I can't wait either!! I have completely solved the single dosing issue with my Robur and now am ready for the payoff!!!!!

Please post any brewing profiles that seem to work! I plan on starting with my "go to" dose of 18gm with 66% brew ratio, slowish flow. Probably lower temps. How does that sound as a starting point?

Mod: Moved from Don Pachi Private Sale

Now that the distribution is (mostly) done, I wanted to start a topic for shot exploration. Please keep the comments toward espresso.

Has anyone had a chance to dial any in yet?

Start with a fine grind (fine enough for a classic Italian 14 gram double, or 17 to 17.5 in the VST-18), lowish temperature, 197-198, 0.7 brew ratio.

Look for a balance of apricot on top, an exotic green tea and chocolate base, very creamy mouthfeel, very long finish, in the god shot range. If the taste isn't subtle enough, grind finer, if it is too subtle, grind coarser. Change the temperature to balance the apricot top, green tea/choc base.

I found this coffee as roasted totally unsuitable as espresso. Go for anything but.... French press, Hario work great. It can be tamed a bit on Cremina but it is still far from pleasing for espresso.

Wow! That's unfortunate to read. I hope that's not everyones conclusion. I just posted my thoughts on it as a drip coffee and was floored. I would hate to waste a single gram of this bean trying to "dial in" a good shot. If I hadn't read Jim's tips, I'd have been starting extremely far off to begin with. Not that one persons approach is objective for all, but I imagine I'd have been disappointed had I tried a blind approach.

The Ipsento roast is a little lighter than mine. Do not be scared to grind really fine These light roasted coffees may need a grind that runs ristretto in a regular basket filled to 12 grams, virtually Turkish. Dial in on another coffee, and then use the dial in that gets these brew parameters on the Don Pachi.

I test cupping roasts for espresso all the time, and probably have more experience doing this than most. They have a tiny sweet spot, so take this to heart.
-- Any coffee that is sweet enough (certainly the Don Pachi) can be made into a good espresso. But there are two keys
-- a really fine grind that extracts all the sugars and caramels.
-- A lowish temperature: light roasts aren't overwhelmingly sour as espresso, but they can be overwhelmingly cutting-bitter from the wood-toast light roast flavors. At temperatures of 200F and above, they can rapidly become undrinkable.

Oh, if you don't enjoy very bright coffees for espresso -- SOs and beyond -- don't even bother using this coffee fro espresso.

I would think in the right hands, given the right treatment, the brightness would be a plus, since it's so sweet and so incredibly balanced. I will make an effort sooner or later to pull a shot. I just want to see a few others step up and share their approach first

another_jim wrote:The Ipsento roast is a little lighter than mine.

Jim, do you (or anyone else) have information on how dark Klatch roasted this coffee? The website says "medium" roast, so I'm assuming it's darker than yours or Ipsento. If that's the case, sounds like a larger dose and coarser grind would be appropriate. But if I'm correctly reading what you've written, the darker roast won't make it possible to get the most out of the coffee. True? If so, that would change the value equation.

And I'm only toying with getting some...

It may take a test shot to get the grind right. I tend to to err on the fine side first time around, since if I go wrong, I prefer a shot that's too soft to one that punches me in the mouth.

Coffees this expensive underline the need to know what combinations of dose/grind setting to use ahead of time. Dialing in a coffee should not include starting out with a gushing or choked shot (it can happen with unusual coffees, but otherwise it's mostly avoidable), it should be about deciding which properly flowing combination of dose/grind and temperature tastes best.