This friend of mine - I've been making him cappuccinos for like 6 months or so now - was over last weekend and he asked me why my coffee doesn't taste like it does in coffee shops. So, I made him a bad cappuccino.

Keep in mind that I've learned pretty much everything about making espresso and espresso drinks from reading on the internet, plus I took the course at Intelly about two years ago. I think my technique is pretty ok (no real opportunity to get bad habits).

So, I did this:
- set my grinder way too coarse (taking a mental note of where it was set),
- didn't worry about the distribution,
- tamped just barely,
- knocked the crap out of the portafilter with the tamper about 4 times (I used the abused Reg tamper that came with my neused machine),
- barely tamped again, locked it in and let it brew.
- while my 3 ounce espresso was quickly brewing into the cup (I think I got about 3 oz in 15 secs), I steamed up some milk
- I let that sucker screech, then lowered the pitcher to get some really big bubbles and just barely scalded the milk.

This was pretty much the first time I'd tried to make a drink like this. My friend started drinking it and said that the difference was very noticeable and reminded him of what he usually gets in coffee joints. I thought it was a pretty good demo.

And this was with fresh beans.

Anyone else?

fredfal wrote:he asked me why my coffee doesn't taste like it does in coffee shops. So, I made him a bad cappuccino.

Hahaha! That's perfect! Thanks for sharing it.

No, I've never gone quite that far. Have made quite a few too coarse shots etc when setting up the new grinder, and pulled shot after shot after shot of bitter + sour Sainsbury's beans (BB AUG 2010) this weekend in an effort to get my dose-distribute-tamp right, but nothing quite like your story!

The milk in cappuccinos can sure hide a lot of poorly made espressos - still be drinkable. I have noticed though, when I make a good cappa with a good fresh espresso - peoples eyes light up - and they notice the difference right off.

Howard

Too true Howard. My mother, who isnt considered a coffee drinker in our family, used to have a daily coffee habit about ten years ago, but stopped completely, as she said "it just stopped tasting good". So, with a few exceptions, its been quite a few years since she has had a coffee, and really never has she had fresh coffee.

Recently i made her a cappa, with some SO Brazil Cerrado. No sugar, no syrups, just a double shot of espresso, and the milk I used was Parmalat Whole, as always. One sip later, and her eyes lit up. She was amazed at how good it tasted.


She now has 2 cappas a day. After a ten year hiatus, and really hating coffee, she is now loving her daily cappas. She aint no geek tho!

Nice one, Fred!

My little brother is a bit of a coffee PITA, he's so used to bad coffee he doesn't appreciate the drinks I make. So.....I play his game!

One time he was at my house and I went to make us a couple drinks. I prepared my basket, steamed our milk, pulled my shot, then, repulled his shot. His repull (what I call a blondo) was basically the shot from seconds ~30 to ~90 . But, of course, he likes it! With a ton of sugar and a gallon of milk! He likes this (or instant+milk!!!) better than my proper cappuccino! My beans are too good to burn on this guy.

There are several variations to this: using very old beans, bad basket prep, no flushing...you name it, this guy will drink it(+1ton sugar + 1gallon milk)! I'm just hoping he'll eventually GROW UP and start liking what I like .

Ok it's not coffee but when I was a kid my younger sister always wanted to try the Quick chocolate milk mix I'd buy with my own hard earned paper route money. So after much nagging from her and my parents I finally made her a chocolate milk. She never asked for one again. Could have been the soy sauce I added.

Haha.

Go buy their syrup too! That way it can taste just like the "real thing."

What bothers me the most about big chains is how much sugar - correction, high fructose corn syrup - they put in their drinks. Ocassionally I'll try to order a flavored latte at the airport or something, and there is 4oz of syrup on top of the 1oz espresso. Even if the shot was perfect, I don't know if I could enjoy the sickeningly sweet flavor.

When my friend really wanted a vanilla latte, I made him go buy his own syrup. Starbucks sells their stuff quite cheaply. It's probably because they don't even use any real vanilla beans in the entire process. I suppose you get what you pay for... the flavor associated branding is unmistakeable.

Reading the OP, appropriate urban www language describing my response now has to be ROTFLMAO.

(a) In another thread there was discussion on backflushing, or not, E/61 type groups with coffee as a primer to get old, stale, coffee residue out of the brew head.
(b) I have this glass sitting under my doserless grinder that collects grind that sometimes falls out of the grinder chute after it dried out a little. It also collects an initial grind pulse with old grinds after some idle time.
(c) I do not really intentionally backflush (as per a) but occasionally run a first shot with the grind from (b).

I now have a nobler purpose occasionally for not putting the result of (c) in the sink.

ROTFLMAO.

Regards
Peter

fredfal wrote:
So, I did this:
- set my grinder way too coarse (taking a mental note of where it was set),
- didn't worry about the distribution,
- tamped just barely,
- knocked the crap out of the portafilter with the tamper about 4 times (I used the abused Reg tamper that came with my neused machine),
- barely tamped again, locked it in and let it brew.
- while my 3 ounce espresso was quickly brewing into the cup (I think I got about 3 oz in 15 secs), I steamed up some milk
- I let that sucker screech, then lowered the pitcher to get some really big bubbles and just barely scalded the milk.

This was pretty much the first time I'd tried to make a drink like this. My friend started drinking it and said that the difference was very noticeable and reminded him of what he usually gets in coffee joints. I thought it was a pretty good demo.

And this was with fresh beans.

Anyone else?

Write a recipe.
Put a patent on it.
Sell to Starbucks.
I think you have a chain store winner there buddy.
Make $millions.
Send me my $commission.

Old thread, but I actually have a very appropriate response...
I am currently working on an owners manual and wanted to show examples of good and bad results. The very-slow, over-extracted example was done with a grind so fine that it took 30 seconds for a nearly-black, tar-like substance to begin to ooze out of the basket. The correct was not too difficult to capture. The too-fast example was an award winner. I ground two full numbers (20 increments iirc) too-coarse with the Kony. I hit the brew button and the flow started within one second. By three seconds I had an upside down reenactment of what it would have been like if Mt. Vesuvius had been filled with espresso instead of lava! I had to stop the extraction as my camera was being threatened by the spraying espresso.

(as seen on the 1st-Line Facebook page)