TIL my pour over was over extracted because a barista in Portland told me my grind looked like sidewalk gravel | Afternoon Coffee Club - Chatter Central
TIL my pour over was over extracted because a barista in Portland told me my grind looked like sidewalk gravel
I argued with her for five minutes about my $40 hand grinder, then drove home, set it two clicks coarser, and got a cup that didn't taste like burnt tires for the first time in a year, so now I'm wondering if anyone else had to hear it from a stranger before they'd admit their setup was off.
People keep acting like a random barista is some kind of coffee oracle but half the time they're just guessing based on what works for their own shop. Two clicks on a hand grinder is basically nothing, that could just be burr wobble finally settling in or your beans aging a day or two. Also a cup that tastes like burnt tires usually means over extracted, which means too fine, so going coarser makes sense, but you could've figured that out a year ago by just tasting and adjusting one variable at a time. The stranger didn't fix your coffee, you did, you just needed someone to give you permission to change something you'd already decided was right. That $40 grinder thing bugs me too, price has nothing to do with it, a cheap grinder can still be set wrong. Learn to taste a sour cup vs a bitter cup and you'll never need a Portland barista to tell you anything again.