Still relativley new to this industry i am a little bit confused when a customer asks for a weak coffee. On my commercial 2 group Bezzera the manual says the fullest cup on the programmable button is a weak cup. Now what confuses me is all it does is extracts more water through the shot. Would'nt there still be the same amount of caffiene in this shot? would'nt be much different to a long black would it? i am interested how you guys out there do a weak coffee???
from a customers perspective ... when friends of mine come with me to 'good cafe's' and ask for a weak coffee, it's because they know coffee as a strong, bitter drink, whose flavour they find too bitter to really enjoy. So they order weak and they add loads of sugar to sweeten it all up a bit.
Then there are those who ask for a weak coffee because 'a normal coffee will keep them awake all night'. I made a coffee for a friend, and as she drank it she commented on how much she liked it. I saw her again a few days later and she said she was thinking about that coffee all that night - as in she couldn't get to sleep til 2am. She now asks for weak so that she can sleep... That's been a one off case in my experience, and most of my friends who ask for a weak coffee (either at my place or when we go out), ask for one for the flavour issue.
Still relativley new to this industry i am a little bit confused when a customer asks for a weak coffee. On my commercial 2 group Bezzera the manual says the fullest cup on the programmable button is a weak cup. Now what confuses me is all it does is extracts more water through the shot. Would'nt there still be the same amount of caffiene in this shot? would'nt be much different to a long black would it? i am interested how you guys out there do a weak coffee???
Strong and Weak are really bad terms when it comes to coffee, unfortunately, because they can mean whatever the customer wants them to.
A double espresso is a 47-62.5 mL (1.5-2 ounce) extract that is prepared from 14-17 grams of coffee through which purified water of 88-95°C has been forced at 9-10 atmospheres of pressure for a brew time of 22-28 seconds. The espresso should drip out of the porta-filter like warm honey, have a deep reddish-brown color, and a crema that makes up 10-30% of the beverage.
That's a reasonable starting point, but there are lots of variations out there. Try changing one of the variables and seeing if that makes better or worse coffee in your setup.
It's possible to change the volumes quite drastically, but that means adjusting the grind, time & basket. For a given grind a larger basket will produce more volume than a smaller basket. That's why there are places using 20, 22 even 24 gram baskets.
Now, in regards to taste, a couple of general guidelines: - The first part of a shot extracts the easily soluble compounds. These tend to be sour. A very short/fast shot or a cool machine will be sour - The compounds in the middle of the shot will be balanced, and hopefully sweet. - The tail end starts extracting the less soluble compounds that tend to be bitter. Too high a heat will accentuate the bitterness as well.
So you've adjusted your grind, machine and basket to get the volume of coffee you think best. What do you do when the customer asks for ???
Some possibilities: - Weak: change the ratio. Instead of a doubleshot, extract a single. If that's still too much, slide the cup under the spout only for the middle part of the pour - Strong: add more coffee. Doubleshot instead of single. Quad shot instead of double. Less milk. Or the customer might be equating Strong with Bitter. If that's the case and they don't want other options, run the shot long.
It sounds like you've got a volumetric machine. I'd suggest you have 3 buttons programmed: single basket, double basket and flush. That means for a given basket there's only one volume of water programmed for it. Use the manual pour button for the times when you need to futz with the result.
At the end of the day it's your customers tastebuds. If they really want a 1/4 shot in 300mls of scalded soy then serve them with a smile.
Cheers
Paul Haddon Drinking doppio ristretto piccolo lattes in Sydney, Aus
i think fad pretty much summed it up, however it's an interesting topic to put in 2c worth.
when people come into our roastery and ask "how strong is your coffee?" i reply to them "how long is a peice of string?"
with a confused look they reply "what do u mean?" i then say that " well what strong is for u might be really weak for another."
it's all personal interpretation. then they go on to say, "well i don't like a strong coffee". "well dont order a short black then."
point is, find out what is it they are referring to being weak ie. body, aftertaste, bitterness(apparently the stronger the coffee that more bitter it's going to be... i'm just the messenger). dilution etc, then u can start to create the type of coffee they're after.
point is, find out what is it they are referring to being weak ie. body, aftertaste, bitterness(apparently the stronger the coffee that more bitter it's going to be
Uh.. not quite. A touch of bitterness is good. You can do stronger = bitter if you want to, but it's not manditory.
With practice it's possible to get more intensity out of a shot without overemphasizing the bitterness. Try a standard 60ml espresso then adjust grind/pack/tamp and try a 15ml ristretto and see what you get..
Pual, sometimes Lukes Humour is subtle, sometimes its really subtle. I think the strong=bitter comment was the customers perception. If you don't know, Luke works for me here at Pioneer Coffee Roastery and we serve all our shots as double ristrettos.
HollyYip Senior Member Joined: 17 Aug 2005 Posts: 11 Location: Auckland Expertise: I live coffee
Posted Sat Oct 22, 2005, 9:35pm Subject: Re: Weak Coffee
Well, I think the strength is mainly based on the taste.
I remember Mark Prince saying in a podcast that espresso has less caffeine than filter coffee or Coca-Cola. From memory, it was something like 40mg in a 30ml espresso shot, and 200mg in a cup of filter coffee (and I think even more in Coke).
For a weaker tasting coffee, I just pour half of their shot out. I never thought of using a ristretto. But now that it's been mentioned, I might try that... it could be a better quality coffee.
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