Hi, I am new to HB and coffee. I have just bought a Expobar Office Leva 1 with HX/E61 and a Eureka Mignon Grinder. The grinder have 50mm flat burrs and have ground less than 5KG of coffee. I am using fresh coffee bean and I am having problem of early blonding. I have tried overdosing to 18g but the coffee puck hits the shower screen and have signs of channeling. Here is my normal procedure.
1. Pour hot water into the espresso cup.
2. Lock the portafilter with the basket.
3. Measure 5g of coffee bean and load the grinder.
4. Grind.
5. Cycle the switch and swipe out stale coffee. Repeat three times.
6. Discard the coffee.
7. Measure 14.5g of coffee bean and load.
8. Thwack the doser while grinding to a container.
9. Cycle the switch and clear out all the coffee from the chute and the doser. Repeat three times.
10. Weight the container and scoop excess coffee back to the doser. I am now aiming 14g for a double basket.
11. WDT in a zig-zag pattern
12. Unlock the portafilter, remove the basket and lock it back.
13. Wipe the basket dry and scoop out the coffee from the container using a spoon to the basket.
14. Level the coffee with my finger. The basket is not completely filled so I have to put my finger under the rim.
15. Tamp using 4 fingers on the tamper, until the puck feels no longer compressible, about 15 pounds.
16. Polish the puck using tamper's own weight (220g).
17. Flush the machine until the thermometer shows 95.0C.
18. Unlock the portafilter, put the basket into the portafilter and wait till the temperature stabilize at 92.5C
19. Lock the portafilter and unlock it to check the puck for any impression of the shower screen.
20. Lock the portafilter, empty the espresso cup and put it under the portafilter, pull the lever to engage the pump and start the shot.
21. Crouch and see the extraction. The first drop is 7 seconds after I engage the pump. I see no extraction problem, perhaps because I am inexperienced.
22. Blonding starts at 17 seconds after the first drop, 24 seconds after the pump is engaged. About 30mL in volume now.
23. Stop at 60mL.
Please comment on my procedure and why the blonding happens so early.

If you stop the pump when blonding first appears, how does the shot taste?

How long do you let the machine warm up before use?

Are you SURE that the coffee is fresh? How fresh? What coffee is it?

The E-61 groups are tolerant of more coffee dose. Fill the portafilter with the ground coffee, level off across the top. Grind directly into the portafilter.

Are you using a bottomless portafilter?

Tap the BOTTOM of the portafilter around the edges of the bottom, LIGHTLY, moving all around the portafilter. The goal is to EVENLY settle the coffee so that it is level and evenly distributed. No WDT.

Tamp level and hard. Forget 15 pounds. Tamp to 50, or 60. Just press hard, but level. Forget polishing.

What some people think is blonding is just the normal lightening of the color of the flow. When it starts "blonding" what you want to look for is a watery flow that looks like colored water. A lack of viscosity. Even that is only a bad thing if you are drinking the espresso straight. For milk drinks it has little or no effect. The watery flow doesn't taste bad- it just is not very "strong" in taste.

If you are not sure, post a video on YouTube and post the link.

thomas5267 wrote:Please comment on my procedure and why the blonding happens so early.

You say the final volume is 60ml. What is the brew ratio? And more importantly, how does it taste? If it's dull and weak, you may be pulling it too long (lungo). See Ending the Extraction by Color for more details.

For what it's worth, the stock Faema-style baskets for Expobar that I've used were best dosed around 16 to 17 grams. You can dose less, but they are more likely to channel if your technique is off. The maximum dose is around 18 to 19 grams. I recommend starting with a target brew ratio of 70% and adjusting to taste.

thomas5267 wrote:Please comment on my procedure and why the blonding happens so early.

I had the same reaction as Dan: 60ml is optimistic for a nonblonding 14g dose. My shots typically blond at a 2:3 brew ratio. This amounts to 21-22g extracted liquid for a 15g dose, approx 45ml in volume (almost pure crema). It's a rare 14g pull that extracts to 60ml without blonding.

As a general comment: your procedure seems fine, although a bit on the fussy side. Use good, freshly roasted coffee; get the grind, dose, and distribution right; keep the tamp level... and you'll be making great espresso in no time.

I am drinking espresso straight if it taste good ,or else I will just steam some milk and make a latte. I think I make a lungo instead since it taste like diluted espresso. I haven't try stopping the shot by color and measure weight of the shot, so I will try that later.

Randy G. wrote:How long do you let the machine warm up before use?

Are you SURE that the coffee is fresh? How fresh? What coffee is it?

I warm it up at least one hour before use. The coffee is fresh. One day fresh. It is a Brazil Cerrado. BTW, the micro-roastery is called "fresh" .

Randy G. wrote:Tap the BOTTOM of the portafilter around the edges of the bottom, LIGHTLY, moving all around the portafilter. The goal is to EVENLY settle the coffee so that it is level and evenly distributed. No WDT.

Tamp level and hard. Forget 15 pounds. Tamp to 50, or 60. Just press hard, but level. Forget polishing.

Just curious, isn't tapping bad? And what does polishing do, I just do it for aesthetics.

Now, COFFEE time! I will be right back. Thanks guys!

Might be TOO fresh, if it's one-day fresh.
Try it after 5 days or a week.

Tapping is not bad to settle the grounds; it is bad AFTER tamping as it may fracture the puck, or break adhesion with the walls of the basket.

Polishing just gets the loose grinds off of the tamper. No real benefit to the shot.

In my opinion, tamping hard is less important than tamping evenly; the water will put a couple hundred pounds of pressure on the puck.

Just pulled three shots, with two forgotten to measure the brew ratio. The first one with Randy's method with a dose of 18g.* It tasted sour but still enjoyable, perhaps I have got a thermosyphon stall because the flush of the second shot has a lot of steam but not much water. The second shot tasted brilliant with a dose of 16.4g*, but a bit aggressive, so I down dosed it and make the grind finer. The third one is the best shot I've ever made and tasted in my live. It taste very sweet but lack of some delicate flavor. The volume is about 40mL, The dose is 14.6g and the beverage is 27.1g which yields a brew ratio about 53%. I would like to call this a god shot but it is pretty lame because it only has 33% crema by volume!

*Dose of the coffee, not espresso.

Just to clarify, my "tapping" on the portafilter is done after dosing and leveling but BEFORE tamping. The tapping is done on the BOTTOM of the portafilter only. I use a bottomless portafilter and tap along the edge of the bottom opening of the body, avoiding the basket. I do it very lightly. I use the top of the handle of an aluminum tamper. I move the portafilter slightly downwards and the tamper slightly upwards so the momentum of each object is neutralized (p1-p2=0 or some such thing). The tamper and portafilter stop and the coffee's momentum causes it to compact and level. Then I tamp once or twice. No post-tamp tapping, no polishing. File it under "whatever works for you."

Off topic: I am really excited to get responses from three highly skilled barista, especially you, Randy. I really loved your Espresso! My Espresso! website. It helped me a lot on choosing between a PID'd Silvia and a HX machine. Thanks a lot!