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Whats Wrong With Lavazza Coffee?
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Footnote. The 2kg purchased is just about all gone. The Kimbo Supreme was way better than the Lavazza. If it was available locally, I would buy it again. Can't seem to pull a bad shot with it.
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Great that the experiment worked, you got to try something different without the expense of a trip to Italy.
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No more to report for now. Consistent results and validation of what was reported on the Home Barista forum.
Would I buy again? Probably not because of the messing around involved, and a kilo of beans at a time is too much to manage with our rate of consumption.
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Day 2.
Got all the beans packed and in the freezer yesterday. Weighed out a pile of 14g batches and put them into individual little air tight plastic containers.
Two espressos this morning from those. Tweaked the grind very slightly for the second to get a tiny bit more flow. The Niche is so adjustable and so repeatable!
Second espresso was a beauty. Smooth, warm, hints of almond in amongst it.
These results are as good as I would expect from my regular home roasted or local specialist beans.
Oh, and the "super crema" name. The crema I'm getting is no more or less than I would normally expect, and of similar colour.
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Day one. Lavazza Super Crema.
Beans look ok, not a burnt roast, just darkish. When ground they are not as dark as I expected. They smell ok, not rancid. Very slight oil sheen on the surface, but by no means would you call them oily.
Used up quite a bit getting the grind sorted. Finally settled on a recipe that was in the Home Barista thread.
First try in my IMS basket with 14g in and 28 out, about where I am with my usual beans, was very unpleasant. Quite harsh.
By the end as mentioned above, standard basket, 14g in and a little under 20g out in a longish 40 seconds was very drinkable. Not bad at all.
The Niche always seems to have one loan fat Robusta bean left at the end that takes 30 seconds or so to get chipped at until it can fall in and be ground.
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Gary when you post your thoughts, let us know how your landed price relates to say a top class specialty roasted coffee in NZ? I assume it will be more expensive, which adds to the chase and story. A perverse pleasure in paying handsomely for this workmanlike coffee, history is full of similar endeavours.
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So my two bags of Italian beans have arrived. A bit of a delay getting them cleared because they were a food stuff.
The best before date is April 2021 on both, which is within the recommendation on the Home Barista thread and way fresher than what is on offer locally here.
Dissapointment awaits.
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I don't think I ever took that journey. I started with a Silvia and the basket that came with it. Was never interested in single shots and the 7g dose is a bitch to get right. With the Mazzer I had I let the timer grind and it just happened to produce a dose that filled the IMS basket I had bought. I levelled it and tamped. (watched the technique of baristas around town and this is what they seemed to do) An easy procedure. Grind was adjusted to get the requisite volume out. I was happy with the results so there I stayed. Better coffee at home than elsewhere. Double short blacks as we call them here.
Since I moved to the VBM a couple of years back, and more so since I got the Niche grinder, I've been searching again...
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Morning Gary, most of us start out using a 7 gram basket in our early espresso days, then gradually work up, 14, 18, 21 and so on until we feel we've gone over the top, then we start to reduce the dose until we arrive at what we feel is the Goldilocks zone for our taste, somewhere in the very distant past that happened for me at 18 grams, there I have remained to this day.Originally posted by GaryM View PostI've followed the general trend of bigger doses bigger baskets. 18g or so typically, in a basket that is full without impacting on the screen. Never thought to try 14g doses. Is that surprising?
Perhaps I'm simply an irredeemable creature of habit.
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Thanks 388. There is a huge amount to be said for taking a naive approach to things. Unlearning is a powerful tool.
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Yelta you can't blame a guy for mixing it up a bit! Assuming Gary nailed his personal coffee in 5 years, that means he has a a decade the same. He deserves some variety.
Never to old to experiment or learn.
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I've followed the general trend of bigger doses bigger baskets. 18g or so typically, in a basket that is full without impacting on the screen. Never thought to try 14g doses. Is that surprising?
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Originally posted by GaryM View PostWhile I wait for my beans I reread some of the Home Barista thread. One thing there is the focus on 14g doses and a standard double basket.
For interest I swapped out my IMS and put in the double that came with the VBM. I'm grinding with the Niche for 14g and 28g out in about 30 seconds.
What a surprise. Better coffee than I've had in a long while. More nuanced.
I'm trying to understand where your coming from Gary, in post #68 this thread you say "I've been at this, home roasting, espresso making and drinking for about 15 years plus." most of us have a better than average understanding of the process with 15 years of practical experience under our belt.
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While I wait for my beans I reread some of the Home Barista thread. One thing there is the focus on 14g doses and a standard double basket.
For interest I swapped out my IMS and put in the double that came with the VBM. I'm grinding with the Niche for 14g and 28g out in about 30 seconds.
What a surprise. Better coffee than I've had in a long while. More nuanced.
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