s in the cup “hey I must have messed up my usual procedure a little that time and because this is a "DIFFERENT BAD”. Notice I said you will notice you messed up your usual procedure because you got a different taste not the other way around. Until you can get the same results with a standard unchanging process you are unlikely to progress. It matters not whether the result is good, bad or indifferent only that is dependably the same. Once you get to that point you can deliberately change one and just one variable and decide whether it made a difference good or bad. If the coffee is better incorporate the new technique until you come familiar with the new taste then repeat the cycle. If the result is bad go back to the old familiar way but try changing another parameter. If no difference is noticed keep the simpler process. Until you’re satisfied, it’s a never ending process; but get familiar with the new product before you introduce another change. You must be able to produce repeatable results before you can judge the impact of a change but until you can, changes just make the whole process much harder.
OK, now to specific suggestions to achieve the “SAME BAD” coffee. The key to sameness is using the same sequence of processing every time: ABC every time, never ACB. If you forget A and start with B throw it out and start all over. The ABC sequence will become a habit and you will never have to think about it again until you change it for an identifiable reason. Then: same dose, same coffee, same distribution, same tamp, same flush. EVERY SINGLE TIME until you no longer have to think about it and it produces reasonably repeatable results. Even if it’s all wrong; dose, coffee, distribution, tamp and flush all wrong, do it all wrong every time. If you really do it the same way, the results in the cup will really be the same too and you will become familiar with it and will notice any changes introduced by altered variables intentional or otherwise.
Recommendations meanwhile: Try a different bean supplier; perhaps it’s just a bad source. Adjust the brew pressure to 9 BAR, 12 will make channeling more likely. Continue the WDT. I would forget the scale and depend on the grind, WDT and leveling with a straight edge scraped across the top to produce the same dose, but that’s because I know from experience it works for me. Don't worry too much about tamp pressure, the important thing is the coffee bed is low enough in the filter after tamping that it doesn't contact the shower screen before brewing and what ever dose and tamp achieves that with the proper grind will be good enough. 9 Bar is 135 psi or several hundred pounds of pressure when the area of the whole bed is considered. You have to be a pretty big boy to put that much pressure on it with your tamper, let the water do the hard labor.
What works on my BZ40: My BZ40 works, I relax. What I really mean by this is NO flush for all practical purposes. I do flush through the empty portafilter, but just enough to fill the espresso shot glass I am going to extract into and heat it up. Does this constitute a cooling flush? I don’t think so; it’s only 60ml and I grind, WDT, level and tamp at a leisurely pace afterward then pull the shot. I think the HX heats back up to normal temps by the time i do all that and start the pull. Flushing was the biggest obstacle to me getting the “SAME BAD” every time so I quit doing it when I discovered by accident that no flush produced excellent results. I was just unable to perform the flush with the same accuracy each time and the coffee is best if I omit this step still. If you try this method long enough to become familiar with the result you can then alter it using the too cool=sour and too hot=bitter parameters to guide you. But, to beat a dead horse, you must become familiar with the “SAME BAD” before you can judge what changes to make.
The Bezzera’s use an HX chamber to mix cold and hot water before delivery to the brew head resulting in a different (and on the BZ40 perfect for my taste) temperature profile than the usual strait tube employed by others. I have found flushing to be counterproductive and if I change coffees I adjust the pressurestat to alter the brew temperature if a small adjustment is indicated by the taste profile. Almost like a double boiler, change the boiler temp a few degrees and the brew temp changes too with no flush needed. No big deal on my machine. I love my BZ40, It works, I relax.
walkerjohn Senior Member Joined: 15 Nov 2011 Posts: 4 Location: Prague, Czech Republic, Europe, Earth, Solar system of milky way Expertise: I live coffee
The beans are low acidity, medium roasted and asked the vendor before ordering, to suggest me some sweet low acidity beans.
I tasted the espresso during extraction today every 10 seconds, and I can say that my final shots pretty much taste like the first 10 seconds of the extraction. Which this tells me that the final extracted espresso is underextracted. What I dont understand is that I tried to solve the underextracted problem with various solution read from various articles, like slower flow rate, grind finer and the result is still the same. I am must be doing something wrong.
Hmm, sounds strange. would be helpful if you wrote something about the espresso. "medium" usually is more acid. I would suggest you try two things, one i lowering the pressure, or the other one - using a deeper basket. I have found by experiomenting, that the sweetest syrupy 30sec extrat i get from a "noname triple basket" and what ssems to matter is the thickness of the puck. Thinner puck means usually more danger of channeling and more acid coffee (water gets faster through the beans and exctraction is probably at a lower temperature) regarding flushing - try not to flush and see (it usually is better, and try googling this thread - something like: "cooling flush is actually a warming flush")
and then the final one, try some other roasters as well, is you are not used to have straghtforward acidity, it may tear your tongue:) (especially if prepared too acid) i would recommend union cofee roasters with their foundation or revelation espresso, then one of my secret tips is square mile cofee - ethiopia Guji Oromia (blueberry jam taste, and coconut with milk) and then, the wery best i recently had, from guys in our country an uebercofee: colombia from a farmer named Carlos Imbachi - this one is sweet, chocolate, cane, whoa, and no acid tongue tearing tones at all:) Click Here (www.doubleshot.cz)
Well hope you will enjoy your cofee soon, wish you goo luck. Walker.
Symbols: = New Posts since your last visit = No New Posts since last visit = Newest post
Forum Rules: No profanity, illegal acts or personal attacks will be tolerated in these discussion boards. No commercial posting of any nature will be tolerated; only private sales by private individuals, in the "Buy and Sell" forum. No cross posting allowed - do not post your topic to more than one forum, nor repost a topic to the same forum. Who Can Read The Forum? Anyone can read posts in these discussion boards. Who Can Post New Topics? Any registered CoffeeGeek member can post new topics. Who Can Post Replies? Any registered CoffeeGeek member can post replies. Can Photos be posted? Anyone can post photos in their new topics or replies. Who can change or delete posts? Any CoffeeGeek member can edit their own posts. Only moderators can delete posts. Probationary Period: If you are a new signup for CoffeeGeek, you cannot promote, endorse, criticise or otherwise post an unsolicited endorsement for any company, product or service in your first five postings.
= No New Posts since last visit 