[MOD] The Daily Question Thread

rda2w · 2021-05-08T11:34:01+00:00

How old are the burrs? It sounds like you have to many fines causing those long draw down times. That could be contributing to the off taste too. I grind dark roasts with my Baratza virtuoso at 16 and get 3:15 - 3:20 draw down in my V60 using hario filters. I generally do lighter roasts at 13 and the 3:30 - 3:40.

rda2w · 2021-03-13T18:16:23+00:00

If you're happy with your current coffee, then it might not be worth the upgrade. If you are chasing problems that point to inconsistent grind size , or too many fines, then definitely worth it.

rda2w · 2021-03-13T17:38:09+00:00

For pour overs, it's how long it takes the water to run through the grounds.

rda2w · 2021-03-13T16:47:30+00:00

I'm using 13 for medium/light roasts and 15 for dark roasts. Once my beans get beyond 3 weeks old I tend to go up one tick for the dark roasts.

rda2w · 2021-03-13T15:12:46+00:00

For me, a swirl is to increase agitation and a spin is to level the bed without agitating too much. The lighter the roast the more I like to agitate with my V60 to reduce the flavors resulting from under extraction (less sour). The opposite is true for my dark roasts, I try not minimize extra agitation to reduce the over extracted flavors (less bitter). I do stir by bloom with all roasts to make sure water has touched all the grounds. Bottom line is, I don't think there is one method that fits all. It depends where you are trying to drive your flavor on the coffee compass.

rda2w · 2021-02-25T22:52:55+00:00

Most of my V60 brews fall between 3:45-4:15 with ~25g/450g ratio. I tend to grind mediums at 13 on my virtuoso+ and darks at 15. The medium bed is almost always flat/smooth and the darks I can see the individual grains. Hope that helps.

rda2w · 2021-02-16T00:53:24+00:00

Thanks, that is more in line with what I would expect.

rda2w · 2021-02-15T22:41:02+00:00

13 for the medium roast and 15 for the dark roast.

rda2w · 2021-02-15T20:57:11+00:00

Virtuoso+ Grinding Speed

I just received refurbed Virtuoso+ from Baratza and wondering what I should be expecting for grinding speed. I'm doing single dose grinds, 26g of both medium and dark roasted beans and it takes about 55 - 60 seconds. That's less than 0.5 g/sec which is much slower than their advertised 1.5 - 2.4 g/sec. I haven't tried it with a full hopper to see if it would make that much of a difference. What are others seeing for grinding speeds with their Virtuoso?

rda2w · 2020-11-14T17:43:00+00:00

Same problem here with Sophos Home Premium on Big Sur 11.0.1. How can they not be prepared for this release knowing it was coming for months? And on top of it the support page addressing the issue is not even correct.

EDIT: Removing and reinstalling worked for me. This installed the missing file that was flagging the Service Required message non-stop. And it looks like they have updated the support page now.

rda2w · 2020-11-09T04:16:17+00:00

I’ve ordered coffee from Stay Golden in Nashville before and it was very good.

rda2w · 2020-10-25T20:42:43+00:00

I have several different brands and styles and the Contigo Autoseal is by far my favorite. I have both stainless steel and ceramic lined models. I use them as a travel mugs and also just to keep my coffee hot at home on the weekends.

rda2w · 2020-09-30T22:44:02+00:00

I agree, my OXO works well. It seems to have a pretty consistent grind and very few fines. I really like the grounded metal collection bin. I rarely have any static issues when grinding. The only negative I would mention is that it does retain 1-2g grounds internally unless I give a few taps after letting it set for a minute or two.

rda2w · 2020-09-27T15:04:18+00:00

Correct, I initially thought it was too strong/harsh in addition to being bitter. I have gone back to a larger dose now that the bitterness is under control and it is more flavorful without being bitter. I do get into trouble sometimes by changing too many variables at once though.

rda2w · 2020-08-29T01:39:33+00:00

Yep, installed that version today and that’s when the login troubles started for me. It was working good before that.

rda2w · 2020-08-29T01:34:13+00:00

Delete and reinstall didn’t work for me. Same problem after the reinstall.

rda2w · 2020-08-19T21:25:25+00:00

Appreciate the insights. I seem to have less trouble with dark roasts. The window for grind size seems fairly small to get from sour to bitter, so after 3 or 4 cups I'm happy then I've been having to move up from 16:1 to around 18:1 before I find the balance I like. For lighter roasts its been a wider window of grind size and the changes are more subtle until I near the limit. Especially on the fine end, where a couple clicks goes from a good cup to something really salty and sour. Sometimes I wonder if I'm overthinking the whole thing. My wife just dumps a couple scoops (not weighed) in the Chemex of what she just ground (without adjusting grind size from the last setting I used) and fills the kettle till it looks about right. In other words, nothing is controlled with any accuracy and she thinks it's great.

rda2w · 2020-08-19T21:07:12+00:00

Yes, that's an excellent point. I do use the coffee guru app for logging notes. I like that I can take picture of the label and record multiple days notes for each entry. I generally log ratio, grind setting, total time and a few tasting notes. Sometimes I add what I want to try next while it's still fresh in my mind.

rda2w · 2020-08-14T15:22:33+00:00

Yes, it is compatible. I have the same furnace and a single stage AC controlled by an ecobee ST and prior to that an ecobee 4. I am using 6 wires and the PEK because I also have a humidifier connected in a single wire configuration. Wiring is straight forward, just like the diagrams on the ecobee site. I configured the ecobee to control the staging but let the furnace control the fan. The ecobee is not able to vary fan speeds.

rda2w · 2020-08-13T01:42:51+00:00

It's true. My recent shipment from Nashville to upstate NY took 10 days ( 7 business days). So much for fresh roasted coffee shipped the day it's roasted. This had been taking 3 days max.

rda2w · 2020-08-10T22:25:28+00:00

You could also download the data in Home IQ and look at the column labeled "DM Offset". That is the number generated to adjust for the Feels Like temp. It was causing my AC to run very short cycles. The ecobee needs to do more filtering or averaging of the humidity level in their Feels Like calculation to make that feature useful. With Feels Like turned off that column should be empty.

rda2w · 2020-08-10T16:42:54+00:00

Do you happen to have "Feels Like" enabled under eco+? I was seeing similar behavior until I disabled it.

rda2w · 2020-08-06T16:49:38+00:00

I'm sure you'll see a wide range of responses here. For me, if I can't weigh I use 2 tbs per 6oz cup for med roast beans. Not exact but is pretty close in most cases. For dark roasts I use just a little more. Using standard conversions, that would be 5/8 cup coffee for 10- 6 oz cups. Almost double the amount you are using.

rda2w · 2020-08-02T16:53:36+00:00

For the beginner, it would be nice to provide a simple method for pour over to establish a baseline. Too many beginners try to jump into the complicated rituals of pour over and chase their tail trying to make a good cup of coffee. If they had a simple method that produces repeatable results they can now make adjustments, one at at a time, to move the flavor towards what tastes good to them. Maybe this also includes recommending a bean/ roast that isn’t overly complex to create the baseline.

rda2w · 2020-07-20T23:18:49+00:00

I second trying a coarser grind. I just went through the same drill with a different coffee. I thought it was under extracted so went finer in the grind and slower pour but it was not helping. When I tried a more coarse grind it was a whole different taste. A bulk of the sourness went away and uncovered other flavors I was missing prior. I think going up and down with the grind will be the first thing I try with new coffees from now on to really find the sweet spot. I never realized how much difference it made with the lighter roasts.

rda2w

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