EdipisReks1

Reviews of early production Eureka Mignon Oro single dose are trickling in. I had been interested in this grinder. I am very happy with the decision to jump on the Niche when they were available.

Flair 58 is even more wonderful, and it is a permanent device. And you can use all of your 58mm stuff with it.

The Flair Pro 2 is great for travel.

The coffee I bought today was from a grocery store and was roasted on December 12th, but it was not a regular grocery store… If k cups are what works it’s what works. But I really would look into Cometeer. People I trust say it’s very good for what it is, though it has the same sort of waste issues that a Keurig does.

Ode converted to stepless. Super easy.

I have wanted to try Cometeer, but I don’t really have a use case for even very good instant coffee here at home.

Chemex is sort of special for me and Heather, so Esteban Garcia it is before I go see her for the first time in a month. 16:1. I do the chopstick trick with Chemex. Bloom, draw, then fill to desired water weight. This is some active coffee! Ground off frozen on the SSP. I seem to have finally gotten a good grind size with Chemex though: usually it’s either slow or fast. I don’t time Chemex. It’s also a fucking good cup of coffee. Lemon and cream and chocolate for miles. Super clean (Chemex, after all). Chocolate (again). No bitterness. The lemon brightness is not acidic at all. Soft on the palate. Sweet. I’ll miss this coffee when it’s gone. SSP burrs a little coarser than I do V60.

Hah! I saw drift immediately, Sam. Every grinder is going to need calibrating sometimes. The process is super duper simple, but I was having to do it every time I used the grinder. The Niche is great, and very well designed. I think this was just an issue of rushing to get product out. Anyway, It’s just not going to replace flat burrs for me for filter. I’m weird and actually prefer conical for espresso, but I like that flat burr distribution for filter (I grind pretty fine for filter, but I want a different fine, if that makes sense).

Packing up to see my woman and Boy. Two week trip. Car is mostly full of gifts. But I’m not going to not make at least one meal and two coffees, when I pack all this shit. And I made that lacquered Milky Way knife saya (well I lacquered it anyway) and I will not make another, so don’t ask.

Re: Niche. I like it a lot. After I took it to pieces and fixed the assembly issue that was causing calibration to drift. I’m sure this is a QA issue due to trying to get units out, but I also doubt the average buyer could have fixed it (I’m hardly the average buyer, fortunately). It is nice to use and fun and happy looking and will never be the limiting factor to any espresso I make (it ain’t replacing the Ode with SSP for filter, but would be fine if I didn’t have that). It is certainly inferior to the OE OG and, to a lesser degree, the Option-O Remi, but these are not surprises. I’m glad I bought it, and I grant a mulligan to the assembly issues. Basically no bearing surface was tightened enough, and I replaced two washers that were undersized in the drive shaft: being undersized the torque of grinding beans caused the assembly to move, as the washers didn’t do their job of preventing motion (certainly prevented friction!). Ode had the same issues, more or less. Sticks now, after use.

It didn’t channel, per se (in the way most people use the term), but you can see where pressure was higher due to the grind being too fine. I have a very careful puck prep. I think this would have totally failed otherwise.

It worked out okay, but one thing I can say with surety is that my Breville and my Flair 58 do not take the same grind size. Also I’ve gotten used to the huge amount of power the Bellman has for steaming. Having said that, this is a delicious latte. It’s ugly, but I got a very good mouthfeel from the oat milk, and there is no bitterness in the shot despite is stalling out HARD. Let’s call that a long pre-infusion. I had to do some mitigation, in process, temp surfing etc., but I hate wasting coffee or milk if I don’t have to. With a lid on a paper cup I would have left any cafe I know happy. But it’s boy ugly.

Did a cup very different from normal. AeroPress decaf Colombian (meeting a friend for coffee later, and these are great sugar process and the darkest I have), sort of a half-assed version of the Hoffman, recipe. Not bad.

Oat is my standard. For steaming I honestly like the Chobani extra creamy the best.

I just realized I’m going to have to either rearrange or get a bigger table once I have the Smart Espresso Profiler, to accommodate the tablet I’ll buy for it (this may be an excuse for me to get a new iPad). I guess I wasn’t kidding when joked I was going to need a bigger boat.

Oh, it doesn’t retain much (you should see what the Ode with SSP retains in comparison, and I would consider it a fairly low retention grinder, even though it was certainly not designed to grind fine for espresso, and the finer you grind the more retention you’ll get). The Niche certainly doesn’t retain enough for me to worry about it, for sure: the bellows for me is really just going to be for periodic cleaning, but thought I would mention that it would indeed get all the coffee out each time! Going to use the Breville tomorrow; it would be a lot easier on my life if it and the Flair 58 successfully take the same grind size. The Flair Pro2 has to be slightly coarser, due to the height of the puck, and I either had to use a different grinder for each, with both dialed in or fiddle around.

I saw this recommended on one of the coffee forums: it’s a powder pesticide sprayer. The bellows on it fits the Niche perfectly. Makes cleaning out the grinder easier and much faster than a brush. Also allows you to get that last bit of grounds without tapping and what not.

That makes sense, and that’s a nice work flow. I’m walking while listening to a virology podcast, and only medium caffeinated: don’t want the jitters!

That sounds great to me, Sam! You are going to have a little variation on timing even using the same beans and same settings. Does that machine have an auto preinfusion? Also, make sure you are timing from when the pump starts (the Acaia should be sensitive enough to do that, but just wanted to make sure). I steam the milk first, then set it on a warmer, and then pull my shot. I find it to work better for me that way, but YMMV.

Made a latte today. First shot pulled using the Niche. 15. Worked great. 18.7 in, 41 out in 30 seconds (not including pre infusion). Not the best milk steaming I’ve ever done (used oat), but it was delicious.

Oh, I’ve done all kinds. Oat milk works great, and while it doesn’t taste like milk it works similarly taste wise to me, almond is harder, but I like the taste better, soy is… well, it’s possible to do. Soy just doesn’t seem to have enough of whatever it is that does it. Also it’s awful. Where it really is is macadamia nut milk! It basically works the same way as whole milk, and tastes delicious (“my latte is a snickerdoodle!”).

Meeting a friend at a cafe I haven’t been to next week. I’ve never had coffee done this way before!

Nice, Sam! I think that looks good. Though I do suggest doing a longer shot. In a 58 mm basket I’m like 18.5 in to 45 out in a little under 30 seconds (if I do all of my stuff correctly anyway). That milk texture looks good; are you using whole? If you want a real challenge get some soy milk! And that coffee table was my dining room table (it’s just a work table from IKEA; it always had a table cloth, so why get something nice looking). I also live alone and haven’t, uh, thrown a lot of dinner parties in the last 2 years (no idea why) so I figured it was more useful for this than just being a place for cats to sit and stare at me! It has really made life easier, having the space, though I have too much shit to quite comfortably keep everything I use regularly on it, now.

Not close to calibrated out of the box (and there is a large safety factor between “calibrated” and chirping, but I don’t particularly want to grind coffee beans unto talcum powder, so that’s okay) but boy is that an easy calibration process. This is dead center in the espresso range after calibrating to the manual’s process. Lots of range there.

Take 6 of “Love” is, wow: this should have gone on the album. I also just realized that the intro is essentially the same as that for “Yesterday:” I instinctively started singing “Yesterday.” Anyway. I understand why this is an out-take: it is slow and jangly and a little out of tune. But wow.