Ode to Espresso: A Journey into the Cup
Growing up, my family didn’t drink espresso. They would drink drip coffee but of the Folgers quality. To them, it was strictly a transport vehicle for caffeine. I didn’t particularly like coffee, but my love for espresso grew gradually while living in Paris.
Paris, je t’aime
I lived in Paris for my last two years of high school, and at the time, I was cheap. When we went out to a cafe, I would get espresso, but not because I loved espresso, rather because it was the cheapest thing on the menu. However, I started to enjoy it quite a bit. It had such a strong, rich flavor. The first time I drank espresso, it tasted as if I melted a piece of chocolate in my mouth but it was coffee. My palette was only in its infancy, but the mouthfeel of espresso was unlike anything else I had ever had.
I returned to the US, and I was on my way to my recently deceased grandfather’s house to help my mom and my aunt clean stuff out. On the way, we stopped at Starbucks. They got lattes, and I asked for an espresso. The baristas were shocked that anyone would want just a shot of espresso. They insisted it wasn’t enough liquid. I acquiesced and ended up with four shots of espresso in a cup. I wasn’t going to drink it all, and I put a regular amount of sugar in it. Then I took the first sip 🤮.
Their espresso was so bitter, and I had such a terrible experience, I decided espresso was best had in Europe. I wasn’t into other espresso drinks, so I didn’t have espresso for a number of years. What I didn’t know is that half the problem centers in Starbucks’ inability to roast coffee well. In the early 2000’s, 3rd wave coffee wasn’t yet a thing, and the main coffee explosion in the States was of the Starbucks variety, not espresso.
Passion Revived
I met my wife at Notre Dame, and her Italian family would have espresso. Slowly I dipped back into having espresso in the US, but I never had the experience I had with espresso like I had in Europe. She got me a super automatic espresso machine, and you pressed one button to grind, pack, and brew espresso.
For the super automatic, I had to make some adjustments to the grind to get the richness I look for. I increased the shot to the maximum strength (highest weight), the liquid to the minimum, and adjusted the grinder to the finest setting. A few years later, I tore it down to clean it, and I adjusted the grinder to go even finer than it was supposed to go. This choked the machine, but once I removed the marble that made the portafilter pressurized, the shot came out okay. It was good enough for espresso drinks and on occasion, a straight shot.
Then I started upgrading the beans. At the office, I befriended two espresso lovers, and we started an espresso ritual much to the chagrin of others. This experience led us to try different beans, and soon I was clued into what was a good roast. At the office, we only had a Mr. Coffee, but if I packed the filter to almost the top, the machine would choke and produce a good, syrupy shot.
I bought a manual espresso machine for $38 at an estate sale, and I started working towards making a good shot from there. Finally, a machine that could give me what I wanted even if I still wasn’t consistent in my pull. This resulted in a home and office espresso setup.
Coffee Roasting
I dabbled in coffee roasting as I became more fascinated in all aspects of coffee. However, a good coffee roaster was between $300 and $1,600 for small batches (1/2 lbs). I wasn’t ready for that type of commitment even though I knew the potential break even point was only two years at most.
When I moved to California, a casual conversation with my boss’s boss ended with a free coffee roaster. He had upgraded to a $5,000 roaster that would do 1 kg. He had a Hottop, one generation older than the current model. It would cost $1,200 new, and it would roast 9 oz per batch. This roaster only needed a little cleaning up, and it was ready to roast.
I spend a year adjusting the roast heat profile to get the best out of the beans. I quickly settled on ending each roast one minute after the First Crack (FC), but to get there was the issue. Getting to the right temperature too quickly resulted in a burnt taste even for a medium roast. If the beans heat too slowly, the roast tastes like grass and not so sweet.
For the first few years, I stuck to blending African beans with South American beans. Once I started to save more data on my roasts, I was more adventurous. Even when I find a great roast, I’m not so concerned about repeating it forever because I’m still curious what other flavors are out there.
I ended up drinking twice as many shots as I used to simply because my cost went down. However, I didn’t want to roast more than once a week, so I explored going higher than the spec of 9 oz. I saw others had gone to 16 oz, so I tried a 16 oz roast, but the roaster could barely do it. The 9 oz max must have been for a dark roast because the beans expand to such a large size. For my medium roast, I found a little over 12 oz (350g) worked really well and got me through the week.
Upgrades
The next upgrades trickled in for fear of spending too much too quickly: new filter baskets, a new grinder, a bottomless portafilter, a distributer, a leveler, and a knock box. All of these tools improved my shot and my consistency. Filter baskets
At the start of 2019, I began to use a data sheet, and my journey down the rabbit hole really began. I bought a Kruve sifter two months later, and things got wild. I developed the staccato shot and pressure pulsing. The addition of a refractometer allowed me to gain more insight into the shot as a whole.
Espresso has thus merged with my other hobby: data. The ritual, the data, and the taste are what intrigues me about espresso. My shot ritual takes time, patience, and attentiveness to detail. This has become a form of character building as I have focused more and more on making the best shot everyday.
The shot I make is much different than normally pulled even in Europe, but during the summer of 2019, I believe my regular shot surpassed my memory of my first shot of espresso in Paris. I’ve been rocketed into the fourth dimension of espresso.
I look forward to the future because I feel like the espresso shot is woefully mysterious. There is a wide amount of experience on different aspect of the shot, but the inner workings of the shot are still unknown. If I have learned anything about espresso, it is that questioning the best practices is key for future improvements. Not all questions will lead to improvements, but the future understanding from experimentation is vital.
If you like, follow me on Twitter and YouTube where I post videos espresso shots on different machines and espresso related stuff. You can also find me on LinkedIn.
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