Coffee Appreciation

www.myespresso.co.uk

Were the first to respond to my email, £33 for both hoppers

I have always found these youtube clips very helpful but a little nauseating

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sc-lGbQmvf4"]YouTube
- Tech Tips: Cleaning a Rancilio Rocky Grinder[/ame]

But it made it easy to see how to see how to strip rocky down to replace the hoppers.

Press-fit, ftw

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-hampshire-11302161

Combined failure of pressurestat and over-pressure safety valve = bomb.

Nasty stuff.

Will keeping my coffee in the fridge keep it fresher? We don't have a freezer at work so that's not an option. It's just preground lavazza (for the moment) for a cafetiere.

Freezer, sealed. Not fridge.
I don't do either personally but it depends how quickly you get through beans.

Isn't the humidity really high in a fridge / freezer?

http://www.home-barista.com/coffees/refrigerator-or-freezer-for-coffee-storage-t2286.html

sealed container in the drawer it is then, cheers hippo

i keep it in an airtight jar in the fridge.
i don't care if it's right or wrong.

It's wrong*. I don't care about your coffee, just mine. :P

*might not be but I'm sticking with the freezer having adding less 'taste' and keeping the beans fresher argument.

i keep it in an airtight jar in the fridge.
i don't care if it's right or wrong.

Same here, and I haven't noticed any difference in a shot from a brand new bag or from beans that have been stored in the fridge for four-six weeks.

Will keeping my coffee in the fridge keep it fresher? We don't have a freezer at work so that's not an option. It's just preground lavazza (for the moment) for a cafetiere.

I use preground lavazza at work. Think it says you should keep it in the fridge, which is what I do. Mine's tasted fine for the last 3 weeks, but might just be losing a bit taste now but am at the end of the packet anyway.

Same here, and I haven't noticed any difference in a shot from a brand new bag or from beans that have been stored in the fridge for four-six weeks.

There's a noticeable lack of crema on the stale beans I'ved used.
Turn it into a cappucino, screw it, no harm done. ;)

from Salento, Italy

i get ground coffee from espresso room/monmouth/milk bar and get through it in about 2 weeks. there is a slight change of flavor over time but it doesn't hang around long enough to go stale.

coffee from the supermarket is possibly months old already

Yep, I never got good head crema from pre-ground supermarket stuff.

The first jump is to go from pre-ground to grinding your own.

The next jump (though this may already have been made) is to stop storing your beans in the bag you get them in and starting to store them in a sealed jar).

The 'storing your beans in the freezer' jump is, in my opinion, just a little too much. Buy less coffee and buy it more often. If you have a roaster local then there's often not a big price difference anyway. If you order off the internet then yes, there are significant price differences between buying 250g and buying 1kg.

I don't have a roaster handy but I often do a kilo in a week.
I really should get onto hasbean a bit more and get out of the office to Monmouth but it's a pain and I like to go there for a pint at the market porter.

I'm thinking of getting a PID kit for my Silvia, has anyone got any experience of these?

My girl got me a coffee machine for my birthday... a delonghi icona. It was a bit of a surprise but boy am i happy with it.

The first few cups were a bit lacklustre I dont know if that was down to me, but now its tasting great. I'm on the illy atm that came with the machine, gonna get a bag of monmouth espresso blend this morning. I guess i could use that as a bit of a pepsi challenge on the taste buds.

I've had a coffee from Buffalo bills coffee machine with monmouth espresso beans (freshly ground) and the way his comes out is slightly sharper and with a stronger aroma with a more consistent tone crema.

Why o why did i not get a machine sooner.

raymundo - have a crack at monmouths organic espresso blend, little bit more robust than the straight espresso blend without being any harsher

Ok might get a bag of each... i fear change.

I took my Gaggia apart last night to descale it. 5 years use (cleaned fairly regularly) and I was surprised by how little scale was in it. A quick brush with some wire wool saw it away. Whilst it is apart I'm going to replace the group head gasket and boiler seal.

I have always used filtered water in it, and have probably descaled it about once every 6 months to a year. There was quite a lot of coffee residue here and there which I've cleaned off, and have ordered some of those PulyCaff tablets to keep it cleaner in future. Having looked at pictures of other people's scaled up machines on the internet and read the stories of de-scaling with a dremel (wtf??!) I was surprised by how little scale there was. Would definitely recommend a Brita water filter to prolong the life of your machine.

They are also surprisingly straight forward inside - most of the weight comes from the brass group head.

Question for the coffee heads.
I'm running this Beauty
http://www.dualit.com/products/espressivo-coffee-machine
along with the dualit burr grindatron.

Any ideas how I would descale/clean the pipes...?

We used to use the crazy foam tabs when I was a barista but this feel a litte harsh for a domestic machine like this, and I'm wary of forcing water the wrong way up it. (don't be cheap)