Newbie here again. I always read a description of the so-called god shot. There's this adjective: tiger striping of flecking. I was trying out a 2 day from roast Thai arabica/robusta blend double shot. Usually, I'd get crema that is on the light brown side (not beige, darker) but uniform. With this shot I noticed that the crema was much darker and with specks of caramel colored something. I got 2oz in about 35secs from the time I hit the shot button. It was a smooth shot, with a bit of body, a little sour, but not bitter. I was able to take this without need for sugar. This was the better tasting shots I've had with the Mia and the many beans I've tried.
Posted Fri Oct 14, 2011, 6:46am Subject: Re: Is this TIGER STRIPING or FLECKS in an espresso shot?
mayong_md Said:
Hi all,
Newbie here again. I always read a description of the so-called god shot. There's this adjective: tiger striping of flecking. I was trying out a 2 day from roast Thai arabica/robusta blend double shot. Usually, I'd get crema that is on the light brown side (not beige, darker) but uniform. With this shot I noticed that the crema was much darker and with specks of caramel colored something. I got 2oz in about 35secs from the time I hit the shot button. It was a smooth shot, with a bit of body, a little sour, but not bitter. I was able to take this without need for sugar. This was the better tasting shots I've had with the Mia and the many beans I've tried.
It's hard to tell from that angle, but it looks like maybe edge channeling with evidence of very faint mottling in the corner that indicates it would have been a good pour had the channel not opened up. OR it could be slightly overextracted and you may have been pouring a little too far into blonding and was fine, but too much of the blond crema made it in on top of the well mottled shot. OR the pour was as fine as you'll get for stale beans. It's hard to say without more information.
I'll explain. "Tiger striping" isn't something you see in the cup. It refers to the visual appearance of the pour, especially in a bottomless portafilter of the "veins" leading to the cone and entwining within the stream. Since it's visible in the stream, you CAN also see it with spouts, but it's a little harder to identify. You can watch your streams carefully to see tiger striping.
Mottling or flecking is what you should see in the cup. Your picture here DOES show some amount of mottling/flecking in the back. But the front looks overly light, at least from this picture, which is usually caused by channeling, overextraction (pouring too long for the dose) or beans that are less than fresh....though sometimes a very dark/oily/smoky roast will behave like overextracted beans even when it isn't (because the oils that create the crema were largely burned out in roasting. We can rule out staleness since you said it's 2 days from roast. And being a little "too fresh" may throw off our results as well. Its interesting you say sour since I sensed "sour" just looking at it. that seems to confirm a bit of channeling or overextraction, especially since it was a long pour.
What type of spouts did you use? Single may point to overextraction, double may point to channeling on one side of the puck (since one side is mottled, the other is blond). I don't like that blond patch....we need to fix that... :)
Edit: By the way, I'm not trying to be critical, it's a good start and you have evidence of being partially there with the start of mottling! But by the visual and your own description of "sour" you can still refine it more and get that mottling across nearly the whole surface and get that sourness out of the shot!
mayong_md Senior Member Joined: 12 Feb 2011 Posts: 22 Location: Bacolod, Philippines Expertise: Just starting
Posted Fri Oct 14, 2011, 7:41am Subject: Re: Is this TIGER STRIPING or FLECKS in an espresso shot?
@MadTamper: Thank you very much for taking the time to explain this phenomenon.
TheMadTamper Said:
I'll explain. "Tiger striping" isn't something you see in the cup. It refers to the visual appearance of the pour, especially in a bottomless portafilter of the "veins" leading to the cone and entwining within the stream. Since it's visible in the stream, you CAN also see it with spouts, but it's a little harder to identify. You can watch your streams carefully to see tiger striping.
Ok, now that clears it. Yes, the tiger striping I've been reading about were descriptions in THE pour through a Naked PF. Thank you. Learned a new thing!
Mottling or flecking is what you should see in the cup. Your picture here DOES show some amount of mottling/flecking in the back. But the front looks overly light, at least from this picture, which is usually caused by channeling, overextraction (pouring too long for the dose) or beans that are less than fresh....though sometimes a very dark/oily/smoky roast will behave like overextracted beans even when it isn't (because the oils that create the crema were largely burned out in roasting. We can rule out staleness since you said it's 2 days from roast. And being a little "too fresh" may throw off our results as well. Its interesting you say sour since I sensed "sour" just looking at it. that seems to confirm a bit of channeling or overextraction, especially since it was a long pour.
The blonded patch was in fact blond. During the process of the pour, I already noticed the blonding but I did not cut the shot because I was only at around 1.5oz in volume. So there was overextraction. What in the spent puck will tell me "channeling"? My pucks are on the soggy side, not soupy, but not dried up.
What type of spouts did you use? Single may point to overextraction, double may point to channeling on one side of the puck (since one side is mottled, the other is blond). I don't like that blond patch....we need to fix that... :)
Yes Please! I need the fixin'. I used the double spout on the double basket PF. One day, I hope to really taste what a good espresso tastes like.
Edit: By the way, I'm not trying to be critical, it's a good start and you have evidence of being partially there with the start of mottling! But by the visual and your own description of "sour" you can still refine it more and get that mottling across nearly the whole surface and get that sourness out of the shot!
Posted Fri Oct 14, 2011, 8:47am Subject: Re: Is this TIGER STRIPING or FLECKS in an espresso shot?
mayong_md Said:
The blonded patch was in fact blond. During the process of the pour, I already noticed the blonding but I did not cut the shot because I was only at around 1.5oz in volume. So there was overextraction. What in the spent puck will tell me "channeling"? My pucks are on the soggy side, not soupy, but not dried up.
Not all beans produce the same amount of volume. Changing the dose also affects how soon blonding occurs and thus how much volume you get. I don't know anything about Thailand as an origin, nor arabica/robusta blends (though I hope to try the all robusta Indian S.O. being offered by Paradise soon.) But "2oz" is sort of the "hard and fast" rule. I've been using a lot of beans from Paradise recently. Their Nuevo blend should yield 1.5-1.75oz with a 17-18g dose. Their Classico blend, a light-medium roast, yields about 1.25-1.5oz with a 19oz dose and should be cut after 22 seconds or so. That's a pretty small cup of coffee....but it's an excellent blend if you like light, fruity shots. Since you're pouring up toward 30 seconds and getting blonding that light, I would say cutting the shot MUCH sooner, regardless of liquid volume may be the right way to go. Up-dosing may also help. Even dosing in a triple basket if needed. Though that can make channeling more likely.
I'm not a big fan of "puckology", I find the spent puck tells very little about what happened during the pull. By the time the flow of the reverse suction of the opening of the solenoid is through with the puck it can be pretty hard to figure out what happened before that. Sometimes you can tell...but it's a little hit or miss. A soggy puck, if it's very soggy could indicate an underdose of the basket size. It doesn't do any harm. Silvias are also famous for soggy pucks. No machine truly tries it, but if you have "water on the puck", it could just be the nature of the machine, or it could be that there's a lot of headroom between the group and puck because of your dose. That's not always a bad thing.
Identifying what's going on in terms of channeling is the key benefit of bottomless portafilters. You can see very clearly where channeling is occurring. The same information can be divined with spouts too though, but it takes a good bit of practice to figure it out, and examining the result in the cup is just as useful. If you start cutting the shot at blonding, it should be eaiser to tell from the cup what happened where. If the flow in the streams turns too blond too fast, or is blond in spurts (gets lighter, then darker again, etc) rather than a smooth transition, then there's probably some channeling going on. What TYPE of channeling is harder to define without a bottomless. Channeling is almost always a distribution issue (leaving mounds before tamping, not filling in the edges etc.) It can also occur due to non-level tamping, or disturbing the basket after tamping. Sadly, analyzing spouts has become a lost art after the advent of the bottomless, but it can still be done! It's just a little more trial and error, and a little less instant gratification ;)
If that blend is really just blonding early, though, I suspect it needs a higher dose of coffee, and/or a reduced pull time/volume. Some very good shots can come from some very low volume pours, especially in lighter and light-medium roasts. That Classico I mentioned produced very small shots (pulled at very high temperatures, using fairly large doses of coffee (medium-large)), but it was all wild-cherry taste at the bottom of the cup! :)
Yes Please! I need the fixin'. I used the double spout on the double basket PF. One day, I hope to really taste what a good espresso tastes like.
You're getting close! There's mottling there, and certainly covered over by blonding. If there's channeling I suspect that, if you were to use a bottomless PF, you may see some spritzers or uneven edges, but you wouldn't see a total "meltdown" of the pour!
Being critical's way OK! I'm here to learn. No pat on the back and say good job even if it wasn't .. hehe. Thanks again
Your taste buds will torture for us if it's wrong! :) Being able to identify something's sour and needs adjustment is the truest step into geekdom!
calblacksmith Moderator Joined: 25 Nov 2007 Posts: 5,772 Location: Riverside, Ca, U.S.A. Expertise: I live coffee
Espresso: ECM Veneziano A1 Grinder: Many different commercial Vac Pot: 40s era Silex Drip: Milita, Bunn&Curtis... Roaster: Cast iron pan, gas burner
Posted Mon Oct 17, 2011, 10:09am Subject: Re: Is this TIGER STRIPING or FLECKS in an espresso shot?
TheMadTamper Said:
What type of spouts did you use? Single may point to overextraction, double may point to channeling on one side of the puck (since one side is mottled, the other is blond). I don't like that blond patch....we need to fix that... :)
From my experience, a spouted PF merges the stream from the puck together and there is no way to tell what coffee came from what side of the puck. After the merged flow from the puck goes down the single hole, it is randomly divided in the spout, it is all mixed up. A naked PF will show this for sure but when I use a spouted PF, I can't tell much about what happened out of the basket. You must have a better eye than me! Congrats!
In real life, my name is Wayne P.
Feed the newbs, starve the trolls and above all enjoy what you drink!
Posted Mon Oct 17, 2011, 10:35am Subject: Re: Is this TIGER STRIPING or FLECKS in an espresso shot?
calblacksmith Said:
From my experience, a spouted PF merges the stream from the puck together and there is no way to tell what coffee came from what side of the puck. After the merged flow from the puck goes down the single hole, it is randomly divided in the spout, it is all mixed up. A naked PF will show this for sure but when I use a spouted PF, I can't tell much about what happened out of the basket. You must have a better eye than me! Congrats!
LOL, I wish! I'm no master of the mystic art of spout stream observation. AFAIK you certainly can't tell which side of the puck a channel came from, though you can tell the likelihood of a channel having occurred by the inconsistent striping/huge of the stream(s) . Though all mixed up, a channeled shot does tend to flow blonder from one spout than the other. That doesn't determine where the channel occurred, but I think the fact that there's a different density (extraction ratio if you prefer) in one part of the pour than another tends to force part of the stream to different (albeit random) spout. I'll often have one spout flow blonder....and I know I screwed up and it's time to take out the bottomless to sort it out!
But that wasn't what I was trying to evaluate here. I was trying to determine the cause of one side being mottled and the other being blond and was just trying to figure out where the PF was dumping coffee. If it was a double spout that would imply chanelling as a strong possibility (different pour on different sides.) If it was a single spout, 50/50 as to whether it was channeling or blonding. Further description of the pour revealed everextraction as likely anyway, though!
Some of THAT though depends on the type of spouts (thus my wood PF handle question earlier). I've found that the "inverted 'u'" spouts are FAR less behaved than offset type spouts. The fact that it relies on the pour to fill up a little well and use that to push it over the edge just leaves MUCH too much inconsistency possible than offset spouts where everything hits the spout section from the horizontal span at uniform velocity from a uniform location. The "u" type spouts vary the flow based on where the cone forms...if it's offset, even just a little, it'll go down the hole from one side or the other of the PF floor, and it ends up splashing & skewing to one side or the other. More fun, it's random which cup fills more because of it!
Due to he lack of cup clearance on the Duetto (and my love of LM PFs) I've been using upside down u spouts on my LM PF. I can't stand it anymore, I'm clawing my way to whatever PF body is shallow enough to allow me to go back to my LM open spouts! :) (I use bottomless most of the time for shots, but I often leave the spouts in the group since I tend to split shots for capps and americanos.)
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