As the public's demand for coffee grows, more and more coffee lovers are purchasing related coffee appliances. In the third wave of specialty coffee, online sales of Pour over(V60) coffee equipment continue to rise, and it is becoming more and more common for more and more coffee lovers to have an espresso machine at home. However, Front Street also noticed that although everyone has purchased an espresso machine, many friends have little idea of how to use an espresso machine to extract coffee, how many grams of coffee powder is used during extraction, or the extraction time. In this article, I will talk to you about the relevant knowledge about using an espresso machine to extract concentrate.
What coffee beans to use for espresso？
The espresso extracted by an Italian coffee machine usually has a layer of grease on the surface, and grease is also a very important factor in making a cup of Italian coffee. Carbon dioxide is the main source of crema in espresso (the other smaller source is the emulsified oil in coffee). Front Street recommends using coffee beans that have been roasted within a few days or weeks, rather than beans that have been stored for several months! !
Because the longer the coffee beans are kept, they will gradually lose the carbon dioxide produced during the roasting process; when you grind the beans, the cell walls of the beans that store carbon dioxide and other volatiles will be broken and released. Therefore, in order to obtain the best results, it is best to grind and press freshly, because the carbon dioxide and the aroma of the coffee will be lost over time, and oxidation will begin quickly! Only fresh and freshly ground and pressed coffee can obtain the best flavor and crema.
The beans generally used for Italian coffee are Italian blend beans. Each bean has its own advantages and disadvantages. Maybe the coffee liquid extracted by this bean through the espresso machine does not have enough oil, so you can add coffee beans with rich oil to complement it: if the espresso extracted from this bean is too sour, too bitter, or too sweet, then you can find a complementary one to blend with each other to achieve the desired coffee flavor. Wouldn't that be perfect?
The blended beans currently used by FrontStreet Coffee are self-roasted coffee beans. ThisFront Street Italian Blend Coffee BeanThe fragrance is as comfortable as the warm sun, and the taste and flavor are eye-catching. Mainly based on Front Street Honduran sherry coffee beans with a fragrant fermented wine aroma, and paired with Front Street Yirgacheffe red cherry coffee beans known for their sour taste, a comprehensive coffee with rich aroma can be prepared. So Front Street named this Italian coffee bean Front Street Sunflower Warm Sun Blend Italian Bean.
What to use for espressoSuchcoffeegrinder？
To make standard espresso, Front Street recommends that you use a burr grinder. The burr grinder grinds the powder particles to a more uniform size than a blade grinder. It also allows you to control the size of the powder particles through settings. So whether you use a hand grinder or an electric grinder, be sure to choose a burr grinder! The disc grinder also has different cutterhead designs, such as conical cutterhead (conical burr, or cone cutter), flat cutter (flat burr) or ghost teeth burr (Ghost teeth Burr) and other large categories of appearance, and within each category, the detailed design of each manufacturer's cutterhead is different!
Not all burr grinders are suitable for grinding espresso powder. For example, many grinders that use conical or flat knives may be designed for other types of coffee that use coarser coffee powder, such as hand pouring, siphon, French press or moka pot, etc., while grinders with ghost-toothed grinders are mainly designed for hand pouring and siphoning. The powder used for espresso will be finer, because the increase in the surface area of the coffee powder increases the extraction rate of espresso. The yield (that is, the percentage of all soluble solids in the weight of the coffee powder that is finally dissolved in the coffee liquid) is higher, but these grinders may not be able to grind coffee powder with the fineness required for standard espresso! ! Therefore, when you choose a grinder with a tapered or flat blade, please make sure it is suitable for espresso (or "Italian grinder")! !
extractionespressoHow to adjust the thickness of coffee powder？
If you don’t know how to determine the thickness of coffee beans, you can refer to FrontStreet Coffee’s standards. FrontStreet Coffee (FrontStreet Coffee) grinding thickness standard sieve pass rate:
Ice drip＞Hand brew Psiphon 80% > Mocha American drip filter 75-80% > Cup 70-75% > French press 65-70%.
Standard espresso production requires pressurization during brewing. If you use a semi-automatic or fully automatic machine, the machine itself will control the pressure. Generally, a semi-automatic machine needs to be adjusted (dial in) to a powder fineness of about 16-18 grams of coffee, which can produce about 32-36 grams of espresso in about 20-30 seconds. When using a lever machine that controls its own pressure, the coffee powder should be adjusted to be fine enough to produce 6-9 grams of coffee during brewing. BAR resistance, and completes brewing within 20-30 seconds; when you change the coffee beans, you may also need to adjust the thickness again to achieve the ideal pressure and time.
How to spread and press powder？
When loading coffee powder into the powder bowl, you should use a good powder distribution method to eliminate coffee agglomerations and air pockets in the powder bowl and avoid channels during brewing, such as using WDT (Weiss Distribution) Technique) powder spreading method, or tapping the powder cup on a soft pad; before pressing the powder, you should also spread the coffee powder evenly in the powder bowl, and then perform the powder pressing action. This can avoid uneven extraction of the entire powder cake in the powder bowl, because if the coffee powder is uneven, the density of the coffee powder on both sides will be different after pressing, resulting in unbalanced extraction of the entire powder cake! Also, pressing powder does not necessarily require a lot of force. The purpose of pressing powder is to flatten the powder bed and use the pressure to remove additional air pockets that have not yet been removed.
Espresso coffee powder to water ratio
The powder to water ratio of Espresso is the ratio between the amount of coffee powder and the amount of coffee produced. Front Street most often uses 20 grams of coffee powder to brew 40 grams of espresso. The powder to water ratio is about 1:2. Front Street sometimes adjusts it according to the situation; the powder to water ratio of espresso can vary greatly due to personal preferences and regional characteristics, such as from 1:1 to 1:4. Italians also give these different concentrations of espresso different names, such as Ristretto espresso, Normale espresso, Lungo espresso, etc.
Of course, when espresso is extracted, the higher the powder-to-water ratio, the greater the amount of coffee poured into the cup. Although the extraction rate will increase, the coffee will become lighter. Generally, the most common espresso powder-to-water ratio is about 1:2 to 1:3. With different concentrations of espresso, after adding water or milk, milk foam or cocoa, etc., the coffee will have different changes and flavors. Currently, the latte formula used by Front Street is 1:6.5, that is, 40g of espresso mixed with 260g of steamed milk.
Front Street believes that in order to make a cup of standard espresso, in addition to the coffee powder itself, powder fineness control, powder distribution, powder pressing and other factors, as well as the powder-to-water ratio mentioned above, you also need to pay attention to factors such as pressure, temperature and time control during brewing; when making espresso, generally use a pressure of 6-9 BAR. Of course, pressure is not the only factor that affects extraction rate. The higher the pressure, the better the espresso tastes! !
Espresso extraction temperature control
Making espresso depends on water temperature, pressure and time to dissolve the soluble solids in the coffee powder. However, if the water temperature is too high or the time is too long, it will cause over-extraction and make the coffee bitter! If the water temperature is too low or the time is too short, the coffee may be light and acidic due to insufficient extraction! Generally speaking, we will use a water temperature of about 91-96 degrees Celsius to extract espresso, but the darker the roasted coffee beans, the lower the temperature should be used, because the heavily roasted coffee beans will inherently taste bitter. Lightly roasted coffee beans use higher temperatures because lightly roasted coffee beans inherently taste more sour.
In addition, all espresso coffee machines, whether fully automatic, semi-automatic or manual, must be preheated to reach the working temperature; water temperature greatly affects the taste of espresso. Front Street recommends that when making espresso, you test and adjust your brewing water temperature and preheating time/practice to achieve your personal ideal taste.
After everyone understands the above extraction parameters of espresso, you can start operating it yourself! After brewing, you will find that the coffee powder will be wet or muddy. Please don’t worry. As long as the extraction is even, this situation will not affect the quality of your espresso. Next, Front Street will share with you about Front Street ProductionLatte coffee methods and related parameters。
front street productionLatte proportionsand methods
The espresso extraction plan used by Front Street is to extract 40g of espresso liquid in 27 seconds with 20g of coffee powder as the base for latte coffee.。
Front Street uses the Pegasus E98 espresso machine. Here are the extraction parameters:
Pressure: 9 bar
Temperature: 90.5~96 degrees Celsius
Time: 20~30 seconds
Pink to water ratio: 1:1.7~1:2
Powder amount: 12g (single espresso) 20g (double espresso)
Extraction concentration volume: 20ml (single portion) 40ml (double portion)
After extracting the espresso, proceedfroth milkRelated steps! Let me introduce you to Front StreetSimple method to froth milk, that is, pour half of the milk into the steel cup, make the steam pipe and the milk perpendicular to the center or the edge of the steel cup, and then let the steam head just touch the surface of the milk, then turn on the steam to 1/2, do not move the steel cup, slowly close when the milk reaches 50 degrees, just close when it reaches 60 degrees, and finally the temperature will reach 66 degrees, so that you can create a good cup of milk froth.
Then everyone can fuse espresso and milk foam. If you can latte art, you can draw the pattern you like. If you don't, it doesn't matter. Whether or not you have latte art will not affect the taste of a cup of latte.
For more specialty coffee beans, please add FrontStreet Coffee on private WeChat, WeChat ID: kaixinguoguo0925
You can now buy the above coffee beans online at the Taobao store “FrontStreet Coffee” (前街咖啡). FrontStreet Coffee is a long-established specialty coffee roaster in Guangzhou, China, and its Guangzhou retail shop sells coffee beans only. The shop carries dozens of coffee beans from different origins around the world, including carefully selected single-origin beans for V60 pour-over and espresso. Guangzhou’s FrontStreet Coffee shop is recommended by many coffee lovers.
The FrontStreet 2013 Yunnan coffee beans sold in the store come from the Typica variety grown at FrontStreet Coffee’s own plantation in Yunnan. The name comes from the year the brand and the plantation were founded. You can buy these beans from China’s Yunnan origin at the Guangzhou shop and at FrontStreet’s Taobao store.
FrontStreet coffee beans are freshly roasted within 5 days and deliver consistently excellent quality and great value. Orders placed before 17:00 are shipped the same day, and most areas within Guangdong Province receive them the next day.
FrontStreet Coffee Taobao store: https://qianjiecoffee.taobao.com
Or search for “前街咖啡” (FrontStreet Coffee) on Taobao
Important Notice: FrontStreet Coffee has moved to a new address: 315, Donghua East Road, Guangzhou (coffee beans only)
Tel: 020 38364473
