Drgary, thanks for sharing! Eager to hear more as you continue to test and dial in!

I had one brew from the Niche, and at least 4 or 5 from my own Virtuoso using the same beans.

The Niche has much more prominent floral note at the expense of body. The Virtuoso has consistently more body, but somewhat muted top end. For this particular bean I preferred the Niche profile, although I suspect I may have just gotten bored with the Virtuoso brew.

drgary wrote:I can also bring my HG-1 into the mix. I hadn't thought of using it for drip. Hmmm.

...

Wish I had the free time to do it quickly.

This is fantastic, and please take your time. Personally, I'd rather see objective subjectivity vs subjective subjectivity.

I've owned both the niche and the virtuoso. If I was going to own one again for pour over alone, it would be the virtuoso. Even if they were the same price, I'd still go for the virtuoso. The pour over really is fantastic from that grinder.

If you're doing any espresso though - 100% go for the niche

Tiger, what do you think made the baratza so much better? Would it be worth owning both the Virtuoso AND the niche - virtuoso for pour over/immersion, and niche for espresso?

Adding another subjective data point for you. TL;DR, I think the NZ is optimal for med/dark espresso, and believe there are less expensive and better alternatives for PO grinders.

I used the NZ for a long time for PO with medium to light roasts, and tried single bean feeding techniques to get more unimodal grind results from it. But I could only get so much clarity and sweetness with the NZ and there was also a noticable layer of muddy fines I could never eliminate from my V60's. This, of course, is expected since the NZ is a bimodal grinder designed for espresso, where it excels and is what I currently use it for.

I then bought a cheap Xeoleo 520N ghost burr grinder for PO, and it solved the major issues I had with the NZ for PO. I've been using it ever since. Full disclosure: I have a DF64 with SSP MP burrs on the way that I intended to trial for both light espresso and for PO, which might supplant the 520N but that's TBD.

Surprising one-trial "subjective/objective/subjective" result - at least to me

I've been using an old model Baratza Virtuoso in my office, paired with a Mazzer Super Jolly for espresso. For a couple of years when I had that setup I really enjoyed the Virtuoso for Clever Dripper immersion brews. It was so good that it surprised me. Although one of the initial reviewers of the Niche Zero and a long-time owner, I haven''t used it for pourover. Instead I've been using a Bunn LPG that I've retrofitted with Ditting 802 burrs. Eventually those burrs will go into a Mini Bunnzilla. I had read user reports that the Niche isn't that good for pourover, so my expectation slanted that way.

What I found instead is that when I approximately calibrated one grinder to the other, I prefer the Niche Zero immersion brew. The grounds look very similar when spread on filter paper.



Keep in mind that I calibrated on one medium home-roast coffee of Guatemala Huehuetenango Guaya B organic washed greens. I ground from frozen beans. Here's another disclaimer. I don't spend lots of time perfecting my immersion brew and generally use 2 AeroPress scoops to 1 mug. My recipe for this very rough trial was 1 AeroPress scoop of coffee to a half mug of water = 14.84 gm coffee to 3/4 cup (177 ml) water. Brew temperature was 202°F/94°C with 4 minutes immersion time. When I place the Clever Dripper on the mug to drain, I briefly stir the grounds so there is a uniform drawdown.

The Niche brew was noticeably cleaner, and the Virtuoso brew tasted comparably overextracted or flat and slightly chalky.

For me, the bottom line is that based on what I know only a little better than before, I would not recommend that a Niche Zero owner get a Baratza Virtuoso to improve pourovers. Here's the catch, though. I didn't follow the Niche Zero designations on the adjustment dial. I had to loosen the grind well past where it indicated to match grind size -- one full turn plus 4 ticks past my espresso grind setting. The Niche Zero was calibrated per instructions. The Baratza Virtuoso isn't calibrated. I haven't done anything to align the burrs on either grinder.

I can do a similar exploratory tasting with my HG-1 soon.

So again, here are all the ways you can be skeptical of this post and do a more disciplined study:
1. Not a blind tasting
2. One trial
3. One coffee
4. Not necessarily the best immersion technique
5. Baratza Virtuoso is an old model with unknown mileage on the burrs. The new model is the Virtuoso+, but oddly the company website shows both in some views (see my links).
6. I've removed the anti-popcorning plastic shield from the Niche Zero because I find it slows the grind more than I like
7. A focus on comparing equipment emphasizes that view and conceals what can be achieved by dialing in the equipment you have. You technique may change with each grinder, for instance, you may try grinding coarser with the Virtuoso or steeping for a shorter time than with the Niche.

For anyone else owning these two grinders or a Niche Zero and an HG-1, I'll be interested in your results. This finding, above, was interesting. What's your take on it?

dilin wrote:I had one brew from the Niche, and at least 4 or 5 from my own Virtuoso using the same beans.

The Niche has much more prominent floral note at the expense of body. The Virtuoso has consistently more body, but somewhat muted top end. For this particular bean I preferred the Niche profile, although I suspect I may have just gotten bored with the Virtuoso brew.

To be fair, to the Virtuoso, I did not bother to fine tune the grind, and kept all conditions identical. I feel with a bit more effort I could get it to taste closer to the Niche. Alas the beans ran out, and the Niche is now back with the original owner.

drgary wrote:Baratza Virtuoso is an old model with unknown mileage on the burrs

Does it have the old "585" burr? If so, it's not surprising you could get better results with the Niche (with or without the NFC disc?).

I picked up a used Baratza Preciso with the new style Etzinger burrs in good condition, so AFAIK identical to current Virtuoso. My early impression is that I quite prefer it over the Niche (w/NFC). It has given me sweeter, less bitter and more flavorful brews.

On the other hand, with the beans used, results with the Niche have been acceptable and I could see how someone not too fussy about pour over/immersion would find it just fine. There's most likely a combination of grind size/beans/roast/brew parameters where I'd prefer the Niche brews instead. My comparison has been with a modern cupping/V60 grind.

I have the old 585 model burrs. Interesting.