The Coffee Thread

[Omnis]

Race Trac's cuban espresso blend coffee: probably the best gas station coffee in the universe. Better than Dunkin Donuts.

 

[Joel]

Tim's tastes like dish liquid to me. I don't get why Tim Horton's coffee is so popular in Canada, it's not "Canadian" anymore (owned by Wendy's), and the coffee is seriously sub par. For fast food coffee, I still think McDonalds is the best for something you can get anywhere. There's probably better quick coffee out there, but you can get McDonalds coffee anywhere and it's not bad for fast food coffee.

 

[Fazerfan]

The only coffee i have tasted was turkish coffee and it was very bitter.

 

[shmogt]

I had some cinnamon bun coffee a few days ago. Sounded like a good idea and smelt good but nope was not.

 

[Mikeybc]

Tim's tastes like dish liquid to me. I don't get why Tim Horton's coffee is so popular in Canada, it's not "Canadian" anymore (owned by Wendy's), and the coffee is seriously sub par. For fast food coffee, I still think McDonalds is the best for something you can get anywhere. There's probably better quick coffee out there, but you can get McDonalds coffee anywhere and it's not bad for fast food coffee.

Yes Tim Hortons does have its inconsistencies, it varies from location to location. I forgot about Mcdonalds, its excellent and in my opinion better than Tim Hortons, I just never think to go there because they have no decent bagels or doughnuts. I heard that Country Style and McDonald's use the same brand of coffee, and they taste very similar. Too bad Country Style's locations are few and far between.

 

[Sprite]

Seeing as I’ll be getting a new manual/travel espresso maker today plus a grinder, I thought it a good idea to resurrect this thread and keep my exploits out of the food and drink thread.

So far since moving, my coffee has been coming from bags of pre-ground coffee via a mocha pot / stove top coffee maker. I’ve managed to dial in what works best but the basket is an 8 cup one, so way too big and wastes a lot of coffee.

I’ve managed to get the results so they are not sour or bitter and really quite smooth. It’s turning into too much faff though and not really doable at work (we don’t have access to a hob etc)

I’ve picked up a Nanopresso with the barista kit and a Hario slim hand grinder. This combo should give pretty good results compared to drip or instant. It should also be a step above the poorly maintained machines we have at work.

When I get them I’ll post up my findings and that way if anyone is interested they can get an informed opinion. I’m no expert though just an enthusiastic amature.

I’ve also picked up some beans. Again this is a coffee I know the smell tasted and mouthfeel of via my mocha pot so it will be interesting what results I get. I normally buy their coarse ground stuff as espresso grind is way too fine for the mocha pot and sets the pressure valve off.

I’m not 100% on when the beans were roasted and so not going to be at their best. However I do like their coffee.

I’ve also picked up a couple of glass espresso cup so I can show the extraction and hopefully crema.


Edit:

@F1GTR I’ve now had a little play. I’ve pulled a single shot. The temp was a little low so came out a little sour, plus the grind was a little coarse.

My second shot was finer, hotter and longer. It was tasty and when turned into a latté really good.

I’d certainly recommend the Nanopresso for ease of use. Once I get my routine down I expect it will be a quick job to get a shot and enjoy.

So the standard kit has 1, 8 gram basket, small water tank (80ml) with cup. Also you get a scoop and brush. It’s all really well built and much better than I expected. The Barista kit comes with 2 16 gram baskets, the addapter to use them and a 140ml water tank and cup. You also get a little tamper too.

The Hario grinder is fantastic and super easy to adjust and also clean out. I wound out the settings counter clockwise till the little bolt was flush with the adjuster. Then I turned it around 25 clicks clockwise and this got me my finest grind I just used.

This is how the basket sits in the maker.

That’s 16 grams. It’s level with the top of the basket un-tamped and once tamped and polished it’s as it shows here.

This is the double Espresso 16g coffee through 80ml water so gives about 60ml of coffee. Nice crema and taste.

Just in case people wanted to see what else I use for my latte this is it.

Milk is full cream Jersey gold.

To sweeten I don’t use granulated sugar. I use this stuff...

It’s sweet but not overpowering and lets the coffee come through with a more rounded edge to it and not as sharp.

If anyone has any questions then let me know.

 

[Shaun]

@Sprite highly recommend finding a roaster near by if possible so you can buy beans that you know the roasting date.
Makes consistency so much easier apart from a better cup in general. 👍

 

[Omnis]

The best coffee is at the little java cart at work. They have a great rancilio grinder and their machine is perfectly dialed in. There's only like 2 girls that know how to perfectly steam the milk though. Their lattes are my favorite.

It's easy to find good beans in south florida because all the spanish/cuban brands are roasted here.

For drip coffee, I pretty much can't drink Keurig anymore. I have my Capresso Infinity and my Bonavita 8-cupper. I've been buying the bulk beans from Lucky's Market. They have a few non-house brand varieties that they buy direct from the source. For something bright and acidic I love the finca Las Lajas Costa Rican. The finca Vindas is also pretty good from CR. On the opposite end of the spectrum, the Zambia Terranova Estate AA is amazing.

 

[Sprite]

@Sprite highly recommend finding a roaster near by if possible so you can buy beans that you know the roasting date.
Makes consistency so much easier apart from a better cup in general. 👍

I’ve hit up a roaster a few towns over to see if the stuff bought has a decent date. I’ve yet to hear from them though.

 

[Sprite]

@Shaun

Well I got an answer from them. Apparently they roast on a weekly basis and nothing is more than a few days old when shipped. As I live about 15 miles from them I expect it will be pretty fresh. So I’ve ordered a couple of bags.

Aged in whiskey barrels for 2 weeks.

Premium bag of single origin.

I’ll post up how they taste.

 

[Shaun]

@Shaun

Well I got an answer from them. Apparently they roast on a weekly basis and nothing is more than a few days old when shipped. As I live about 15 miles from them I expect it will be pretty fresh. So I’ve ordered a couple of bags.

View attachment 804378

Aged in whiskey barrels for 2 weeks.

View attachment 804379

Premium bag of single origin.

I’ll post up how they taste.

Excellent, beans are at their best 5-15 days after roasting so you should be right on the money timing wise.

 

[Sprite]

Excellent, beans are at their best 5-15 days after roasting so you should be right on the money timing wise.

Lets hope so. These were not cheap.

I’ve been paying around £5 for a 250g bag. These are around £12 for the same size bag.

 

[Daniel]

@Sprite I picked up a Minipresso about a year ago for Christmas and it's current sitting unused at my work desk. It's the nespresso pod variant but so far it's pretty shoddy with all the pods I've tried with it. It's difficult to pump and half the time it comes out very watery.

I've just given up and end up making coffee at home or buying something from the cafe at work.

 

[Sprite]

@Sprite I picked up a Minipresso about a year ago for Christmas and it's current sitting unused at my work desk. It's the nespresso pod variant but so far it's pretty shoddy with all the pods I've tried with it. It's difficult to pump and half the time it comes out very watery.

I've just given up and end up making coffee at home or buying something from the cafe at work.

I haven’t bothered with the nespresso adapter. Don’t give up on it though. Watch some videos on YT on correct pumping action (Sounds so dirty). So far I’ve had not too many issues and the ones I have run into have been a grind/tamp issues.

It’s never going to give the same espresso as a dedicated machine but it’s pretty good for singing which can be thrown into a bag and have coffee out in the wild etc.

Keep trying it and try and get the pressure up and a huge one I found was pre-heating the separate components before I brew.

 

[Daniel]

The Minipresso I got only allows for capsules rather than ground coffee. I'll bring it home from work and give it another try over the weekend.

I've really got into cold brew coffee recently, especially some really nice Nitro injected stuff from a cafe near me. I've looked into making my own Nitro brew at home however I got to get some type of cream whipper contraption which isn't cheap.

 

[Sprite]

My bags of beans arrived.

The barrel aged one roasted a few days ago after being sat in bourbon barrels for two weeks. The smell from the bag has a real rich thick smell almost like velvet in the nose with deep tones of bourbon.

The taste carries this on but pulls really rich fruit through. Very tasty.

The second bad was also roasted in the last week. I’ve yet to open it up and smell it. I’m waiting till I can settle down on Sunday morning with it and enjoy while listening to some music.

 

[Sprite]

Well since the post above, I’ve moved onto V60 pour over and using my stove top brewer for most of my drinking. Currently switching between two single origin bags of beans, both nothing spectacular.

However my main reason for re-resurrecting this thread again is to share this rather amusing coffee related vid. I do enjoy James YT videos.

 

[Scaff]

Well since the post above, I’ve moved onto V60 pour over and using my stove top brewer for most of my drinking. Currently switching between two single origin bags of beans, both nothing spectacular.

However my main reason for re-resurrecting this thread again is to share this rather amusing coffee related vid. I do enjoy James YT videos.

I watched that one earlier today.

Snap on the V60 for pour over, with a modified Gaggia Classic for espresso.

 

[TheCracker]

@Sprite - have you tried Rountons coffee?

www.rountoncoffee.co.uk

It's another Yorkshire (North Yorkshire is best Yorkshire) roasters. They've got a pretty wide selection of beans i've been slowly trying out. I've been using them for about a year now and i've never had a bag delivered (i go through about 1kg a month) that was more than 2 weeks from being roasted, most have been within a week of.

I actually came across them on Amazon, but the roast dates, as printed on the bags, were very up and down. Sometimes they were really fresh and other times they been sitting on the warehouse shelf for weeks. So i buy them direct now. There's no next day delivery, but its much fresher when it does arrive.

 

[Sprite]

@Sprite - have you tried Rountons coffee?

www.rountoncoffee.co.uk

It's another Yorkshire (North Yorkshire is best Yorkshire) roasters. They've got a pretty wide selection of beans i've been slowly trying out. I've been using them for about a year now and i've never had a bag delivered (i go through about 1kg a month) that was more than 2 weeks from being roasted, most have been within a week of.

I actually came across them on Amazon, but the roast dates, as printed on the bags, were very up and down. Sometimes they were really fresh and other times they been sitting on the warehouse shelf for weeks. So i buy them direct now. There's no next day delivery, but its much fresher when it does arrive.

I hadn't but will certainly have a look. Thanks for the heads up.

 

[W3H5]

I tried my 3rd ever coffee recently. It was as awful as I remember the first 2 times.
However, while I was in the coffee shop I did discover ice chocolate frappe which is my new favourite drink after beer.

I still maintain that coffee has the most amazing aroma of anything on the planet. Keep your fresh baked bread and lavender gardens. Coffee takes the prize in the olfactory world.

 

[Scaff]

@Sprite - have you tried Rountons coffee?

www.rountoncoffee.co.uk

It's another Yorkshire (North Yorkshire is best Yorkshire) roasters. They've got a pretty wide selection of beans i've been slowly trying out. I've been using them for about a year now and i've never had a bag delivered (i go through about 1kg a month) that was more than 2 weeks from being roasted, most have been within a week of.

I actually came across them on Amazon, but the roast dates, as printed on the bags, were very up and down. Sometimes they were really fresh and other times they been sitting on the warehouse shelf for weeks. So i buy them direct now. There's no next day delivery, but its much fresher when it does arrive.

Union coffee is the same if you buy direct.

You need to plan your orders, but every order is roasted after the order is placed, so in most cases its been roasted no more than two days when you get the bag. It's actually too freshly roasted for an espresso grind (which you want around 5 to 7 days from roast to allow enough CO2 to leave), which means I start off using them for pour-over and then migrate them to espresso use.

 

[Sprite]

@Magdelayna now you have your new machine, you may want to check the thread out for local roasters. Have a look at Darkwoods and the one @TheCracker suggested. Both local to us and have some interesting coffee on offer.

 

[Magdelayna]

@Magdelayna now you have your new machine, you may want to check the thread out for local roasters. Have a look at Darkwoods and the one @TheCracker suggested. Both local to us and have some interesting coffee on offer.

I went to one in Castleford the other day - picked up 10 types of their beans!

 

[Scaff]

New delivery from Pact

 

[Shaun]

So with my recent bout of Covid and family members Covid I was confined to home for nearly three weeks.

One downside was I couldn't get to my usual roaster for beans and actually ran out of beans to my horror. Anyway my neighbour was helping out going to the supermarket for us and I explained the situation and he got me the freshest beans he could from there. A couple of weeks older than hoped but at the end of the day after a few trials dialling in the grind the results were better than I expected.

Still nice to be out of isolation today so I could get to my local roaster for a brew and some beans, nice to know though that in a pinch the supermarket was a half viable option.

 

[Adamgp]

Not a huge coffee drinker anymore, usually just on weekends. I normally just get a bag of the cheapest stuff available at the grocery store. Picked up a bag of Black Rifle JB during a recent trip to Cabela's, and think I'll go back for more. Much better than the grocery store stuff and price isn't too bad.

 

[Daniel]

The Minipresso I got only allows for capsules rather than ground coffee. I'll bring it home from work and give it another try over the weekend.

I've really got into cold brew coffee recently, especially some really nice Nitro injected stuff from a cafe near me. I've looked into making my own Nitro brew at home however I got to get some type of cream whipper contraption which isn't cheap.

Welp, I've certainly upgraded over the past three years.

Started with a Minipresso and am now at home with a:

• Breville/Sage Barista Express
• Hario V60
• Clever Dripper
• French Press

And I want more. I've already been eyeing up a Moka Pot, a new grinder, and an Aeropress. This hobby is stupidly expensive.

But it tastes so good.

 

[Shaun]

This hobby is stupidly expensive.

But it tastes so good.

Yes and yes, I went through a few appliance level machines for at home before landing where I am now with my Rocket.

In hindsight I should have jumped in at the deep end straight away but it was fun learning along the way also.

 

[Daniel]

Yes and yes, I went through a few appliance level machines for at home before landing where I am now with my Rocket.

In hindsight I should have jumped in at the deep end straight away but it was fun learning along the way also.

I'm more than happy to not spend over $3,000 on an espresso machine.

Well, maybe not yet.