Maybe a week or two ago I found a very interesting YouTube video of maybe most famous barista YouTuber - James Hoffmann. He always uploads materials which are really interesting for coffee lovers. I try to keep up with his uploads, this particular one is uploaded about two years ago and I missed watching it back in the days, or maybe it was not very interesting for me. The topic is regrinding already ground coffee. Seems interesting, huh?
If you don’t have time to watch the whole video, I will try to summarize the whole info for you. One of his followers told him that regrinding coffee gets very interesting results and coffee turned out to taste even better. He reground a relatively coarse coffee in espresso size, which is much finer.
The follower suggested that you should put the beans very slowly. This results in less pressure for the beans between the burrs of the grinder, which is resulting in more even grinding, without much fines. James tried to grind whole beans, putting them one by one which gave the relatively similar test setup. And he told that doing that made him go much finer in the grinder setting - maybe about 2-3 steps finer, while the espresso brewed for the same time on the same machine. So… I decided to do that at home too.
The good old Brazil Aliança - the farm owned and operated by the Japanese man, you remember that? Actually this coffee is also from the Yellow Bourbon variety, the one with bright yellow fruits. I decided to experiment with this coffee, because it’s cheaper on one side and because I wanted to see how better could it taste.
Now, towards the experiment itself. When grinding all the beans at once, I managed to go as fine as 4+1/3 (I noticed that between each number there are 2 smaller steps, which I refer as 1/3 and 2/3). This setting gave me espresso shots of 38ml brewed for about 35 seconds.
Putting the beans very slowly, gave me several “clicks” finer grounds and I get relatively the same volume of coffee for the same time at grind setting 3. This is a lot finer and I also find the coffee to be tasting a lot better and thick.
Before, when I brewed this coffee with preground beans, I wasn’t that much fond of it and I was buying it mainly because it was cheaper and because my wife liked it a lot. Now, when grinding it before brewing and using this technique I get a very flavorful and complex coffee, which I tend to enjoy a lot!
Throughout the week I’ve been drinking mainly espresso, where this coffee really shines. I’ve never tried it on V60 though, and maybe it’s time to try it differently. Maybe soon. Today, I decided to brew filter coffee, but I went for the best of the Kenya box -the Kenya Kamoini, which comes from the Othaya Society farm. As far as I learned, this is a farmers’ organization from one of the famous Kenyan coffee farm regions.
The beans are mix of 2 varieties - SL 28 and SL 34. The SL varieties are very common for Kenyan coffee. This exact coffee combines both creamy and chocolate flavor and fruity ones - Forest fruit and jam. The process is washed, which is also quite typical for the Kenyan coffee.
I try implementing the same technique as with the espresso - putting the beans slowly in order to achieve more even grind profile. And why a better way to start your day - with a nice cup of coffee originating from Kenya!
During the past week I wasn’t so active in hive due to very busy workdays and list of various other things that I had to do, but I hope to never miss my Saturday post in CCC community. I always learn new facts and things about coffee and will be happy to share them with you. See you soon and have a beautiful weekend!
Take care. See ya soon!