zin1953 wrote:Michael, I don't think you disagree at all -- or else I've misread the posts prior to yours. No one has mentioned the differences in beans until you. Ergo, I am presuming that all of the previous posts rely on the same beans/different dosing methods. You are the one that introduced varying your dose with different beans, and while I agree with you, I think it's a different issue than "weight vs. volume."

YMMV.

Cheers,
Jason

Jason, I was replying to KK's and subsequent posts prior to my own of dose being determined by headspace alone, which I took to mean for all beans in a given machine and therefore disagreed.

Did I miss something?

Cheers

Mike

wow. Thanks for so many replies in 24hrs. Today got busy, but I'll be reading this thread over the weekend.

I have been dosing by volume for some time now. When I started years ago I would use a scale because my doses would vary a gram either way. After a few years of practice I rarely get the scale out. Familiarity with a coffee is essential with dose by sight. You have to know the coffee, and know what volume gets you what weight. When I get a new coffee, or one I have not used for a few months, I get out the scale to verify my dose. I may use it for a couple of days then it goes back in drawer.

I find that I regularly fall well within sub half gram dose variation. I do not think I have any kind of super barista sense, I just pay attention to what I am doing. On dry days I know the coffee will do this, when it is raining out it will do that, so I know to make a slight adjustment in grind or dose. Now and then I will break out the scale just to make sure I am still on the mark.

I find that dosing by sight is a lot like pulling shots. You just look at the streams and know if your timing is slow/fast or on the money. Now and then I will time a shot just to make sure. Timing every shot or weighing every dose would become tedious and cumbersome after a while.

Totally agree with you there, Dave. I don't think it matters what method you use as long as you can get the repeatability you want.

I dose by grinder time, because that's by far the easiest solution on the Nino - it's designed to work that way. I get slightly more shot-to-shot variation (around 0.2g), but the whole thing is push and go.

But I also use the scales now and again just to check my benchmarks. Nonetheless I dial in the bean grind and dose by the taste. Knowing the weight and dose time makes it easier to get things right next time round.

I have no problem with any method that produces consistent shots for the person and the setting in question. But when Abe and I tried the bars during brunch time madness on Saturday, our two singles were once ristretto, once normale, tasting radically different (undrinkable ristrettos) in two places. After that we watched, and some PFs were dripping, some dribbling and some pouring. My last tour, of three places, also on a busy Saturday, also had varying volume shots with varying taste, although not as dramatic. We couldn't measure the dose variation, but at home it would take more than a gram difference to produce those flow variations.

There's a ten minute line and a panicky cashier, there's another barista muttering something about even flipping burgers being better than this, a customer sidles up and asks about his moo-goo-gai-pan latte -- it's a glorious sunny Saturday, and you're wondering why the f*** you are doing this -- how accurately would you be dosing?

I remeber watching a number of discussions here on H-B on different aspects of dose-level-tamp in home vs cafe settings. Scales, wdt's, magic movements etc. against simplicity.
No consensus was ever reached. Some argumentation was the optimization of the beans for a cafe setting, and another the repeatability of the procedure's result in the basket and then out to the cup, and another the superiority of the equipment (grinder). So looks like some myths just got busted: only the last one mentioned argument stands. No repeatability of the result in the cup?

So the answer is if you want total shot to shot control you will go with weight.

If you care a bit less you will go by volume.

If you do not give a %#ck you will just slide a finger over it.

Did I get the overall way it is working?

-C

2 CRCasey: I think you did, good sir!