The Cupp-A-Coffee Report

FreshCoffee2

I do get to travel around a bit and here is the latest bit of "research":

a) On Wednesday I was in a vibrant Victorian country town. The wife and I walked the length of the "high street" looking to sit and relax a bit over a coffee, after concluding the mornings business.  There wasnt much to pick from in that we are particular in the kind of establishment we like to sit in. Came across a suitable looking venue.

The front wall of the cafe had been replaced with glass and the espresso machine and grinder were in the large open window facing on to the footpath. The cafe and staff were all clean and neat and professional looking. It looked good.

There was already a client at the window waiting for her coffee to be made, and we stopped to wait and watch.

We left.

Brand of coffee beans, brand of grinder, brand of espresso machine....be they ever so ethical / artisanal / conikal / planar / multi boilered or HX'd, cheap or expensive.............all irrelevant.

Why? The deep rumbling sound of milk about to boil. Dunno if it was a fresh jug full steamed for too long to get it "good and hot" OR, a jugfull that was being RE-steamed. Dont care not good.

b) Driving home from Sydney yesterday stopped at a crappy service station roadhouse (hunger can make you desperate). Was about to walk when I couldnt find anything to eat other than deep fried / remanufactured / baked goods, when I spotted some clean looking sandwiches. ok.

Wife wanted a cuppa (she's more daring than I am).  Found 2 expensive brand commercial automatic espresso machines on a side wall. The beans in hoppers were well roasted and not greasy. Taking life and limb in hand, I pressed the cappuccino button.  The espresso poured out well made, and I stopped the milk portion early to suit our style. The milk was well textured.....

With takeaway cup in hand I reached for a paddle pop stick to stir the liquid before taking an exploratory sip.

Blow me down........the resulting capp was VERY GOOD, especially in consideration of the situation (auto machine in crappy highway roadhouse scenario).

I didnt need to be convinced these particular brand / model expensive commercial auto machines can make good coffee,  the surprise was that they were well set up (as we do for hotel and office situations), with reasonable looking FAQ beans in the grinders.

It pays to always keep an open mind and one finger on the reality button out there....

Brett H

What a great read, thank you A!  I've not yet had an acceptable coffee from an Auto or a Pod; however, I've never had either yours or Jeff's examples to try.  I think you are very brave, open-minded and pragmatic crazy!! I've tried the DiBella Pods, a Superauto for a business allegedly from DiBella and stacked itch their beans; as well as the commercial Merlo Pod.  I wasn't able to drink either without wincing. The choice was clearly either move interstate, or do it at home with the best value and most consistent tools money can buy.  Thank you for your part in this also!

mycuppa

Ahh A.........it can be surprising. I liked the part about how you inspected the beans beforehand. Guilty myself of poppin' the hopper lid to get a good gander. Been busted a few times as well with hand on lid and when possible, snout buried near hopper opening. One of my clients provides a similar bean2cup solution to petrol stations and I must admit to being quite surprised as to the quality and consistency of the result - I use his list as my stopping points when the urge becomes overwhelming as I travel around.

derrilex

"A " has just been promoted to detective in the coffee police force  :rofl:

mycuppa

Not to hijack the thread Brett - but I thought this might be useful to understand in context. The issues with POD's, or more specifically ESE POD's being the ONLY open, international standard are somewhat akin to what we have to cope with in the manual espresso domain. That is - EXTRACTION EFFICIENCY. Not all POD machines are created equal. Even the most minute variance - say a fraction of a millimeter - in the chamber design or manufacture can have quite considerable impact in the brew result. Then we have a big variable to contend with - the grind setting used to manufacture the pod and even the dosage (and I'm talking about a point of a gram that can make a difference). We just had another new batch of fresh roasted pods arrive back from the converter last week. Testing a sample we found the flow slightly faster than the previous batch using the same commercial pod machine, etc. The slightly faster flow is not entirely desirable (for me personally) - but it may work perfectly fine for the majority of our customers who predominantly own domestic type equipments. Unfortunately, portion control is not perfect - yet.

Brett H

on 1353202997:

Not to hijack the thread Brett - but I thought this might be useful to understand in context. The issues with POD's, or more specifically ESE POD's being the ONLY open, international standard are somewhat akin to what we have to cope with in the manual espresso domain. That is - EXTRACTION EFFICIENCY. Not all POD machines are created equal. Even the most minute variance - say a fraction of a millimeter - in the chamber design or manufacture can have quite considerable impact in the brew result. Then we have a big variable to contend with - the grind setting used to manufacture the pod and even the dosage (and I'm talking about a point of a gram that can make a difference). We just had another new batch of fresh roasted pods arrive back from the converter last week. Testing a sample we found the flow slightly faster than the previous batch using the same commercial pod machine, etc. The slightly faster flow is not entirely desirable (for me personally) - but it may work perfectly fine for the majority of our customers who predominantly own domestic type equipments. Unfortunately, portion control is not perfect - yet.

It sounds like an expensive process for the roaster!  Thanks for your post Jeff, very interesting.  It goes some way to explaining for me why the stars have never aligned for my limited experience with this product. It also should read as a loud-hailing alarm for those who imagine that mass produced affordable Nespresso could ever come close to real coffee.  Damn it, my friend has several of their contraptions and every one is noticeably a different temperature, so I can't begin to imagine how poorly they cope with the comparatively sophisticated parameters you mention above Jeff.

FreshCoffee2

Yes J! and D, in so far as being promoted to detective,......I am reading a really absorbing crime novel at the moment and wont take anything less than a DCI posting (detective chief inspector..... ;D ) I always buy cups of coffee with an open mind to see what will be......"che sara sara, whatever will be will be....".......famous doris day song and no, I'm not that old! Once had a coffee in a very well known (famous?) melbourne coffee establishment. It was vile and we left it. As I spend most of my life in coffee quality control in one form or another, I've had a very broad base of qualities thrown at me and I am very forgiving (cant be snobbish in the derogatory connotation and its all legitimate research for me and my palate), but it was one of the worst scheit ever gone onto my palate. Had a coffee in another well known (famous?) melbourne coffee establishment and the coffee was good. But it DID NOT live up to all the image hype associated with the establishment ( it was just a well made coffee.....AS THEY ALL SHOULD BE...) and the 25 minute wait certainly wasnt worth it. "Coffee With Attitude"....phooey. So someone that does what they should do and gets paid to do (make coffee properly) is turned into an urban legend, an icon and even a celebrity....for simply doing their duty and their job as they should. We live in interesting times.

FreshCoffee2

This morning. Biz colleagues wanted to meet at a local vietnamese bakery. I paid for all, and prepared for the worst. The machine, an old 2 group San Marino. To lessen the damage, I ordered a cappuccino for myself (standard cup please not a mug). .............And was pleasantly surprised to "cup" a perfectly *acceptable* (for any regular cafe/eatery) product, with no operator induced bitterness, & if anything it was a little on the luke warm side. Reasonable balance in the brew, and no horrible aftertaste of any kind. No (bad) attitude on the part of the operator; No fancy schmancy web generated Politkally Korrekt brand name multi boiler machine or paddle in sight; God forbid......a flat plate grinder and No coffee "celebrity" Moral of the story....keep an open mind please. Probably shoulda called this thread "The Cappuccino Diaries".

C-man

great stories! from the diary Listen to this one- We were driving up to the Whitsundays and after too many hours driving we had to stop Literally in the middle of no where.  It was a petrel station come bottle shop come whatever, the Mrs said to grab a bottle of wine for our dinner later. I could see the beer but not the wine, so I asked where is the Wine? WIYYYYYYYYYYINE he said, WINE  (Wayne)  doesn't work here anymore, he done run off with his sister... yuk yuk Desperate and falling asleep I asked if they had any real coffee? REEEEEAL Coffee, Whats that?  was the reply. past caring I said give me a strong coffee with milk. expecting Boiled instant, I was shocked when presented with a large triple shot cup with nicely textured milk, took one sip and ordered another! Hows that?