The Mighty Coffee

Recently I’ve been trailing a new technique for getting your latte art spot on. I call it cutting the crema. To cut the crema you pour a small amount of milk into your espresso shot just after it has finished pouring and as you pour you move your jug around the cup so to create a layer of silky milk below the crema so that it rises up and settles just under the crema. This gives you a nice canvas to work with as you free pour your Rosettas, leaves and hearts.

Tags: Coffee, Latte Art, Technique

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The foreshore at Warners Bay is a great place for a meal or a coffee. The views are great and there is enough variety in the food to keep everyone happy, but I’m not going to talk about that today. Instead I’m going to compare the coffee at two of the cafes on the high end of The Esplanade; the established and well known Bills Bakery and newcomer to the scene, trendy and up market Hippo Espresso.

Hippo Espresso

Its been a while since I’ve been out to Warners Bay and seeing a new cafe on the scene I walked in to check the place out. I ended up ordering a short black and a double piccolo.
The barista did a fine job of crafting both the short black and the piccolo with a nice full bodied espresso that leaves a slightly chocolaty after taste. I didn’t have time to chat with the staff about their blend, though it immediately tasted fruity and left a slightly chocolaty after taste, quite a nice blend over all.

Bills Bakery

Bills Bakery has been on the top end of The Esplanade for as long as I can remember. Their focus is naturally on their pies and cakes, though its a popular spot for older demographics to catch up on a pensioner Tuesday. The barista fits into this demographic.

After being asked “What’s a double piccolo?” and waiting 15 minutes for my beverages I quickly gave up hope on tasting anything beyond over extracted espresso and burnt milk. The piccolo was served in a cappuccino mug and showed evidence of several different batches of milk in the froth.

They had a range of blends on display that people were encouraged to buy, however there was no way I could taste any of them, “Oh, we only use this one”. After briefly enquiring about the origins of the blend I drew blank looks and gave up.

Overall a poor performance, I would have liked to taste the different blends but as I mentioned earlier they were unavailable.

Closing Remarks

While some may say that comparing the two establishments is unfair I point out that these two businesses are in direct competition with each other, and in this industry those with better products and services will come out on top as thier customers will spend their money on quality when the price point is the same (which it was).

For quality barista coffee Hippo Espresso wins hands down.

Tags: best coffee, Bills Bakery, Comparison, Hippo Espresso, Piccolo, Review, Short Black

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Yours truly (me) entered a Barista Competition on Thursday (13th May) and performed much better than I expected. With a total score of 83.5 out of a total of 90, I finished in second place with the winner scoring 84/90, but not before I was tied for first. The scores after the tie-breaker put my competition in front.

The format of the competition goes like this

• 15 minute time limit
• 6 minutes to adjust the grinder so your shots pull perfectly.
• 9 minutes to produce 2 Short Black’s and 2 Cappuccino’s, with each pair served simultaneously.

Points on the Short Blacks were awarded based on the following

1. Colour of the Crema (Hazelnut, Dark Brown, Reddish)
2. Consistency and persistence of crema
3. Taste balance (of sweet vs acidic vs bitter)
4. Tactile balance (full bodied, round, smooth)
5. All espressos served simultaneously
6. Correct espresso cups used (Hurr Durr)

Cappuccino points were awarded on a similar standard, though the criteria reflects the drink

1. Visually correct cappuccino
2. Consistency and persistent foam
3. Temperature of cappuccino (not too hot or cold)
4. Taste balance (rich sweet milk vs espresso)

Additional points were awarded for how technically correct the use of the espresso machine was, as well as the workstation tidiness. As you can see very few details go un-noticed.

Tags: barista competition, best coffee, Coffee, Coffee Machine, Espresso Pefection Technique

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Ok, so its not a coffee recipe, but its absolutely delicious. Lamb Stroganoff.  I also know what you’re thinking; “Hey don’t you mean beef stroganoff?” And I’ll answer with this, lamb was on special, so instead of beef stroganoff I’ve made the dish with lamb and ended up with Lamb Stroganoff.

This recipe actually has a story behind it and I’m going to tell it too you. I used to live in a college dormitory which was fully catered, and thus I didn’t have to do any cooking for myself, which was a bit of a shame because its something I really get a kick out of turning a pile of raw ingredients into a delicious meal. While I was living there I got to know the kitchen staff and would chat with them regularly. But since I’ve moved into my own place I haven’t seen them as much, but fortunatly I ride my bicycle right past the door to their kitchen on my way too and from University and so I drop by and give them my regards.

Earlier this week as I was riding past I saw the head chef outside having a cigarette. I stopped to say Hi and we began to chat, and during the conversation I asked what he was making for dinner that evening, he replied that he was making beef stroganoff. I asked how one would go about making such a meal and he proceeded to describe how.  Tonight was the night that I made it, however I added my own creativity to it.

Lamb Stroganoff

Although the picture doesn’t really do it justice it does give my post some extra spider food (SEO = good rankings in Google).

Lamb Stroganoff Recipe Ingredients

You’ll need the following Ingredients:

• Lamb pieces, approximately 500g, I bought mine as lamb chops, removed the bones and chopped into pieces.
• Mushrooms, 250g, chopped.
• Tomato Paste, 3 tablespoons.
• White wine, 1/2 to 3/4 of a bottle.
• 2 small onions or 1 medium one, diced.
• 2 or 3 cloves of garlic, diced.
• Salt, pepper and other spices, I used half a chili and it added a nice “click” to the dish.

Lamb Stroganoff Recipe Method

Prepare everything before hand, this includes cubing your lamb, dicing your onions and garlic and sampling your wine.

1. Into a large frying pan add a little oil or butter. Then procede to sear you lamb on a hot pan. Keep the meat moving to ensure it doesn’t burn. At this stage I added a healthy amount of pepper. If you feel like it you can marinade your lamb in chili or some other spices. Maybe at some stage I’ll experiment with honey as a marinade.
2. Once your lamb is sealed then add your diced onions, garlic and chili to the pan. Once again keep it moving.
3. After the onion has become tranclucent add the tomato paste and wine, the pan should still be on a strong heat so it shouldn’t be long before its bubbling.
4. Add the mushrooms ensuring that they’re all under the broth so that they cook evenly.
5. Cut the heat down so that it’s simmering. Keep the heat on untill the mushrooms are tender, for me it took about 25 minutes.

Serve with rice, pasta or potatoes, anything with a mild flavor and contrasting texture. I used rice because it’s easy to cook and cheap to buy.

I’m thinking that I’m going to make this for the next date I go on, its that good. Seriously.

Tags: Lamb, Lamb Stroganoff, Recipes, Stroganoff

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Making Coffee at home is not only cheaper, but fun too. The enjoyment I get watching my shots come out perfect time after time. I really like pouring an amazing Rosetta and tulips, then watching the look on the faces of my family as I present them with a coffee that is 30-40 times better than any they’ve ever paid for before. All this is possible on a home level machine. The skill of a world championship barista could produce even better coffees than what I can, but what I make is better than 95% of cafes out there.

Beville-BES-860

I’ll step you through what I do and use to make my coffees and I’ll take some pictures of the ones I make tomorrow and post them up, but it’s a bit late now.

The machine I use at home is a Breville BES-860. I really like it because its got a conical grinder built in, which is fully adjustable and pretty much everything is adjustable. The notable exception here is the temperature of the water. However I don’t see this as an issue. It would just confuse people and outside of the hands of a skilled barista, whose coffee technique was good enough to make full use of this feature it would just confuse people and provide another way to muck up their shots. Although I recommend this machine I’m sure that there are other systems on the market that will do just as good, if not better, I’m simply not familiar with them.

I use a 600ml steaming jug, with a pointed spout. The Breville comes with one, but I find that it’s not as good as a more traditional shaped jug. Having said that, use what works for you, I’m not out to tell you what to do, I’m just writing about what works for me.

One thing I would recommend for everyone is a tamp pad. Also known as a barista mat. This is a piece of rubber that sits on your bench, near your machine. You rest your group head on it as you tamp so you don’t damage the spout of your group head. A tamp pad will also allow you to lightly tap the group head without damaging either your bench top or your group head. I’d recommend a tamp pad to anyone, regardless of your skill level.

I don’t have an external grinder because my machine has one built in that does a darn fine job.

With these appliances in mind I’ll now step out exactly how I go about making my coffees.

1. Turn on the machine (durrr); make sure it’s got enough water and beans in it. Assemble anything that is in pieces.

2. Get your milk and steaming jug out of the refrigerator. Pour into your jug enough milk for one cup. This machine isn’t big enough to make more than one cup at a time.

3. Purge the steam wand and get your milk going. With this machine you can rest the jug against the wand so that you don’t have to hold it.

4. While your milk is steaming away you should have enough time to grind your beans and tamp them down.

5. The Breville has a little quirk where it purges the steam so that you can pull shots within seconds of the time when you finish steaming, and this is enough time for you to load the group head into the machine, get your cup ready and wipe down your steam wand.

6. Pull your shot, pour your milk, and enjoy your coffee.

It’s as simple as that. You’ll notice in this method that I steam the milk first, this is because with the Breville it takes a while to steam the milk, and in this time the shot has gone off, so to avoid this I do the milk first, which leaves it enough time to settle but not too long, avoiding it separating.

Now that I’ve said all that go, enjoy your brilliant and fantastic coffee from home.

Tags: Benefits, Coffee, Coffee Machine, Espresso Pefection Technique, home, Tamp

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Got the runs

Lets start off with how much I dislike buying a coffee in a cafe for $3.50 and having runs down the side of the cup. Seriously, not a good look, it shows a distinct lack of attention and general inattentiveness by the staff. While it may be a simple mistake, and by itself is not an indication of a poor brew, it does point to a general apathy about the joint. Not a good look at all.

The lighter side of life

Now that I’ve got that out of the way I’d like to say this. The alphabetic synthesis passes the constituent behind the assuming ace. I really like the sequence of words in this sentence. It really says nothing, and yet en-capsules the entire word within its phonic confines. Its like having someone lightly brush your knees with feathers as you sleep, the sensation works its way into your dream. Perhaps you were dreaming about a cat, and it began swooning up against your legs, and as it did so you felt a similar sensation to that of the feather on your knee. It makes you wonder doesn’t it….

You suck at cleaning

Another thing that I’d like to say is this. Don’t soak your steam wand in a jar or cup or any vessel what-so-ever, to try and remove the build up of milk that you’ve let accumulate at the tip. Asside from an indication of poor milk-wand-wiping-technique it buggers up your boiler. See its all about capillary action. In your seemingly innocent cup or jug of water is nothing but water, but after it begins to do its job, dissolving the milk gunge that has built up on your poorly cleaned steam wand, the water begins to go cloudy. The cloudy water then tries to make itself less cloudy by sending bits of milk up the steam wand into your boiler. These bits of milk then cling to the new home that they’ve found inside your previously clean boiler (you were using clean water weren’t you?) and gunk it up. This decreases the efficiency of your boiler, mucks up your water quality and adds odd flavours to your shots. So unless you want to wear out your machine faster, make your coffee taste awful and use more electricity than you would’ve otherwise, don’t soak your steaming wand in water to clean it. Use something wooden to scrape it off and wipe it thoroughly with a moist cloth after you’ve finished using it.

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by Don Holly
There is a definitive clue as to the level of skill and knowledge of the barista preparing an espresso beveragehow he or she tamps the coffee. Tamping is the compacting of the ground coffee in the portafilter prior to brewing. How a barista tamps will be a major determinant to the quality of the espresso, because compacting the coffee firmly and uniformly forces the water to flow through the grounds in a manner that extracts the best of the coffee’s flavors.

Unfortunately, a proper tamping method is rarely performed by most baristas in the United States. At most, you will see a mild flattening motion where the server gently lifts the dosed basket up to a tamping plate mounted on the outside of many grinders. Some baristas have heard that firm tamping is important, but really don’t understand the mechanics. In this case, you will see the barista pressing firmly on the coffee and than rapping the side of the portafilter violently and repeatedly, as if it were necessary to kill the coffee before brewing it.

Tamping is necessary because the brew water is under major pressure (8 to 10 times the weight of gravity) and will have an almost intelligent ability to find the path of least resistance through the coffee. If it does find channels that are easy to get through it will rush through these areas, overextracting the coffee surrounding the channels and underextracting the coffee in the channels. The resulting beverage is the worst of circumstanceswhat flavor does get into the cup is bitter and astringent, and so much of the coffees potential good flavors remain behind in the portafilter basket. With firm and even tamping, the water has no choice but to flow through all of the coffee uniformly, and if the barista has adjusted his or her grind correctly and the espresso machine is in good order, the resulting coffee beverage represents the best the coffee has to offer.

So how do you tamp correctly? Well, now that you know why you tamp, you can apply your intelligence and sense of feeling to the challenge. You can try this at home or politely inform a misinformed barista on these steps of proper tamping:

Step 1: Having dosed the proper amount of coffee into the portafilter basket, even it out so that it is level in its distribution in the basket. Any “high” points will result in areas more compacted than “low” points after tamping, so it is important that the coffee be packed full and level in the basket.

Step 2: Use a flat-faced hand tamper and a counter that is low enough so that you can lean into the tamper with your body weight and arm straight. The tamper should be held in your relaxed hand as an extension of the arm. The tamper face needs to always be applied straight into the coffee, without an angle, because any canting will result in an area where the coffee is thinner.

Step 3: Note that the diameter of the tamper is slightly smaller than the inside diameter of the basket. If you just tamp in the middle, the outside perimeter will still be loose, exaggerating the tendency for the water to flow between the basket and the coffee. I recommend employing the “Staub Tamp” where you tamp the coffee four times riding the tamper up against the inside of the “North, South, East, and West” edge of the basket. Tamp with 30-40 pounds of pressure (in training we tamp on a bathroom scale on the counter). This evenly compacts all of the coffee giving the water a uniform bed to percolate through. Do not tap the portafilter handle between tamps, as this will just tend to loosen adhesion between the packed coffee and the basket. When releasing pressure from each of the four tamps, give a slight twist to the tamper to polish the surface of the compacted coffee.

Step 4: Inspect the result of your tamping to make sure that it was even and there is a good polish. If you notice that one side is deeper than another, you should really knock out the grounds and start over again. If everything looks acceptable, then mount the portafilter handle into the espresso machines group head and begin the brewing cycle.

Step 5: Your final step in tamping is quality control assessment. Noting the quality of the extraction (and of course the best duty of all is tasting the coffee!) is critical to improving your tamping skill. Also examine the spent coffee in the basket after brewinglooking for “worm holes” which is a sure sign of channeling where the water found a weak spot in the coffee pack. The knocked out grounds should have the form of a puck; if it’s mush then the grind and the tamp were off.

Ultimately, the quality of the espresso will be a reflection of the training and the consciousness of the barista. Nowhere is this more apparent that in the tamping technique of the barista.

Tags: Coffee, Espresso Pefection Technique, Tamp, Technique

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The commercial coffee roasting equipments only started to appear in the late 19th century. Before then, all coffee drinkers generally had to roast their own.
The goal of the pioneering coffee roasters was to roast a better quality coffee than the home roasters could. With the basic home coffee roasting equipment available during that time and with great inventors like Jabez Burns contributing to the advancement of the commercial roasters, the commercial roasted coffee indeed produced better quality roasted coffee. And the convenience of buying roasted beans rather than roasting your own eventually tipped the balance towards buying already roasted beans.

Home coffee roasting is now having a renaissance!

This renaissance is due to coffee lovers’ return to taste. A growing number of people are realizing that they are drinking mediocre coffee and that there is a lot more in coffee that could be enjoyed that they are missing in exchange for convenience.

While the goal of the early commercial roasters is to produce quality roasted coffee, the goal nowadays is mainly to maximize profits. To maximize profit the commercial roasters could:

• buy the cheapest raw coffee beans
• choose roast level with minimum shrinkage
• use outrageous practices like quenching roasted beans with more water than is necessary to make the end product heavier
• use of dishonest labeling (i.e., calling a blend a Kona Blend when only a minute amount of Kona is in the blend)

Reasons why it is good to roast your own coffee

Thanks to the Internet, people now have information on their fingertips. Better informed people makes better decision, and many are making the decision to roast their own coffee. Although this may seem a step back to the mid 19th century, this move will give the home roasters the following advantages:

• Most of the home coffee roasting machine available today utilize the state-of-art technology.

For Gene Café, the home-roaster only have two knobs to operate. One for the temperature and another for the roasting time (just like most oven’s control) and both could be modified anytime during roasting to giving the home-roaster total control all of the time.

• You can buy the best quality raw coffee beans (that suits your taste and budget). This also gives you an option to buy Fair Trade (to financially help the coffee farmers) and/or organic coffees (to help the improve the ecological health of Mother Earth).
• Home-roasters could choose the roast level that he/she likes (from light to dark roast level).
• Fresh roasted coffee on demand (most roasted coffee starts to deteriorate in taste after 10 days whereas raw coffee beans could remain at its best for a year or more)

Drinking instant coffee is analogous to eating microwave-ready frozen meal, they are convenient but it could not offer the taste and aroma a freshly roasted coffee could offer.

The Internet is a home-roaster’s friend

There is a wealth of information about home coffee roasting in the Internet. And to get you off into a good start in your journey into home coffee roasting, the Gene Café home coffee roaster is now available in Australia. Gene Café is a home coffee that could evolve with you. Thus, its ease of use would make your initial foray into coffee roasting enjoyable. As your coffee knowledge advances, its feature of total control is there for you to tap. There is a growing community of home coffee roaster that exists in Internet forum that would gladly welcome you into their community.

Some pointers for making a good cup of coffee

The following are things that are absolutely essential for a good cup of coffee:
Quality green coffee beans.
Freshly roasted coffee
A good grinder to ensure the correct and uniformly-sized grind for your preferred brewing method
A good brewer. This could range from the simple (like French Press or AeroPress) to sophisticated (like prosumer espresso machine). Any of these brewers could produce good coffee as long as the following variables are correctly factored in the brewing process:
Water temperature (usually between 90 to 96 degrees Celsius)
Extraction time relative to grind size
Amount of ground coffee to use
Reputable manufacturers of coffee brewers would give you recommendation on the above-mentioned variables. The Avacuppa team will be happy to guide and help you in your pursuit for good coffee.

This article was taken from AvaCuppa

Tags: Coffee, Coffee Beans, Roasting

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I’ve found a really good tutorial on youtube for steaming milk and free pouring. Well worth the 10 minutes the video runs for.

I will, however, add some notes to the video.

• When making coffees to drink, use milk, not soapy water.
• Following on from yesterday, use a thermometer, timing isn’t a very good way of getting it right every time. Also different espresso machines have different steaming times, the only way you’ll know for sure is to use a thermometer.

If you keep these things in mind as you watch and take notes! This guy knows what he’s talking about, and as always practice.

And don’t forget about our free eBook offer, fill out the form below and we’ll email you with a link to the book.

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Before I start I’ll say a few things about milk. Any liquid can be steamed, but achieving nirvana with your milk is dependent on the fat content that it contains. Fat provides the flavour and “mouth feel,” which is why in Italy they usually use whole milk. Whichever type of milk you prefer to use, is the right one for you.

Skim milk produces the desired consistancy the fastest
1% milk produces good results
2% is widely because it is widely accepted to give the best results

Personally, I prefer the taste of whole milk and have practiced frothing so that I can get it right 90% of the time.

Use a thermometer

A thermometer will allow you to get the timing of you steaming spot on. Stop stretching at 40 degrees Celsius, or 100 degrees Fahrenheit, and stop altogether when it gets to 60 degrees Celsius or 140 degrees Fahrenheit.

Milk doesn’t like being streched beyond the 40 C mark, so stopping before this point is emperative. In addition, milk burns beyond 70 degrees, completely destroying the flavour, stopping at 60 C will allow any lag in your thermometer to catch up. You may have noticed that the needle of your thermometer continues to move even after you’ve stopped steaming.  Cutting the steam off at about 10 degrees before your end point will compensate for this phenomena.

Calibrate your thermometer

Over time thermometers can lose their accuracy. Not to worry though, as this can be easily fixed by re-calibrating the thermometer. This is done by loosening the little nut at the back of the dial you can move the needle about on the face of the dial. Put the thermometer in ice water and wait for the needle to stop moving, adjust the dial so that the needle points to 0 degrees Celsius and re-tighten the nut.

The Calbiration Nut

Use cold milk, and keep your steaming jug in the fridge

It takes a fixed amount of time to steam a jug of milk to the desired consistency. If it reaches the temperature at which it will burn before it’s textured to perfection then your milk will be sub standard. Fortunately there is a simple solution to this problem, have both your milk and your jug cold. Keep both the milk and the jug in the refrigerator right up until use them.

Purge the steam wand

Steam condenses inside the wand itself as well as the plumbing from your boiler. It takes a few seconds to open the steam valve and allow the water that has condensed in these tubes to be cleared out. Its a simple thing that anyone can do to improve the quality of their milk.

Avoid letting the tip of the steam want come out of the milk

This is especially true after the stretching has taken place. Allowing the wand to break the surface will cause large bubbles which can completely ruin the texture that you’ve worked so hard to create.

Swirl the milk

After you’ve finished stretching your milk, allow it to swirl around, forming ribbons. The more turbulent this is the finer the air bubbles in your milk will be leading to a more silky texture. But still be sure to avoid the tip of the wand from breaking the surface.

Keep the jug still

This may be counter intuitive, but once you’ve found a sweet spot STAY THERE! If you’re onto a good thing stay with it, the same applies to milk steaming.

Just a reminder about our free eBook offer, all you need to do is submit your email address below and you’ll automaticly be sent instructions.

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