I have some Black Cat arriving in the mail today and am looking for some starting points for brew temperature and dosage.

I have a Expobar Brewtus II (E61) and Mazzer Mini grinder.

Thanks in advance,

Ranger144

Thanks a bunch for the input, Dan. It looks like dumb luck prevailed! Before I got to read your post, I ended up trying 94 deg. C and about 18 grams as a carryover from the last coffee I was using! The second shot tasted great and came out very well at 1.5 oz at 27 seconds (first one was ground way too fine and went into the sink after a quick sip). I will stick with this formula until the weekend when I will have the time to experiment with other settings.

Thanks again!

Ranger144

Don't know if this will help any - we're an Intelly customer in a commercial environment using a Linea set to 202F. We use double baskets exclusively. We have a Swift that's set to 16g. Our top baristi who pull from the Mazzer usually go a half gram to a gram higher. It's worked great for a year and a half.

Then again Intelly has never told us differently - which is kind of annoying since we were just competing with them in Charlotte.

Triple ristrettos indeed... we learn more things over here. Even stuff our suppliers are supposed to tell us about!

PaniniGuy wrote:Don't know if this will help any - we're an Intelly customer in a commercial environment using a Linea set to 202F. We use double baskets exclusively. We have a Swift that's set to 16g. Our top baristi who pull from the Mazzer usually go a half gram to a gram higher. It's worked great for a year and a half.

Then again Intelly has never told us differently - which is kind of annoying since we were just competing with them in Charlotte.

Triple ristrettos indeed... we learn more things over here. Even stuff our suppliers are supposed to tell us about!

Look at it this way. They'd be selling you a lot more coffee if you were pulling triples all day.

I have been musing about the attraction of triple ristrettos. It could be "Ach, Laddie. If ya dinna like your single malt neat, you're still too wee to be wearin a kilt." or perhaps it is for sensory impaired individuals whose tastebuds have been scoured to nubs by the salty rims of margarita glasses. To me, it is akin to putting on a set of earphones and turning the volume up to the max. Subtlety is lost but on the other hand you hear notes that you have been previously deaf to. But if more is better, why not offer quad ristrettos w/28 gms for a 1.25 oz shot?

On the other hand, if you as a professional are pulling shots that taste good to you and to your customers, why not stick with them? It seems to me that the shortest road to ruination is by not trusting your own judgement.

Damn, a mini rant. I'm exhausted. Think I'll go and lay down for awhile.

Bob

PaniniGuy wrote:Then again Intelly has never told us differently - which is kind of annoying since we were just competing with them in Charlotte.

Triple ristrettos indeed... we learn more things over here. Even stuff our suppliers are supposed to tell us about!

I believe Black Cat is capable of good shots in double baskets- Isn't that what the machines in the USBC use?