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What's wrong with my daily espresso? (lemmy.ca)

submitted 1 week ago by GreatBlueHeron@lemmy.ca to c/coffee@lemmy.world

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I've used a home espresso machine, with built-in grinder, daily for at least 10 years. I'm generally happy with the results - there's some variability but most everything I make is acceptable, and I fairly regularly get something I feel is good. Recently I've been getting a lot of "acceptable" and it's been a long time (many months) since I've made one that I'd call "good". They're missing that bit of oily lustre that I feel really makes it perfect.

I drink a single shot over a small amount of hot water
I get my beans from a local (same province) roaster that say they roast to order
I like dark roast beans - the roaster calls it their Italian roast
my house water comes from a well and is naturally a bit hard, but we have a whole house softener
I've never de-scaled the machine because of the water softener - there's no build up or crusting at any orifices
I don't make any attempt to get perfect extraction quantity - I grind, tamp and trim with the tool supplied with the machine. When I first got this particular machine (about 4 years ago) I programmed the extraction time, but a can't remember the "recipe" I used
I've tried beans from one other local roaster (via a grocery store) with the same results

My experience says it's stale beans, but I'm buying roast to order, so I'm confused.

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[–] Imgonnatrythis@sh.itjust.works 4 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Water may have somehow changed composition. Do you have a baseline tds reading on your "old" water when it was good? Any new refresh on the softener system recently? Often changes in the water are unexpected culprit. Can see if your city has any graphs on local water tables that might explain a correlative change too. Get a tds, kh, and gh reading on your water and play with these a bit with mixing distilled water or coffee water drops / salts to optimize by taste.

[–] GreatBlueHeron@lemmy.ca 2 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (2 children)

Well I fully cleaned and serviced my machine yesterday and my coffee today was maybe a little better, but still lacking. That leaves beans and water. There was a drought here last summer and the water table has changed. I really should test my water and service the softener. But, in the short term - I'll buy a jug of water next time I'm in town and try making coffee with that.

[–] CCMan1701A@startrek.website 1 points 2 days ago

Maybe your tastes have changed over the years. I recommend you sample a bunch lf different roast levels and see which one works best with your setup and yourself.

My personal experience is my parents like dark roast, but they also like the coffee I brew which is light roast. My though is my brew method is the real difference.

Best of luck on your adventure.

[–] Imgonnatrythis@sh.itjust.works 3 points 1 week ago

You can buy distilled water and order a "coffee water" packet to make theoretically perfect coffee water, but it's possible the taste you had grown acusstomed to requires water at some wacky tds / pH that just seemed to fit and might be hard to reproduce. Anyway, my money is on the water, it really can make a big difference. Good luck.