How tight is the coffee powder when making your own coffee? what happens if the coffee powder is pressed too tightly?

Professional coffee knowledge exchange more coffee bean information please follow the coffee workshop (Wechat official account cafe_style)

To make a good cup of Italian concentrate, Qianjie Coffee thinks that the most basic and important step is to press the powder. If the flow rate is too fast, the powder pressing strength is too light; if the flow rate is too slow, the powder pressure is too heavy, which will directly affect the Italian concentrated product and the taste of the coffee. When making coffee concentrate, you will find that the dispenser has a handle, a powder dispenser, a powder press, and so on. Someone asks why you need a powder dispenser when you have a powder press for coffee in front of the street. Is it necessary? To what extent does the powder have to be pressed correctly? Let's have an in-depth understanding of Qianjie Coffee today.

When extracting espresso, sometimes using the same parameters to produce several cups of espresso, the extraction will be unstable. After eliminating the problem of the machine, it may be caused by the instability of pressing powder. Qianjie Coffee has a necessary instrument when extracting Italian coffee. The purpose of pressing powder is to make the coffee extraction more uniform and stable and reduce the error rate.

What is the purpose of pressing powder?

1. Prevent the channel effect and make the coffee extraction more uniform.

After laying the powder, the gap between the coffee powder particles may still be uneven, and the loose powder layer is easy to be washed away by the hot water of 9bar during extraction, forming a channel effect. The compacted powder layer can make the coffee powder more dense, reduce the gap between coffee particles as much as possible, and reduce the possibility of channel effect.

two。 Try to ensure the stability of the product and reduce the error rate.

Italian concentration is a technical task. Every time we receive powder and cloth powder, we can not ensure whether the gap between coffee particles is consistent. As the last step before extraction, pressing powder plays a vital role in stabilizing the extraction of espresso.

Let's try the difference between the pressed powder and the unpressed espresso. The coffee beans choose the warm sun blend of Qianjie coffee for self-use. Qianjie coffee sunflowers are matched with Shirley barrel-treated coffee beans and sun-treated Yega Shirley red cherries. The proportion is 6:4, and 60% of the Honduran Shirley barrel coffee beans provide flavor and alcohol thickness for this blend bean. 40% of the sun Yega Chuefei provides more aroma and acidity. The coffee bean information is as follows:

Qianjie coffee sunflower sunflower mix

Composition of mixed beans: Honduran Shirley barrel & Yega Sherfield Sun Red Cherry

Composition: 6:4

Flavor description: vanilla, cream, fermented wine, chocolate

The proportion of Qianjie coffee uses 20 grams of coffee powder to extract 40 grams of Espresso. The experimental results are as follows.

Cloth powder non-pressing powder

Amount of coffee liquid: 40g

Extraction time: 22s

Observe the extraction process: there is a jet when the liquid comes out, and the whole flow velocity is unstable.

Senses: acidity, sense of water

Pressing powder

Amount of coffee liquid: 40g

Extraction time: 27s

The extraction process was observed: the whole flow rate was uniform and there was no jet phenomenon.

Senses: strong aromas of chocolate and fermented wine

Powder distributor

Qianjie Coffee feels that cloth powder is an important link in making a qualified espresso. The quality of cloth powder even affects the success or failure of a good cup of coffee, which is also an important inspection and scoring project for major baristas.

The two most important purposes of cloth powder are breaking up and leveling.

1. Break up

Let the powder of large and small particles from the bean grinder be distributed evenly as far as possible, so that there can be no concentration of coarse or fine powder, and no caking.

two。 Cloth flat

Let the powder be distributed evenly in the powder bowl, so that it is evenly arranged in the powder bowl, so that there can not be too much or too little in the local part, and the pile is not empty.

The common ways of cloth powder are finger cloth powder and cloth powder cloth powder. Finger cloth powder is to gently move the flat powder bowl back and forth on the powder bowl with your fingers, paying attention to moving horizontally at the edge of the powder bowl, rather than squeezing the powder layer.

The powder distributor can achieve the effect of mixing coffee powder, breaking agglomeration, evenly distributing particles, etc., but there are also some defects, such as wasting coffee powder, complicated tools, certain skills to operate, and more downward pressure when distributing the powder. may lead to internal cracks, just surface smoothing, distribution and thickness can not be guaranteed and other defects.

Powder press

Pressing powder is to press the loose coffee powder with a powder hammer, so that the coffee pressed powder can have certain resistance when facing the water pressure of 9bar.

1. Prevent the channel effect and make the coffee extraction more uniform.

After laying the powder, the gap between the coffee powder particles may still be uneven, and the loose powder layer is easy to be washed away by the hot water of 9bar during extraction, forming a channel effect. The compacted powder layer can make the coffee powder more dense, reduce the gap between coffee particles as much as possible, and reduce the possibility of channel effect.

two。 Try to ensure the stability of the product and reduce the error rate.

Italian concentration is a technical task. Every time we receive powder and cloth powder, we can not ensure whether the gap between coffee particles is consistent. As the last step before extraction, pressing powder plays a vital role in stabilizing the extraction of espresso.

The difference between powder distributor and powder press

After reading the above introduction on Qianjie, do you know the difference between the two? Qianjie Coffee is briefly summarized below. The cloth dispenser only makes the coffee powder uniform, and the pressing powder is to press the loose coffee powder with a powder hammer, so that the coffee pressed powder can have a certain degree of resistance when facing the water pressure of 9bar.

So is the powder dispenser necessary?

Qianjie coffee feels that if the output quality of the bean grinder is OK, the caking is not too serious, it can be flattened directly, it can be basically evenly arranged simply by hand, and then it can be evenly arranged by hand with a suitable powder press to achieve a stable production. if a large number of products are produced or further requirements for quality, appropriate tools can be selected as above.

How to press powder correctly

Qianjie Coffee feels that we should first choose a pink hammer that matches the caliber of the coffee handle. The caliber mismatch may lead to unbearable pressure or a gap with the edge of the powder bowl, making the powder meaningless.

The posture of pressing powder varies from person to person, but the overall central idea is that the handle of the powder hammer should be perpendicular to the powder bowl, the force exerted on the powder hammer should be evenly distributed, and press on the powder bowl to make the powder layer smooth and smooth. If the uneven strength leads to oblique pressure, the high-temperature and high-pressure hot water coming out of the cooking head will seek the infiltration of the layer with the least resistance, resulting in uneven extraction.

The strength of the powder also varies from person to person. When La Marzocco designed the Swift automatic filling device around 2000, they did extraction experiments with forces ranging from 2 pounds to 30 pounds (about 15kg). It is found that no matter how strong the force is, there is almost no force at the bottom of the pressed powder. Therefore, the strength of the powder has little effect on the extraction of espresso, as long as the powder is pressed tightly. During the pressure, you can also "feel" the extrusion change of the pressed powder. There is no need to press too tightly. If the pressed powder is pressed too tightly, the resistance of the pressed powder is too strong, and it takes longer for the water to penetrate the pressed powder. Finally, the extracted coffee is sticky and bitter.

After pressing the powder, a small amount of fine powder will stick to the surface of the powder hammer or powder bowl, and then you only need to gently rotate the powder hammer and then take it out.

For more boutique coffee beans, please add private Qianjie coffee on Wechat. WeChat account: kaixinguoguo0925