Eric's Estimate

In The Search of Crema (not affiliate marketing related)

Posted on February 19, 2010 by Eric

photo credit: robceemoz

Well I’ve been away from the blog and PPC affiliate marketing for a bit. Mainly because I’ve been focusing on other things. I’ve had a ton of freelance work to do lately, and one of my clients is hosting a party in San Francisco that has needed a lot of promotional material made.

Plus, I’ve found a new addiction… I tend to be a really intense person when it comes to new things that I like, and coffee is a new one. Not regular coffee… real coffee. I mean if I’m going to be a work junkie and spend my nights working on affiliate marketing I might as well be drinking really good, kick your ass coffee.

For those who don’t know what crema is, I’m not going to explain it… just go here… read… and know that most of what you get in coffee shops has none of it.

There are a ton of factors that go into a really great espresso, and it seems that since I’ve been sucked into the world of coffee geekdom I’ll be chasing them all… as of now, I’m just scratching the surface.

The first thing is a really great coffee grinder. Even if you have an amazing espresso machine, you’ll never make a decent cup if you use either pre-ground coffee or have one of those crappy blade thingies… Go get yourself a proper bur grinder. It doesn’t heat up your coffee when it grinds it, and it will keep all of the ground coffee a similar size (perfect for crema… haven’t you read that article yet???)

I just acquired a Rancilio Rocky Grinder (you can pick it up from amazon here… and yes, that’s an affiliate link). I know I know… spending that kind of money on a grinder seems silly. But really, the difference it made in the coffee is just amazing! I had no idea that the grinder was creating such shyte!

I still unfortunately have a shitty espresso machine. It sucks… I mean it realllly sucks. But I can still get a decent cup out of it, and for those of you with cheap espresso machines (I have a 70 dollar Krups one) here’s how to at least make a drinkable espresso. For any coffee geeks out there, please let me know if there are any other steps I can add, or correct me if need be.

1. Fill the machine with cold water (no distilled crap, just filtered).
2. Make sure every part of the machine that touches water is clean, and without putting any coffee in it turn it on brew.
3. wait until the water has built up and a bit of steam is produced.
4. Turn it off.
5. dump the water that has come out and pull off your coffee basket and fill with fresh ground coffee from your Rocky Grinder… what, you haven’t bought it yet?
6. pack your coffee into the basket a bit. No need for a tamper here or to apply too much pressure… these terrible machines have no pressure.
7. By now the water in the boiler will have dropped in temperature… turn on the steam portion and wait until it produces full steam for about 5 seconds.
8. Put your coffee basket (portafilter) back into the machine and turn it onto brew.
9. Wait for your coffee and turn it off when it starts to change color and gets a bit washed out.

You’re done! With a bit of practice you can get decent (not great) coffee from your crappy machine… suck it starbucks! If the coffee is bitter, you’ve either tamped too hard, or left it brewing for too long. Dump it and try again. I usually get about 1 out of 3 shots that are decent enough to drink straight… the others get turned into americanos…

Why does this belong on a marketing blog? Well I suppose it doesn’t, but I find that a lot of entrepreneurs are very intense people when it comes to their hobbies… besides, how can it hurt?