Hi all.
Just realised it has been 15 years since I started making coffee at home, so I decided to share my story.
I got my first espresso machine in 2005. I was in university, and I got it as a birthday present from my girlfriend. It was a basic Sunbeam machine, that cost about $150. I used a Delonghi mini blender to 'grind' cheap supermarket beans. It probably made a terrible frothy drink, but there was novelty in using it. After a white I rarely used it, pulling it out to make coffee for friends who were impressed I was making coffee from scratch using whole roasted beans, as most of them were drinking takeaway coffee from Starbucks or Gloria Jeans, and would not even have seen what a roasted coffee bean looked like.


After a few years of this, I upgraded to the Rancilio Silvia + Rocky combo in 2011. It was a big investment at the time, at a cost of around $1300. I tried beans from a few roasteries, and ultimately decided to settle on supermarket beans again, for cost reasons. I decided that beans only stay fresh for a week after opening the bag anyway, so no point spending $$$ on quality beans. This was true to an extent, as I could see a big drop-off in quality from the 1st day and the 7th day after opening a bag of beans. I bought Coles branded beans for years, only because I was able to buy 1kg beans for $12, with an expiry date close to 11 months which meant they were roasted less than a month ago. Coffee didn't taste great and my frothing and pouring was very average, but occasionally turned out well like the example below. I was making coffee on weekends and mornings off only.


2 years ago I upgraded again to the Rocket Giotto Evoluzione R, after going to a mate's place who served a cafe quality flat white from his ECM machine, which I didn't think was possible from a home machine. I got a Helor 101 hand grinder which he recommended as a cheap alternative to more expensive options. I upgraded my grinder to the Baratza Sette 270Wi, which helped to cut down the prep time by accurately dosing 15g into my basket within 0.1-0.2g margin of error.
I found a local roaster in Pymble in the upper north of Sydney where I live, who sold good quality beans for $10 per 250g. For two years I bought 1kg at a time, but found the quality gradually declining towards the 4th bag.
So I finally decided home roasting was the way to go, and while I was waiting on my local supplier to get the Gene Cafe roaster back in stock, I came across threads about the Kaffelogic Nano 7, and jumped on it.


A few weeks on, I couldn't be happier. I'm currently drinking a Colombia/Peru/India/Ethiopia blend, all from BeanBay, and am enjoying cafe quality coffee every morning from home!



So at this point I wonder what the next step is? I think it will be learning the characteristic of each type of bean, by finding the time to do cupping sessions at home. I have no idea what the characteristics of each bean I use are, and lump them together hoping a blend of 4 beans will produce a balanced flavour. It's not bad, and in fact it's pretty good, but in a few years I hope to be able to know how to produce a well balanced blend from knowledge rather than by chance.
Thanks for reading!
Just realised it has been 15 years since I started making coffee at home, so I decided to share my story.
I got my first espresso machine in 2005. I was in university, and I got it as a birthday present from my girlfriend. It was a basic Sunbeam machine, that cost about $150. I used a Delonghi mini blender to 'grind' cheap supermarket beans. It probably made a terrible frothy drink, but there was novelty in using it. After a white I rarely used it, pulling it out to make coffee for friends who were impressed I was making coffee from scratch using whole roasted beans, as most of them were drinking takeaway coffee from Starbucks or Gloria Jeans, and would not even have seen what a roasted coffee bean looked like.


After a few years of this, I upgraded to the Rancilio Silvia + Rocky combo in 2011. It was a big investment at the time, at a cost of around $1300. I tried beans from a few roasteries, and ultimately decided to settle on supermarket beans again, for cost reasons. I decided that beans only stay fresh for a week after opening the bag anyway, so no point spending $$$ on quality beans. This was true to an extent, as I could see a big drop-off in quality from the 1st day and the 7th day after opening a bag of beans. I bought Coles branded beans for years, only because I was able to buy 1kg beans for $12, with an expiry date close to 11 months which meant they were roasted less than a month ago. Coffee didn't taste great and my frothing and pouring was very average, but occasionally turned out well like the example below. I was making coffee on weekends and mornings off only.


2 years ago I upgraded again to the Rocket Giotto Evoluzione R, after going to a mate's place who served a cafe quality flat white from his ECM machine, which I didn't think was possible from a home machine. I got a Helor 101 hand grinder which he recommended as a cheap alternative to more expensive options. I upgraded my grinder to the Baratza Sette 270Wi, which helped to cut down the prep time by accurately dosing 15g into my basket within 0.1-0.2g margin of error.
I found a local roaster in Pymble in the upper north of Sydney where I live, who sold good quality beans for $10 per 250g. For two years I bought 1kg at a time, but found the quality gradually declining towards the 4th bag.
So I finally decided home roasting was the way to go, and while I was waiting on my local supplier to get the Gene Cafe roaster back in stock, I came across threads about the Kaffelogic Nano 7, and jumped on it.


A few weeks on, I couldn't be happier. I'm currently drinking a Colombia/Peru/India/Ethiopia blend, all from BeanBay, and am enjoying cafe quality coffee every morning from home!



So at this point I wonder what the next step is? I think it will be learning the characteristic of each type of bean, by finding the time to do cupping sessions at home. I have no idea what the characteristics of each bean I use are, and lump them together hoping a blend of 4 beans will produce a balanced flavour. It's not bad, and in fact it's pretty good, but in a few years I hope to be able to know how to produce a well balanced blend from knowledge rather than by chance.
Thanks for reading!



. And man your latte art has improved heaps, the rosetta on the bottom right of the recent picture is phenomenal.

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