It's been a week since I picked up my coffee grinder, a
Mazzer Mini manual. I thought it would be good to post about my time with this bad boy.
Firstly, my coffee has improved. It tastes better. You are probably thinking "what, how can just changing your grinder improve your coffee". Let me answer by saying It's ALL IN THE GRINDER.
Look at my grinder, it's a $750 Mazzer Mini. Look at my coffee machine, it's a $600 Sunbeam.
Through research and help from others, I decided to upgrade my grinder before upgrading my espresso machine. Because it's all in the grind! :)
The Mazzer is awesome, it's quieter, built solidly and performs amazingly. I've put together a list of pro's and cons:
Pro's - build quality, quieter, better grind, better control over grind
Con's - messy, throws grinds sideways when 'clacking' (now fixed with schecter mod), big
The pro's speak for themselves, I'll discuss the con's. It was really messy, until I did the 'schecter' mod. This modification is basically a small paper funnel in the doser chamber outlet that allows the grinds to drop straight down when 'clacking' the lever. Out of the box, this thing threw the grinds somewhat sideways, making for poor distribution and a fair bit of mess. The size of the machine doesn't bother me much (it's the smallest grinder they make), but could annoy those with small kitchens and tight spaces.
For low volume use, you can easily use it without the bean hopper, which I've experimented with. An old tamper can fit in the throat of the machine above the burrs, so you can dose the beans in to the throat, then cover with a tamper, and grind for a single shot.
Yesterday I entertained and made coffee for five guests. I dosed the bean hopper with enough beans for the five shots, and began to grind in to the doser. I'd never done it this way before, previously I'd grind only enough beans for one shot, in to the doser, then dose. Almost like grinding on demand, almost making the doser nothing more than a coffee grinds agitator. I struggled with a half-full doser. Don't get me wrong, it provided stunning doses of grinds in to the PF, but, I really needed to have that doser dialed in to drop the right amount of grinds each time. I ended up with a lot of over-dosed PF's, and I even threw out two wasted baskets which choked my machine because it was too over-dosed. Not ideal when your coffee is $40/kg.
Second batch of coffee's for my guests and I was able to have the doser adjusted a little better for this kind of dosing. I dialed the doser in to probably about 7gms a dose. Three clack's gave me maybe 21gm's (at a guess), it was a good basket level after tamping.
I'm able to dose and tamp, without distribution, most of the time, and I'm getting even extractions (from what I can tell in the cup and by breaking up the puck (waste).
My coffee is just that much more enjoyable, a great improvement over the Sunbeam EM0480 grinder, which for the money, is a great conical burr grinder.
Next step in my coffee utopia (or quest?) is a new espresso machine. I've talked previously about issues with my current machine, so I won't go in to it. I will say, it's hard to justify the expense when you have a
wife that doesn't drink coffee!
