My communication has probably not been that clear (grin) as a lot of people seem to have reached the conclusion that I'm instead obsessing about the incredible performance of single origins on home machines.
The truth is that, by comparison, single origin espressos seem to perform better than blends on home machines.
What I mean is that commercial blends seem to consistently underperform on home machines as compared to commercial machines. If I were to compare the average shot I pulled of a top commercial blend on a home machine with the same blend pulled on a temp stabilized dual boiler commercial machine I would have to say that 99% of the time the shot from a home machine is inferior. By comparison, if I were to do the same test with a single origin coffee, I would say that 70% of the time the commercial machine would produce the better shot, 20% of the time they would be directly comparable and 10% of the time the home machine would produce the superior shot.
The common failings of most blends seem to be (at least in part):
- inclusion of a combination of beans resulting in a narrowed window (if, for example, you have a natural brazil and a monsooned malabar in your blend you have to pull it hot enough to result in the malabar not tasting terrible but if you go too hot the brazil tastes like cigarette ash).
- desired flavour profiles that are complex, showcase multiple high-toned beans and require great clarity of reproduction (which, with all home machines tested to date, result in a muddied and monolithic flavour rather than the desired layered complexity).
- multiple "finicky" requirements (several blends have combined very bright beans roasted light requiring careful temp and dose management with one or more "tricky" beans that can easily end up tasting "off" if not careful on dose).
The roasters can require narrow windows not only on brew temp and pressure (both inter-shot and intra-shot) but also on grind size, dose and tamp etc.
I honestly believe that roasters need to start producing espresso blends directly tailored for (and evaluated with) home machines. My theory is that that would need to be simple in formulation (target would be 3 beans), temp tolerant (both inter-shot and intra-shot) and perform well at two to three different dose profiles. Personally, I would offer two different such blends - one designed for straight espresso and one designed for milk drinks.
