The Wild Drink Blog

This is a landmark event, the first coffee post i’ve ever written for this blog whilst actually drinking espresso! Yesterday I picked up my Expobar Brewtus espresso machine along with Rancilio ‘rocky’ grinder and a Gene Cafe roaster. Until now an espresso machine at home would have been a bit unnecessary, but leaving Fifteen has now made it essential.

The machine is literally plug & play, there is an easily accessible water tank under the cup heater and drainage is covered by the over sized drip tray. Brew pressure and steam boiler pressure are both adjustable (with readout dials) along with digitally controlled brew temperature. Extraction is turned on/off by a lever arm and both steam and hot water arms are controlled by twisty dial things. The rocky grinder is a bit slow compared to the (4x the price) Mahlkonig i’m used to, but it’s doserless and nice and small.

There are a few pieces of kitchen equipment which have been ‘compromised’ in order to fit this stuff in, but I think Laura’s early morning latte was enough to win her over…

I still need to finish tweaking the steam pressure, not getting quite the spin i’d hope for when foaming milk, but it is coming out quite nicely for the first couple of attempts. Espresso is better than I expected, unfortunately i’ve only had a couple of single origins to try out so far so the shots aren’t balanced but the Kenyan Gethumbwini is suitable chewy and ‘currenty’ (that should be a word if it isn’t), i’m expecting good things from blends.

(I had already sipped the shot on the right - hence no crema)

Haven’t yet had a chance to play around with brew temperature but once I get hold of some Origin triple cert. i’ll have a play around as its a coffee I know well.

One observation: Making coffee at home is very messy. I guess you take it for granted behind a bar, but the sight of your kitchen worktop covered in grounds and dirty tissue/cups/cat is quite a shock!

I will try to post up more about the machine once I get more familiar with it. There will of course also be much to write about with the roaster which is currently sitting ominously on the hob below the extractor hood… waiting.