Whale wrote:Whooaa people! Now I am confused!!



Was Ken not talking about the dose in the basket (pre-tamping)? Once you have tamped and can judge the level with the tamper, is it not too late to adjust the quantity of coffee? That is something I learned by experience is a No-No! Correct me if I am wrong.

Having a nice thick base on the tamper gives, IMHO, multiple benefits; weight (mine is a 53mm) and balance (the tamper is self leveling when held lightly) and indeed it gives a very nice visual and tactile feedback on the level of the coffee puck.

Did I misunderstand something?

I don't think you missed a thing. Weigh your dose and you KNOW what is being extracted. Judge after the fact by thick based tampers and you are doing an experiment to see if you can taste the difference between doses you have not controlled well enough. At home I wonder what difference an extra few moments to get it right makes in the grand scheme of things. I'm with you, John Weiss and Ken Fox on this one.

Whale wrote:Once you have tamped and can judge the level with the tamper, is it not too late to adjust the quantity of coffee?

Not for the next dose. It tells me whether I should run my grinder's timer a little longer or shorter (usually neither). This, of course, only applies to the 99% of baristas who grind directly into their basket. I have no advice for spoon dosers.

Marshall - So knowing optimal conditions, you find it acceptable to waste a dose of coffee and the time it takes to make it in order to perform a "non-vodoo" ritual so as to be included in the "99% of all (true) baristas"? In the leisurely comfort of my home and without a line of customers or panel of judges to impress I will carefully perform my own ritual.

GC7 wrote:Marshall - So knowing optimal conditions, you find it acceptable to waste a dose of coffee and the time it takes to make it in order to perform a "non-vodoo" ritual so as to be included in the "99% of all (true) baristas"? In the leisurely comfort of my home and without a line of customers or panel of judges to impress I will carefully perform my own ritual.

Yes.

It's just part of the feedback loop that every conscientious barista uses to make adjustments as the coffee ages and humidity changes. It's not like "Wow, that dose is probably 1/2 gram light. My day is ruined." It's just a factor to keep in mind while making grind adjustments through the week. Plus, I often intentionally dose a little up or down to see if I can make it just a little bit better or just for variety.

Marshall wrote:Plus, I often intentionally dose a little up or down to see if I can make it just a little bit better or just for variety.

I agree with this completely. However, how do you know you have up or down dosed without weighing?

GC7 wrote:I agree with this completely. However, how do you know you have up or down dosed without weighing?

That's easy, he's a conscientious barista, plus only 1% of baristas are dumb enough, or inaccurate enough, to need a scale.

Being a dumbass does have its advantages, however, such as seldom needing to pitch bad shots, and less frequent cursing.

ken

Ken

Alfred E. Neuman would be so proud.

Dosing and distribution are two different animals. I've found that taking extra steps to measure the dose pays dividends in consistency, while excessive distribution rituals don't buy me much, if anything.

That said, I believe distribution requirements are largely grinder-dependent, and probably machine-dependent to some extent. My M4 definitely required WDT to avoid channeling, while my Baratza Vario doesn't. No doubt, it has something to do with grind consistency and clumping. My Silvia was very sensitive to distribution, while my GS/3 isn't as sensitive. Many have said that E61 machines are "more forgiving" of distribution mistakes, probably because of the preinfusion. The point is, I don't think we can generalize about the necessity of distribution rituals.

As for dosing, I weigh each dose. I'd love to eliminate that part of the ritual because it involves a number of extra steps to setup the scale and tare the PF or basket. But I've not found any other way to ensure that I've got the same amount of coffee in the basket as when I dialed in the shot. I can't eyeball .5g, and that's all it takes, or less, to significantly change the shot parameters.

The timer on my Baratza Vario is amazingly consistent during a session, and most of the time it produces back-to-back doses within .2g. But every now and then, it'll be off by a larger amount, probably due to static or humidity causing a little coffee to get stuck in the chute. This means I can't really rely on the timer to produce a 100% consistent dose. Also, as the coffee ages the grind needs adjustment, and the only way I can verify that I've got the right dose after an adjustment is to weigh it.

Bottom line, I've found that weighing the dose is a necessity. This may have something to do with my tending to dose lower, in the 13g-16g range. I guess from a percentage standpoint, dosing errors have less effect as you updose more and more, and that in turn would make visual dosing a more viable option.

Peppersass wrote:Bottom line, I've found that weighing the dose is a necessity. This may have something to do with my tending to dose lower, in the 13g-16g range. I guess from a percentage standpoint, dosing errors have less effect as you updose more and more, and that in turn would make visual dosing a more viable option.

Let me recapitulate;

Distribution correction step requirements are (at least in part) related to the grinder and the machine. I'll buy that. While the need to carefully control dose weight is (at least in part) related to the size of the dose itself. I'll buy that again!

And if it is not what you meant... well it is what I just ended up understanding. I find that my machine (Vivaldi II) is very forgiving of distribution carelessness. (as echoed by some of my fellow Vivaldi users). I dose low and the underdose (-0.3g) gives horrible pour results, while overdosing (+0.3g) degrades the taste significantly. I did experiment with larger dose (16.5 to 20g) and indeed I can agree that larger variation (+/- 0.5g or more) had much less effect.

Of course if you look at it in percentage instead of absolute numbers it all make sense. But my ability to eyeball is in absolute number not percent.

Whale wrote:And if it is not what you meant... well it is what I just ended up understanding.

What you said is exactly what I meant.