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Making espresso is both an art and a science. Perfectly dialing in your coffee bean’s grind size is no small feat and remains one of the most important aspects of pulling espresso properly.
It is important to understand how coffee grind size effects:
• Extraction
• Pressure
• Taste
You are able to use CM5700 all-in-one espresso machine to make perfect espresso at home. It will take time to master the fundamentals of pulling espresso. While the CM5700 makes this as easy as possible, as with any espresso machine, it takes a lot of practice to be able to pull the perfect shot.
First, we’ll look at the grinder of the CM5700 and what options and ease of use that it affords you. Then, we’ll take a look at how you can best use those options to dial in your coffee grind size to exact the perfect coarseness level.
The Sincreative CM5700 coffee grinder has 15 grind level settings that allow you to choose the perfect grind for your coffee. As you get familiar with the machine and the different types of espresso beans that you prefer, you’ll be able to recognize the best settings to use.
The CM5700 has an integrated grinder which means that you don't have to worry about buying a separate grinding unit—your machine has it right on hand. The onboard grinder is a Conical Burr grinder which produces an ultra-consistent grind. This reduced the variance in grind size and lets you accurately get to know your preferences.
Lastly, the CM5700 have a dosage setting. That means that not only do you have the power to make precision ground coffee, but you can also control exactly how much coffee you need. You can easily add extra grams to your dosage or switch from a single shot dosage to a double with ease.
Other than the coffee itself, consistent pressure, and water temperature, grind size is the most element. In fact, it is the most important element that you can and should vary as you gain more skill. Espresso machine should create about 9 bars of pressure at the puck and the water temperature should be around 193 °F to 200 °F. But grind size can change quite a bit.
Firstly, espresso should be ground finely. It is ground the second most finely of brewing methods after Turkish coffee. So, we are working with very finely ground coffee with espresso. This is for two reasons.
• Fine coffee grounds create the best puck in the portafilter tamping process
• Fine coffee grounds create the desired level of surface area of extraction
After you grind your coffee into your portafilter you must tamp it down. Tamping is the process where you compact the coffee grounds together into a puck. This coffee puck needs to be both tight and very even.
If the puck is loose, then the pressurized water will too easily pass through the puck. If the puck is tamped unevenly, then you risk having the pressurized water find the weakest point in your puck. When this happens, it can create a crack in your puck and instead of the water evenly brewing across the entire puck, it will over-extract the coffee right around the crack. This leave the rest of the coffee grounds being very under-extracted. This gives a very unbalanced taste with the worst of being over and under extracted.
Grind size also obviously effects overall extraction. Over extracted coffee tends to be bitter and harsh. Under extracted sour and too bright.
If you’ve done everything right in creating your puck, you shouldn’t have loosely packed or unevenly packed pucks. That is a great step in the process. But you might notice that you still have unwanted extraction levels. This is where you can experiment with grind size (little by little).
If your puck is in perfect shape you are set to start experimenting. Some coffee beans are brighter tasting than others. Others are darker with richer notes. These differences in beans can really change your espresso shots a lot. With a perfect puck you can adjust the grind size to match the particular coffee you are using.
For naturally bright, fruity, and even sour noted coffees, you can adjust the taste by going a click finer in your grind setting. Adjust this one click of the dial at a time. Make sure to maintain a perfect puck as you do this. If you notice your puck cracking under pressure, you may have gone too fine. In that case, you may need to adjust something else like raising your temperature ever so slightly.
For naturally dark, caramelly, and more bitter noted coffees, you can adjust the taste by going a click coarser in your grind setting. Again, only adjust your grind setting one click at a time. You run the risk of lower pressure at the puck as you grind coarser so try to maintain a good flow rate from your portafilter.
Especially if you are trying to get the perfect grind setting that you can set and forget for your current bag of beans, it is important to purge a little bit of coffee out of the grind every time you adjust the grind setting. When you change the grind setting, there likely remains some ground coffee from the last grind. This coffee is ground at the previous setting. Purging that coffee lets you grind more coffee and know full well that it is all that same consistent size as per your new changes.
The CM5700 is the ideal at home espresso machine. It has grinder, steamer, and the main espresso pulling apparatus all in one unit to make espresso making as easy as possible. Specifically, the CM5700 ensures that you are able to grind your coffee perfectly—always having total control over your coffee.
Remember to clean and properly maintain the grinder for best results over time.
