Weigh, weigh, WEIGH

We're going to talk about espresso weighing because it is the basis for most other types of coffee drinks and still enjoys the most popularity with the coffee-loving public. Properly ground and then weighed espresso should be, by world standards, between 7 and 10 grams, doubleshot twice that. The resulting, well-extracted espresso is between 25 and 30 ml and produces a roughly 1 mm thin layer of 'crema' on the surface. The parameters cannot be given exactly, as each type of coffee requires a slightly different weight and variations are therefore allowed.

A few key things play a major role in the preparation of espresso. These are the freshness of the coffee and its quality, the coarseness of the grind, the speed of extraction and the composition of the water. Everything is related, if we don't weigh the coffee well in the portafilter, the speed of the water flow can significantly affect the final taste of the coffee. An experienced barista knows his stuff.

If thecoffeeis ground too finely, the water flows too slowly and the resulting drink can become bitter. Conversely, coarsely ground coffee will allow the water to flow unwanted faster and the resulting coffee is bland, watery in taste. The extraction time for proper espresso is 20 to 30 s. We write about all of these variables on our blog or are about to.

DON'T hesitate to WATCH and FEEL!

You may be thinking that accurate weighing will kind of take the barista's mind off the ball, and that everything will be left to the cold, exact method. But weighing, weighing has far more pros than cons. Thescale allows to repeatedly measure the coffee correctly, thus ensuring its unchanging and you-approved consistency for making the perfect espresso. In the hectic coffee shop rush hour of the day, when everyone in your establishment is head over heels and craving their coffee, itspeeds up production and guarantees the quality your customers come to you for. It will make the job easier even fornovice baristas who will know the exact parameters.

Last but not least ,it reduces waste and has a positive economic impact on your budget. For example, if you own a professional grinder with a timer and don't yet have a scale to carry the weight of the ground coffee, the variation for each batch can be as little as 0.5 g. If you grind about 100 such disproportionate batches per day, you will have already ground 50 g of coffee and 1 kg of coffee per month. Which is already noticeable on any budget. The scale will help you to optimise the dose of ground coffee so that these losses do not occur.

HOW TO CHOOSE A SCALE

In every kit of a proper barista should not be missing. We'll give you some tips on what to look out for when choosing a coffee scale to ensure it serves you well. Be sure to choose a scale with an accuracy of 0.1 g. A scale up to 2 kg should be sufficient . Choose one that has integrated stopwatchto measure the water flow time during extraction. Last but not least, make sure your scale can remember the weight of the container or portafilter you will be weighing the coffee in and the size of theweighing area. This should be larger so that the lever sits well on it. If you want to make things easier for yourself, you can have another scale with a smaller surface area, directly for weighing the final espresso, placed on or near the coffee machine.

ONE STEP CLOSER TO PERFECT COFFEE

Every espresso is different and differently good. This is because coffee beans are a natural, living raw material for which nothing is standardised. We have a need to tame and transform this raw material in our own image. One of these tools to tame the unruly natural substance, in our case ground coffee, is actually a simple physical method - weighing. If we get this right, we can get creative and delight our customers with a great cappuccino, for example!