I would love to see other people repeat the experiment (or send me more VST filters!)
This, however, was an extremely small data set and is nowhere close to conclusive (click here for the spreadsheet).
I pulled each shot with the same grouphead of a La Marzocco Linea PB in order to get as consistent water delivery as possible. In order to achieve as accurate data as possible, I weighed each dose to the tenth of a gram and alternated shots with and without the OCD in order to minimize the effect of grinder temperature on any one set. I compared three spins of the OCD to my normal distribution technique (3-4 horizontal taps on the side of the portafilter with my hand). As such, I pulled out our trusty refractometer and started taking some readings. Ostensibly, a more even saturation of the espresso grounds should result in both a higher total dissolved solids (TDS) and extraction percentage. I always check to see how level my tamp is when pulling espresso, and I believe my tamping was more reliable with the OCD than without. Third, I found it much easier to evenly tamp the grounds after using the OCD. (It wasn’t during a formal testing session where I double-weighed every shot.) In fact, in all of my subsequent use of the OCD I’ve only had one shot visibly channel on me, and I think that was due to a megadose from the grinder. Over the coarse of the bar shift, I didn’t have a single shot channel. But if you’re trying to evenly extract a shot of espresso, it’s hard to see how starting with a perfect flat surface before tamping is a bad thing. So even, in fact, one coworker didn’t realize the coffee still needs to be tamped after distributing! (I tried pulling a shot without tamping- I don’t recommend it.) There’s some debate, however, concerning what impact distributing the top of the espresso has when the majority of the grounds are below. Immediately, I verified that the OCD makes the top of your espresso puck perfectly even. Over the course of a moderately busy closing shift I used it to distribute around 100 shots. Initial ImpressionsĪs a working barista, I’m skeptical of any product that hasn’t been bar-tested. As such, in a slightly reckless decision I decided to use Quills Coffee’s loyal customers as guinea pigs and use the OCD for an entire bar shift. So after getting home I ordered one from the American importer of the OCD, Brew Global. After getting to use the OCD for the first time at SCAA, I wanted to see if it lived up to the hype. Fast forward a year and a half later and Sestic is the reigning World Barista Champion and his Ona Coffee Distributor (OCD) is making waves in the global barista community. I emailed a barista who was unknown to me named Sasa Sestic, but was disappointed to hear he only had a couple of prototypes that weren’t for sale. That’s why I was very interested a couple of years ago when WBC technical judge Şerif Başaran told me about a barista in Australia who invented a distribution device that was so effective Başaran handed out his first perfect score on distributing.
Of course, those shots never make it across the counter, but there’s nothing like re-pulling a shot during a rush to throw off your bar flow. It’s an unpleasant sensory experience no one should pay money for.Īs a barista educator who received above average tamping scores during my last couple of barista competitions, I have a confession I’m reluctant to make: I still see shots I pull channel. This results in a small portion of coffee coming in contact with too much water while the majority of the coffee remains underextracted. The result is a shot that is simultaneously sour and bitter with a thin mouthfeel. Simply put, channeling is when the water passing through the bed of espresso finds a path of least resistance. Even a minuscule inconsistency in the distribution of the coffee can result in the dreaded phenomenon of channeling. Although steaming milk, pouring latte art, and making pour-overs might intimidate new hires, it’s tamping that keeps a self-aware veteran awake at night. It sounds simple enough, but after training dozens of baristas I can attest that it’s one of the last barista skills I see people master. In order to pull a decent shot, the barista must evenly distribute the ground coffee in the portafilter and compress the grounds with a nice, level tamp. Over the course of a shift, a typical barista will pull hundreds of shots of espresso. One of the most basic barista tasks is also the hardest to master.
0 kommentar(er)
