I have a Olympia Cremina and I have been learning to use it for almost a year now. In the past few months I have gotten better at tweaking the grind on my La Cimbali Max Hybrid and its made a pretty big difference, but not enough to satisfy my tastes.

Enter the Kafatek Monolith Titan Conical

My wife put it best yesterday, by saying "Its been a lot better, but now [with the Conical] its consistently great"

I received the KafaTek Monolith Titan Conical about two weeks ago, but didn't get home until last Sunday. My first experience differed then others seemed to have, in which the first shot they pulled was a little fast/slow but still very tasty. Mine was okay.

I started with a couple of large corrections to get closer to a thirty second pull, and as I did that, the espresso got infinitely better. What shocks me about this grinder, is the clarity that is revealed. I like most, have read about the notes revealed in well prepared espresso. At tastings with much more experienced baristas and much more expensive equipment I have been able to discern those flavors. This hasn't always been the case with the Cremina until now. With the Concical, so many flavors become obvious, chocolate, light, dark, sweet and bitter, fruits etc. all become immediately clear and small tweaks can encourage those flavors to please the palate.

I wasn't really prepared, but hopeful, that the Conical would be the game changer for my espresso making, it by far has exceeded my expectations.

A couple of other thoughts:
I don't know much about grinders, this is my second grinder and I didn't buy a bunch of grinders to compare and test.
The customer experience with KafaTek is awesome.

Thanks for the note. A lot of us (myself included) seem to be inching forward towards Monolith purchases

Just amazing isn't it?

Could not agree with you more. Will do some more testing this week.

Looking forward to hearing more from you Mike. That's a beautiful selection of roasters, should make for a tasty week.

I look forward to doing the testing/tasting as well. It will take a while, as I can only tolerate 3-4 shots of espresso per day. Yesterday, I had six, which proved to be a bad idea.

I have today the coffee equivalent of a hangover.

... so this morning i had some Hair(bender) of the dog.

mivanitsky wrote:I look forward to doing the testing/tasting as well. It will take a while, as I can only tolerate 3-4 shots of espresso per day. Yesterday, I had six, which proved to be a bad idea.

I envy where you live... all sorts of good stuff within reach. I'll be paying attention to your follow-up. I'm inching along with some of the others...

mivanitsky wrote:Could not agree with you more. Will do some more testing this week.

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Where did you get Kickapoo? My brother who lives in Mn raves about it. Love to hear what you think.

My Flat has been shipped.... scheduled delivery Friday....

I have OZO Coffee From Boulder Colorado, Organic Sumatra Queen Ketiara and 8th Wonder Espresso ready, as well as
Nizza from Le Colombe , and Monte Carlo Decaf.

I am soooo ready!

Barista PDX, Pearl was the source of the single origin coffees in the picture.

Mike, thanks for that info. I'm in Portland now, flying back to San Diego at 6. I'll try to stop by Barista PDX and pick out a few bags today. I have a Monolith Flat arriving Thursday. I'll run some of my basic local beans through it for a while before trying the boutique beans and taste testing.