THR_Crema

So after a patient wait with the bank holiday and not being around yesterday when it arrived I’ve spent the morning getting to grips with this. First time I’ve ventured into the cold drip world of coffee having previously used the french press to brew over 24hrs in the fridge. The whole thing seems very well designed and made from initial inspection; I backed this through Kickstarter. I have the first batch being made and look forward to sampling it later. Any advice on cold drip coffee is welcome.

Motta 53mm Tamper

1) No - sadly 2) I use a dosing funnel which I sourced off eBay fits very nicely within the double basket. I grind my beans into a cup first then pour into the basket via the funnel. Cleaned my workflow up a lot. https://rover.ebay.com/rover/0/0/0?mpre=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.ebay.co.uk%2Fulk%2Fitm%2F273873965385 3) I originally thought the tamper was good until I attended a barista course. I now use a 53mm Motta tamper which you can get from Bella Barista, 200 Degrees Coffee or elsewhere. Slight bit of room around the edge however once I tamp I give the basket a gentle knock with the tamper and it knocks any small loose bits off into the puck ready for a final more gentle tamp. Hope this helps.

I started off using the grinder to try and get the exact, or nearest, dose figure. I’ve moved away from that now and keep the hopper empty and have my single dose setup now. I find the grinder is fairly accurate considering it’s built in.

Welcome fellow Sage Barista Express owner. Had mine for just over 2 years and looking to upgrade in the New Year - so much good advice on here.

I finally got round to cleaning the internal grinder fully with a full strip. It’s 2years old and felt bad I’ve not done it sooner. I’d recommend doing this for anyone with the Barista Express as I was shocked by how much ground coffee was retained within. I weighed what was retained and came out at 5.5grams. I’ve attached some photographs that may be of interest - I just need to order a new fibre washer for the bottom of the setup (it’s fragile and contained a lot of fine coffee grounds/oils).

Not tried this one before so looking forward to dialling it in.

New BRITA water jug and 6 months worth of filters.

Sounds like the rubber gaskets needs replacing - only a few pounds from their website and easily changed by yourself.

I use the Sage Barista Express - roughly mix the chocolate powder into a milk jug then steam as per normal milk steaming - around 65 degrees. The steaming mixes the milk nicely and we are left with a delicious hot chocolate. Good luck.

Has anyone else backed the Brrrewer project on Kickstarter by Essence Coffee? https://essense.coffee/en/brrrewer/ I should be receiving mine in a few weeks time and looking forward to trying it. I’ve only been making cold brew in my french press till now and interested to see how the flavours might change and the wider use it might have. Any advice/tips greatly appreciated.

Yes I bought two bags and just run out. I personally loved them and most visitors did. They really are the taste of the sea and worth giving them ago.

I’ve got 9g in each however my main coffee I use 17.5g so I have some built in tolerance for grinder retention.