Ristretto

This time we try a roast by Drop Coffee named "Fall Down". Fall Down consists of three different beans, 40% Daterra from Brazil, 40% Kebado Dara and 20% Shakiso both from Ethiopia. The Shakiso is the sweetest one in the bunch and probably what makes this roast one of my favorites.

As an espresso, and ristretto particularly, it really shines. Sometimes these sweet and berry roasts looses body. They are still good but to me they lack something: a base to support them. Here you get that base in the form of a good body that lifts the rest of the lighter flavors. I like it a lot. And I hope you will too.

So keep them tight, overdose, and I think you'll have a good start and a good cup in the end.

(download)

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fall-down-by-drop-coffee-ycDJFatvlnlIogqyAtEF.zip (329 KB)

So I did my morning routine. Turning the espresso machine on, fetch a clean cup and read the morning paper while the machine heats up. When it was hot enough, fill the cup half-way with warm water, grind the coffee, level, tamp, insert into machine, hit the on button, empty the cup and put it under the spout and wait.

Then suddenly the machine stops, lights turn off and I quickly realize that the switch that prevents the machine from running with little or no water had killed the machine. So swearing at my self for being such a fool I quickly get some water and while I do that I can see the coffee already starting to drip. I'm pretty sure now that this cup will taste awful. As soon as I start filling the tank the machine comes alive.

The coffee is the same that Alexander Ruas used when he recently won the Swedish Barista Cup, from Drop Coffee ( https://dropcoffee.my123eshop.com/product.html?product_id=36&category_id=5 ). It's a 50/50 mix of Carmen Estate and Kebado Dara. It's a creamy orange/citrus sort of thing. I like it.

Now this cup had a more intense aroma of oranges. Then I took a first sip. The cup really exploded with oranges. What the...?

So even though I usually let the coffee preinfuse for a few seconds before I finish the cup, this time it preinfused for 10-15 seconds at low pressure. And that made this cup fly.

I guess that it's never to late to stop experimenting with coffee and suddenly that ridiculous La Marzocco Strada makes somewhat more sense. Though I'm not skilled enough to handle such a beast I'm looking forward to get a chance and see what kind of magic it can produce. In my case probably foul magic but it's all fun, right?

So here we are again. Another one from Costas Roastery in Umeå, Sweden. This time it's a Yirgacheffe and as always it's a high quality roast from Costas.

Yirgacheffe, to me, usually have a taste of berries, very fruity. When done really tight it gets almost salty. This one though is very balanced. I picked up the berries and fruit but also sweetness with a nice body.

I'll try to pull them even tighter, dose up alittle and see what happens. I'm confident that one can tweak it to go both ways: more berries and fruit or less and let the strong, mellow body take the upper hand.

(download)

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hafursa-natural-f-t-o-yirgacheffe-wayreAyhCskHbDppdbsh.zip (1.85 MB)

And with regards to the extraction. I think it's very very good. I did let it pull abit to long. I should have stopped around 30s but hey... it was a very tasty cup!

(download)

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IMG_1429.MOV (54.97 MB)

Here we are with another favorite of mine: Costas Roastery. You can read more about him and the roastery here: www.costasroastery.se (site in Swedish). 

This time we're trying the 'Umeå Blend 2014' that contains beans from Panama and India. As you can see the extraction isn't perfect and it's a bit to fast for my taste: it wasn't as tight as I'd like, more of an espresso than a ristretto. But it has lots of taste, nice sweetness. I really liked this one and it'll be interesting what happens when use a little more coffee and keep it tight...

(download)

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umea-blend-2014-gqtdnJfviBCtGsnGfuIm.zip (320 KB)

... and for the geeky-freaks here is the extraction.

(download)

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IMG_0929.MOV (66.59 MB)

We've all heard about the famous and popular Geisha kind of coffee. This isn't the "the one" though but a neighboring kind called Geisha Carleida and it's roasted by Johan & Nyström. This particular roast is not made for espresso but rather AeroPress or similar methods. I've tried it as AeroPress and knowing that the barista did an excellent job it still isn't something I like. I like espresso, that heavy, thick syrupy viscosity of the coffee coupled with strong flavors. That's what I want.

Don't get me wrong: Geisha as AeroPress is a good cup of coffee and there are plenty of flavors so you will enjoy it for a long time. A tip: do like the posh wine tasters do and add air when you sip it. Suddenly the hint of citrus that was there before explodes.

So... here it is, as an espresso. I'd gotten the advise to grind it fine and keep it tight. I do like ristrettos so the tight part was not a problem. I do believe I can go finer on the grind so I'll do that next.

It tasted good, had a nice syrupy feeling and the aftertaste hung around a long time, lingered almost. A hint of sourness but that's to expect from this kind of roast. Grinding it even finer should balance out the sourness and we'll see what happens then.

(download)

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geisha-carleida-icvzhjftGqpakGtvbHuG.zip (282 KB)

And... for those of us that are really nerds, here is a video of the extraction.

(download)

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From_Henriks_iPhone.mov (55.21 MB)

A smooth, creamy and sweet Espresso. The coffee is "Sidamo Kebado Dara" from Johan & Nyström. The aroma is fantastic, both from the cup and grinding the beans.

And this is the making of the cup, for all you coffee-heads out there!