Howdy, all. I'm a brand-new user, both of the site and of home espresso machines. About two months ago, I purchased a Cafe Ariete Prestige espresso machine and about a month later, a Gaggia MDF grinder.

I'm still new to the terminology and techniques, but have had a lot of fun trying little tweaks here & there to get good shots. But I'm stumped by one issue in particular: my shots tend to go blonde (or at least, my perception of blonde) very quickly, often within 10 seconds of turning on the pump.

I ran an example to document here. The shot started going blonde about 15 seconds after I started the pump, and here's a shot 24 seconds after I turned on the pump (I started the pump about 1 second after I started the timer). As you can see, it's incredibly watery. The resulting shot volume was a little less than 3oz, and I would characterize it as bitter, like a very hoppy beer.



I used about 14 grams of coffee, ground on setting "3" of the grinder. I've tried finer grinds, but the filter tends to clog. I used the "double" sized basket.

(One other note: The filter basket has one hole, directly in the middle, and the portafilter itself has a plastic insert that I assume is a crema enhancer. I've tried running without the enhancer, but since the basket has only one hole in the middle, the pour literally shot right down the middle and out the screw hole. The resulting mess took a while to clean up. )

I tamped N-S-E-W with relatively light pressure, then in the center with 30 lbs, holding it for 5 seconds. Then a polishing tamp holding down with about 5-10 lbs of pressure while turning the tamper 360°.

Thanks in advance for any pointers you may be able to give me, and thanks for this website-- it's a great resource with an overwhelming amount of information!

Welcome to the forum. There could be many, many things going on but the usual first suspect is stale coffee. What kind of beans are you using and when were they roasted?

FYI 3 oz is way too much. You should be in the 1.5-2 oz range with that dose and time.

I am unfamiliar with your machine, but it does sound like it has a pressurised basket and probably a thermoblock, but that is just a guess.

You may want to run through the FAQ's, quite a few good articles in there to get you going.

FAQs and Favorites

A good starting point is Home Barista's Guide to Espresso.

You need to grind finer. You said the next setting chokes the machine, but try tamping lighter and see if that helps. You could also try to reduce the amount of coffee in the basket (not by much though since you are already at 14g).

When your pours come out like this one you don't have to let it run the full 25 seconds. That watery stuff is bad so stop it before it gets like that. It will taste better than I image this one does. A decent tasting shot in 20 seconds is better than a bad shot at 25.

Those look like Bodum double wall glasses. If so they hold about (maybe a little more) 2oz, so your 14 gram dose should fill 1 glass, or two half glasses.

Palpatim wrote:(One other note: The filter basket has one hole, directly in the middle, and the portafilter itself has a plastic insert that I assume is a crema enhancer. I've tried running without the enhancer, but since the basket has only one hole in the middle, the pour literally shot right down the middle and out the screw hole. The resulting mess took a while to clean up. )

Sounds like you have a pressurized portafilter. You cannot brew normal shots with them, but are limited to using coarser grinds and trying get the best out of the setup. Fresh beans are never a bad idea.

Sometimes it is possible to disassemble the pressurization and for many machines there are also regular portafilters available.

Thanks for the tips and suggestions, everybody. I'll review all of them and post back when I have some results.

What coffee are you using? Make sure it is fresh, which means no older than 14 days post-roast.

Your machine does have a pressurized filter basket. You should try to get a regular basket if possible.

When using a crema enhancer in the portafilter, you will be limited to grinds that are essentially too coarse to get you into the "sweet spot." To work around this you can do two things:

1. do a manual "pre-infusion" by starting your water pump and then stopping it for a nominal period of time while the coffee soaks, then re-starting.

2. Swap out your shot glasses mid-shot, so you can throw away the early sour and late bitter fractions of the brew. Because the very tail end is mostly water, this will dilute the flavor and bitterness which you may actually prefer however.

Good luck!

Yep. The Cafe Prestige has a pressurized PF basket. You'll want to ditch it for a real one. The La Pavoni Millenium Edition basket fits (http://www.1st-line.net/cgi-bin/category.cgi?item=MP-68). Unfortunately, due to low supply, it'll be about $25-30 from anywhere in the US, at least.

Some modification is required to make it fit, namely flattening the lip of the basket. I accomplished this with a hammer & a hex-bolt. Not perfect, ergonomically, but I was able to pull a 18-second shot the first time, using beans ground at my local cafe (real grinder delivered today! yay!). Also, pull the bit of black plastic out of the bottom, and use a bigger cup to collect in (as you'll have espresso streaming out of 3 holes, not 2).

This is a 51.5mm filter basket, so if you get a tamper, etc. make sure it's 51mm.