The other day I went through my normal dance to pull a shot on our Faema lever...rinsed the cups from the flowing group, left the lever up while I ground beans dosed etc for a quick shot and got a GUSHER with a very fast pour and thin crema...usually the result of underdosing or not grinding fine enough...only happens when changing beans generally....but tasting the shot, it was COLD. Usually I leave the machine off but we had gone to the mountains to get some firewood and I had turned the machine off and had not turned it on when we returned...but here is my confusion and questions....

I had expected that such a shot would be horrible but the coffee tasted sweet and generally smooth with a very pleasant aftertaste (of course we drank the shot) and had no noticeable nasty elements at all save for lack of crema. What confounds me is why was the pour so fast when cold? I would think it would be slower. Why did it not taste sour as in a not hot enough shot? The taste was quite a bit similar to espresso on ice cream. I do not know if anyone has pulled an unheated shot...it takes a certain kind of machine to do this (hx lever or pump), but can anyone shed light on WHY this shot was actually pretty reasonable, just thin and cold, but much better than most espresso offerings in our espresso deprived area (i.e most of the country). It was actually good enough to repeat for a cold shot on a hot day, but then, winter is here for us and we likely will not have suitable hot weather for a while.
Just curious.

Hi Doug, just a quick reply - check out the topic here on brewing in the 175F range.

Regards, Henry

Doug,
Taste is subjective of course but I have enjoyed the taste of espresso ground somewhat less finely and pulled at room temp water on the La Pavona...less acid taste -- It also goes well with steamed milk that I get off my Mini Vivaldi II that sits next to my lever machine. I'm wondering if there is less caffeine when pulled cold?

Most interesting....we have tried the cold process coffee drippers and have made one from lab equipment but I had not thought to do straight cold pulls for a similar result. It was an accident but possibly a good one....now all we need is some warm weather to give the motivation for a cold coffee .

Hoffmann wrote a blog on cold brewing under pressure with positive results. What you are doing may be very similar.

http://www.jimseven.com/2010/08/20/pres...d-brewing/

orphanespresso wrote:What confounds me is why was the pour so fast when cold?

with cold water you don't get as much degassing of CO2 from your freshly ground coffee as with hot water (also the reason for the lack of crema), which plays an important role for building up flow resistance...

no/less CO2 --> faster flow