Episode 2: Brewing at home with pre-ground coffee
In episode 2 we go deep into the controversial topic of brewing with pre-ground coffee. There’s so many opinions on this topic, so we wanted to see if we could make an exceptional espresso using pre-ground coffee. And to make it even harder to achieve a good result, we’re also using second hand, home machines. So if we can make a great cup of coffee in this scenario, so can you!
The coffee we used in this experiment was roasted 7 days previous, then ground 4 days beforehand. We also used a standard, single-wall basket with a 20g dose. This episode is particularly helpful if you don’t have a grinder at home. So jump in and see how we go.
If you missed episode 1
Episode 1 recap : A few weeks ago we hit Gumtree in search of used espresso machines. Our goal is to show that you don’t need to spend a lot of money to make great coffee at home. In the first episode we tested the machines we bought on gumtree. One blew a seal and one was good! You can watch episode 1 here.
nice watch brah!
Best kickstarter i’ve backed thus far.
Hi, pre ground does not really seem practical for this kind of machine, you could go through many bags of coffee to dial it in, so can you let us know what grinder I should buy instead?
Regards,
From my experience the breville smart grinder is readily available at Harvey Norman or the Good Guys, is a great and affordable grinder, it even rivals some higher priced untis.
Hey Dom, I just bought this exact grinder after a few recommendations to buy it. I also have the Sunbeam model up from this, the EM7100 (A great machine). Could you give me a guide on how fine I should be grinding my beans. I’m around 12 at the moment and Im wondering if this is perhaps too fine.
At this stage forget the numbers and concentrate on 2 things.
1. does the coffee taste good?
2. what is the extraction time? to give you a ballpark i have found breville setups to taste good between 28-32 seconds, in our stores we often draw all the way up to 38 if needed, pending good cup flavour.
After that, then use the number on the grinder as your reference point.