Dosing & Soggy Puck

[skyryders90]

I'm playing with my new Bricoletta - very cool machine! I have a recurring problem with soggy pucks, however. The only way that I've managed to get the pucks to come out relatively dry and firm is to overdose the double basket to the point that when I lock in the portafilter, the grounds are pressing against the shower screen - i.e. if I lock it in and then unlock it without pulling the shot, the grounds have been pressed against the screen.

I'm using Black Cat, about 8 days old, the stock double basket in a bottomless Rancilio portafilter. (I have a triple basket, but those pucks seem to come out soggy no matter what I do) My shots are running somewhat long right now, with 1.75oz pulling in roughly 35 seconds - they taste pretty good to my unrefined palate, though. Could too fine a grind also cause soggy pucks?

The Bricoletta is my first "real" espresso machine, so I'm just playing through all the cause/effect relationships. It's a lot of fun.

[HB]

puck*ol*o*gy, n: the study of espresso pucks. Term coined by Jim Schulman and popularized by numerous references on CoffeeGeek. The merits of this obscure area of research are regularly debated; detractors point to it as an utter waste of time, supporters claim the dark, damp compressed coffee holds secrets for those willing to look closely.

A sloppy puck occurs when the water isn't squeezed out by the expansion of the coffee, leaving a puddle on top. Check the puck-to-screen clearance is about 2mm using a nickel: Place the coin on top of the dry puck, lock in and remove. There should be a light impression. You can go with slightly more grounds -- even enough that the puck lightly touches the screen -- but much more than a nickel's worth of clearance and you'll have a sloppy puck.

Triple baskets often pour more slowly than doubles, so 35 seconds / 1.75 ounces doesn't sound terribly out of whack, although I would grind slightly coarser and probably reduce the dosage a little. Mr. Triple Ristretto JonR can confirm as I don't use them all that much, but generally the puck expansion seems more subdued than the double baskets, which may explain the higher dosage to get the same dryness.

PS: Have you checked out Chris' Bricoletta Cribsheet?

[AndyS]

puck*ol*o*gy, n: the study of espresso pucks. Term coined by Jim Schulman and popularized by numerous references on CoffeeGeek.

See alt.coffee Forensic Puckology; is it a real science?