You have your shiny new machine, your fresh beans, and your grinder. You pull a shot, full of hope. What comes out is a bitter, sour, or just plain underwhelming trickle of disappointment. You’ve just joined the universal rite of passage for home baristas: the struggle to “dial in.” Dialing in is the process of calibrating…
You’ve dialed in your grind, you’re using fresh beans, but your espresso is starting to taste… funky. Bitter, sour, or just plain bad. Before you blame your technique, there’s a 99% chance the culprit is a dirty machine. Coffee oils, mineral deposits from water, and old coffee grounds build up inside your machine. This gunk…
You’re not the first person to wonder this. You stand at a café, looking at a menu full of lattes, americanos, and drip coffee, and the question hits you: What actually is the difference between espresso and coffee? Is it just about size? Strength? Or is there something more going on? The answer might surprise…