DE1 extraction recipes

#1: Post by **RapidCoffee** » March 21st, 2019, 5:02 pm

wgmcg wrote:I've not yet ever gotten a shot out of the DE1 that looks even close to anything like the one in your video. What's the recipe?

I've received a couple of questions about the shots I posted in the DE1+ review. My preferred extraction profile is the same one I used for the example:

This simple pressure profile essentially emulates a spring lever. After preinfusion, pressure is ramped up to a maximum and then gradually declines. The profile is adaptable to different beans and roasts:

1) longer (slower flow rate) preinfusion for lighter roasts, shorter (faster flow rate) preinfusion for darker roasts
2) max brew pressure of 6-9 bar (I like 8-9 bar)
3) adjust decline to maintain a fairly steady flow rate (1.0-1.5ml/s) as puck erodes
4) higher brew temperatures for lighter roasts, lower brew temperatures for darker roasts
5) coffee dose suggested by basket manufacturer (but feel free to updose)
6) "normale" brew ratio of 1:2 (adjust to your preference)
7) pour time of ~30s (not including preinfusion)

If you're starting out, I recommend getting a medium roast house espresso blend from an established specialty coffee roaster. This will maximize your chances of success. Then feel free to branch out to SO coffees, uber-light roasts, whatever.

I prep my pucks in the basket, outside of the portafilter, using WDT to ensure an even distribution. Ridgeless baskets make this easier, and I often use this "14g" basket. Despite the name, it's got the geometry of a DE 18g basket. I typically dose 17g, and extract 34g.

Espresso 101 refresher:
To achieve a given brew ratio (say, 1:2) in a specified extraction time, you must dial in the grind. Pull a shot (17g dose) for 30s and weigh it. If it's too light (less than 34g), then your grind is too fine: make it coarser. If it's too heavy (more than 34g), then your grind is too coarse (make it finer). This is an iterative process; you just have to "grind" through it.

That's it. Now you know all my secrets.

March 21st, 2019, 5:16 pm

RapidCoffee wrote:That's it. Now you know all my secrets.

Well, maybe not. I should point out a couple of things about grind.

Longer (slower flow rate) preinfusion necessitates a finer grind. For light roasts, this sometimes gets stated in the other direction: tame the acidity with fine grind and long preinfusion. But the DE1, with its adjustable flow rate, makes this relationship clear: a slower flow rate preinfusion leads to a faster flow rate during the pour. So if you wish to maintain a pour time of ~30s, use a finer grind for longer preinfusion profiles.

In addition, precision baskets (like DE) generally require a finer grind. So be prepared to use fine grind settings.

#3: Post by **JonF** » March 22nd, 2019, 11:33 am

PS: This profile worked great! I am on a DE Pro 1.1, which has a change in the headspace, so dosing discussions might be a little different. I ran your profile with a VST basket and 20 grams of my current favorite--Redbird Brazil Sweet Blue. One of my best shots yet! Crema and actually mouthfeel were great! Coincidentally, I am also coming from a Vivaldi 2.

I do have one question. I am pretty happy with my shots, but I have a bit of a donut extraction going on, and it takes a LONG time for the streams to merge at the center. Any suggestions? Might be clumping before tamping?

#4: Post by **blondica73** » March 22nd, 2019, 2:22 pm

RapidCoffee wrote:I've received a couple of questions about the shots I posted in the DE1+ review. My preferred extraction profile is the same one I used for the example:
<image>

This simple pressure profile essentially emulates a spring lever. After preinfusion, pressure is ramped up to a maximum and then gradually declines. The profile is adaptable to different beans and roasts:

1) longer (slower flow rate) preinfusion for lighter roasts, shorter (faster flow rate) preinfusion for darker roasts
2) max brew pressure of 6-9 bar (I like 8-9 bar)
3) adjust decline to maintain a fairly steady flow rate (1.0-1.5ml/s) as puck erodes
4) higher brew temperatures for lighter roasts, lower brew temperatures for darker roasts
5) coffee dose suggested by basket manufacturer (but feel free to updose)
6) "normale" brew ratio of 1:2 (adjust to your preference)
7) pour time of ~30s (not including preinfusion)

If you're starting out, I recommend getting a medium roast house espresso blend from an established specialty coffee roaster. This will maximize your chances of success. Then feel free to branch out to SO coffees, uber-light roasts, whatever.

I prep my pucks in the basket, outside of the portafilter, using WDT to ensure an even distribution. Ridgeless baskets make this easier, and I often use this "14g" basket. Despite the name, it's got the geometry of a DE 18g basket. I typically dose 17g, and extract 34g.

Espresso 101 refresher:
To achieve a given brew ratio in a specified extraction time, you must dial in the grind. Pull a shot for 30s and weigh it. If it's too light (less than 34g), then your grind is too fine: make it coarser. If it's too heavy (more than 34g), then your grind is too coarse (make it finer). This is an iterative process; you just have to "grind" through it.

That's it. Now you know all my secrets.

This pressure profile is awesome. I have a modified (added pressure profiling) Mini Vivaldi II and I used this profile to pull shots. Amazing.

March 22nd, 2019, 3:09 pm

JonF wrote:PS: This profile worked great! I am on a DE Pro 1.1, which has a change in the headspace, so dosing discussions might be a little different. I ran your profile with a VST basket and 20 grams of my current favorite--Redbird Brazil Sweet Blue. One of my best shots yet! Crema and actually mouthfeel were great! Coincidentally, I am also coming from a Vivaldi 2.

I do have one question. I am pretty happy with my shots, but I have a bit of a donut extraction going on, and it takes a LONG time for the streams to merge at the center. Any suggestions? Might be clumping before tamping?

Doubt it's a clumping problem. Donut extractions are often caused by overdosing. Try lowering your dose by a gram or two and see if that helps.

Glad this profile works for you!

#6: Post by **wgmcg** » March 23rd, 2019, 5:00 pm

I've gotten *decent* (pun intended) results with this profile. Very good results actually.

I'm accustomed to dosing 16.5g in a 15g VST basket, but I've gotten better results in terms of puck stability, and to some extent crema, using the included 18g Decent basket dosed to 18-20g.

For smoother on-boarding, I'd recommend new adopters stick to this reference dose in the Decent basket for the first couple of weeks. I wish I had.

#7: Post by **myso** » March 23rd, 2019, 5:52 pm

A bit of brainstorming on my part. (Hope not out of topic)

So when the average leverhead (analogy to piston head) was first introduced to the DE1, one of the first ideas that came into his mind was "I can save a sink shot by making precise adjustments while I pull a shot. This machine is a hit or miss gadget."

So if you consider "what would a leverhead do?" logic, take his pov (information, knowledge & experience) and apply it to this machine, what kind of extraction recipe would you need to code into DE1?
I mean in the current advanced editor infrastructure or if needed with features that are not yet implemented for current DE1 firmware/software (fuzzy logic criterias etc.).

I can think of couple examples where the DE1 is on his own to read a shot and counteract on info.

You mess with your grind, and adjust slightly finer than your preferred grind setting for the profile. You prep your basket without meticulous process and put your portafilter in and press go. The profile uses some logical criteria borrowed from the leverhead and saves the shot.

Or your wife comes up to the machine and she mimics your movements that she observed while watching you make espresso. She takes the portafilter, puts it under on-demand grinder and gets a double dose of grounds into basket and tamps it down and puts it into the DE1+ then she notices that you were running some experimental stuff earlier and now she's not sure which grind setting she has in the puck. Without much care and in need of her caffeine fix she puts on "the wife" profile in the menu and DE1+ uses the same logical criterias and manages to pull a decent cup of espresso.

Anyone with experience in both worlds of espresso making camps able to suggest recipes for DE1 logic? (Or prospective ones

)

#8: Post by **JonF** » March 23rd, 2019, 6:11 pm

I am going on shot 163 (there is a shot counter!) and am hooked. As with any of my previous machines, there is a moment of panic as you don't feel it's a good as your prior unit. But luckily I remembered feeling like this with my previous upgrades too, so stayed the course until things were dialed in a little better. Now I am getting my best home espressos ever.

There are some great recipes with the private DE group, as well as on the DE when it arrives. The big change to me is the ease of changing parameters. With my Vivaldi, I could adjust preinfusion pressure if I crawled under the sink and tweaked my regulator. Temp was easier, but I needed to find the manual. Pressure meant accessing a screw somewhere. All those parameters and more are quickly accessible on the DE.

The big change to me is the fun you can have with a single coffee and tweaking parameters by changing recipes. This as opposed to changing coffees for changes in flavor. Of course I am still trying coffee recommendations from HB Coffee forum, but having more fun tweaking my espressos by varioing extractions.

March 24th, 2019, 12:20 am

myso wrote:A bit of brainstorming on my part. (Hope not out of topic)

So when the average leverhead (analogy to piston head) was first introduced to the DE1, one of the first ideas that came into his mind was "I can save a sink shot by making precise adjustments while I pull a shot. This machine is a hit or miss gadget."

So if you consider "what would a leverhead do?" logic, take his pov (information, knowledge & experience) and apply it to this machine, what kind of extraction recipe would you need to code into DE1?

You raise an important point, which I mentioned in the review's conclusion: like most pump machines, the DE1 does not allow you to interact with the shot during the extraction. Either the shot runs to completion, or you terminate it prematurely. You cannot change extraction parameters during the shot.

Manual levers (and to some extent spring levers) allow you to change pressure during the extraction. A few pump machines with pressure profiling (such as the Lelit Bianca) permit this as well.

But IMHO "saving a sink shot" is not the main point of extraction profiling. If the grind is too fine, and the shot chokes, is it really worth saving? If the grind is too coarse, and the shot is a gusher, will you get a great extraction by backing off the pressure? I doubt it.

Instead, use this experience to improve subsequent pours. The DE1 provides much useful sensor feedback in the extraction graphs.

Here's an example:

preinfuse at 5ml/s to 1 bar, rise to 8 bar, decline to 4 bar

This graph exposes a couple of issues in the extraction:
1) inadequate preinfusion (spike in flow rate at 10s)
2) puck erosion (flow rate increases to over 1.5ml/s after 30s)

We can address the first issue by preinfusing to a higher pressure (e.g., 4 bar rather than 1 bar). This will ensure that the puck gets completely saturated before moving on to the next phase (rise to 8 bar). To maintain a flow rate below 1.5ml/s, we can back off the pressure with a more aggressive decline (e.g., decline to 2 bar). Or we can address puck erosion more directly by updosing, with a coarser grind.

Extraction analysis like this makes the DE1 unique. But as I said in the review, it's not for everyone. If you prefer to control puck pressure manually during the extraction, then a lever (or pump machine such as the Bianca) will meet your needs best.

#10: Post by **vit** » March 24th, 2019, 6:17 pm

RapidCoffee wrote: Instead, use this experience to improve subsequent pours. The DE1 provides much useful sensor feedback in the extraction graphs.

Here's an example:
<image>
preinfuse at 5ml/s to 1 bar, rise to 8 bar, decline to 4 bar

This graph exposes a couple of issues in the extraction:
1) inadequate preinfusion (spike in flow rate at 10s)

What would be the reason for that flow spike to happen on other machines ?