Congratulations! You’ve got a shiny new espresso machine. You’re excited, but maybe also staring at all those buttons and ports thinking, “Where do I even start?” Don’t worry. Every home barista started right where you are now. This guide will walk you through the entire process, from turning on the machine to pulling a beautiful…
Let’s talk about the most satisfying, yet most misunderstood, step in the espresso-making process: the tamp. It feels like it should be simple. You put grounds in a basket, you push down. How hard could it be? As it turns out, you can screw it up in about six different ways. An bad tamp is the…
For centuries, explorers searched for a mythical Fountain of Youth. Today, that quest looks a little different. It’s less about finding a hidden spring and more about the choices we make every day. Surprisingly, one of the most popular daily rituals on earth—drinking coffee—is being studied by scientists as a potential key to a longer,…
You’ve dialed in your grind, perfected your technique, and preheated your machine. You pull a shot, but the flavor falls flat. It’s not bitter or sour—it’s just… lifeless. The culprit? It’s almost certainly your beans. Choosing the right coffee beans and storing them correctly is the most important step in making great coffee. It doesn’t…
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…
The Breville Bambino Plus is everywhere. It’s the machine every YouTube reviewer and forum expert seems to recommend for beginners. But does it live up to the hype? After three months of daily use, putting hundreds of shots through it, I can give you a straight answer: Yes, but with one critical caveat. This isn’t just…