After three grinders and six or seven years, I finally came to the conclusion that I would be much better off buying a doserless grinder for the express purpose of non-espresso usage. My first venture into a bur grinder was with a $100 De Longhi followed by two La Pavoni's: a PGB and PGC. The Pavoni's had to be repaired multiple times because of bearing failures as well as bur replacements. The only thing going for the Pavoni was that it is a conical grinder. In comparison to the Anfim doserless, the Pavoni's are toys that have a high propensity to break down with resultant repair costs. The Pavoni weighs in at 4+ pounds. The Anfim is serious metal, weighty at 6 kg or about 13.2 pounds, and stands like an ominous black rook or even perhaps the monolith in 2001: a space odyssey. Unlike the Pavoni, the Anfim doserless is not a grinder that one will be able to pick up with one hand shake it to get leftover grind out of the chute and throated area.
My only usage for this grinder is strictly non-espresso and in my case amounts to the grinder that I use with my Royal Balance Brewer, a vacuum pot. The Anfim doserless is exactly the same as the Pasquini Moka 90 grinder but without the doser. The grind quality is exactly the same. I wanted a doserless grinder that would deliver the grind directly into the brewing vessel, whether it be a French press or a vacuum pot. For that purpose, I removed the metal PF fork (screw retained) and created more than enough space to place the brewing vessel directly underneath the chute. The Anfim doserless has two switches. The first and most prominent one turns the unit on, but does not activate the grinder, with the orange switch now being lit. The second switch is actually a black button that sits behind the PF fork and when one places the PF in place the button would be depressed and cause the grinder to grind, as long as the button is depressed. For non-espresso usage, I can hold the brewing container and simultaneously depress the button with one hand. In contrast, the Moka 90 has only one switch and the grinder is either grinding or not.
The Anfim doserless chute is all metal and retained with a Phillips screw. One consideration with the chute is its retention of grind which can be easily dislodged by knocking against the top of the metal chute with one's index finger, after which one will see lots of grind come falling out. This is a critical piece of information for espresso because that grind is substantial enough to thoroughly ruin a shot because it will become stale in minutes, in between shots. The corollary to this is that one cannot expect to dump in 14 or more grams of beans and get exactly that amount out of the grinder without tapping the chute. Even then, the inaccessibility of the small area between the chute and the mills, which I term as a throat, can never be totally accessed unless one takes the grinder apart as one would do with an espresso grinder at the end of a session. With the Moka 90 grinder, that throat area is easily accessible with a grinder's brush, not so with the Anfim doserless grinder. The amount of grind sitting in that throat area is a lot less than what sits in the chute and is, of course, subject to staling. If one is not into attempting to optimize espresso shots, then this will be of little concern. Yes, you can get more than acceptable espresso by commercial standards, but it will be difficult to go beyond that to the Holy Grail of God Shots because of the oxidation factor of the grind that can never be overcome except via milk and sugar.
The Anfim doserless grinder has exactly the same turning wheel with clickable detents as the Moka 90. They are identical except for the doser and the on/off switch. The Anfim doserless grinds upon demand with its dead man button, meaning that it has to be depressed if one wants anything to come out of the chute.
There are commercial grinders with the sole purpose of non-espresso grinding, but I have a hard time convincing myself to spend $900 or so for one of them. Given the cost of my three previous bur grinders with all of the repairs and I have spent $600. If I had known what I know now, I would have been more than willing to spend the bucks to buy a superior grinder. It is only very recently that the Anfim doserless has hit our US shores. With the exception of the Rocky doserless, the Anfim doserless would have no competition at its price level. But both of these grinders are relatively recent arrivals in the US. Hence, there haven't been any serious grinders for those wanting a doserless grinder to even consider until recently.
The advantage of a dosered grinder is that one can grind out as much as one thinks will be needed to fill the PF basket and dispense it relatively quickly. Not that there isn't a workaround with the Anfim doserless if one is willing to catch the grind in a bowl and then transfer it into the PF basket. I would think that those with a doserless grinder would want to grind directly into the PF basket. Aside from not being able to do anything while the grinding is going on because one has to hold the PF basket to catch the grind, it can and will be much, much more messy than using the dosered version.
Making high quality coffee is a process that begins with roasting one's own choice of high grade beans. Then there is the grinder. There is no substitute for a high end grinder which will be the final limiting factor of what ends up in the cup. The extraction process with the Royal Balance brewer is very quick and not all that modifiable unless one is willing to possibly seriously damage the silicone gaskets by artificially restraining the kickdown process. Hence, one must have a grinder that grinds very evenly and fine enough to compensate for the very short extraction time. The grinder is the X factor that is frequently ignored for non-espresso purposes. The Anfim doserless satisfies my requirements and is probably not for everyone. It is a no nonsense grinder and compliments the espresso dosered grinder. Both have their own specific purposes with ease of usage being high on my list. |
