How do you guys grind your coffee?
I just retrofitted my basic hand crank mill with a 10mm nut, and drove it with a drill. It's so much faster now, but I do wonder if there's actual properly motorized versions of what I just did.
I just retrofitted my basic hand crank mill with a 10mm nut, and drove it with a drill. It's so much faster now, but I do wonder if there's actual properly motorized versions of what I just did.
I could not tell the difference between pre-ground and home ground coffee. I am happy with not having a discriminating palate, since pre-ground is easier.
With dark roast I haven't found much difference either.
With a local medium roast, I don't know if it was the beans, but I was able to get a pleasant fruity acidity out of my brew that I haven't been able to find with supermarket medium roast grounds.
Wnh not just buy an electric grinder at this point? People use hand grinders because they enjoy the process.
So are good burr hand grinders. My friend paid as much for his hand grinder as I did for my Breville electric burr grinder.
The Hario burr grinder in the OP is not on the same level. The one I had was about $40, and was so slow to grind that the drill was a gigantic upgrade. It cost me $.50 in parts to use with a drill I already had, which was great for college me. Cost was the deciding factor.
That's cool then. I'm all for cost saving measures, especially for niche stuff like this which seems to always be overpriced.
And yet the Skerton is still a terrible grinder. Not much better than a blade grinder. Too much boulders and dust. Grind uniformity is just plain bad.
Not really. A Baratza Encore can be had for just over $100 and is perfectly fine for 99% of the coffee population that isn't doing espresso.
Yeah, my partner bought me one for my birthday and it works great for my different coffee needs. My only gripe is that it's loud as hell.
When I was choosing between entry level electric grinders, I was down to the Baratza Encore ESP and the Fellow Opus. One of the main reasons I chose the Opus is because it was so much quieter than the Encore.
And you can upgrade the burr in the Encore to the M2 found in their higher end grinders very easily. That's what I did and it's quality is top-notch
$100 for a kitchen implement that grinds coffee and does nothing else is more than a lot of people are willing to spend. I have one that was given to me and I really like it, but I wouldn't pay that much any day of the week. If I had an extra hand grinder, I'd honestly probably do something like this for fun, because I already have these tools for work.
I understand. I hate single use tools. But if I am spending fairly decent money on beans, I want a tool to properly process them. A $20/200g bag of beans is wasted on a Skerton. Other than the beans, a good grinder is the single most important tool in making good coffee.
Also keep in mind that now it is possible to get a far better hand grinder than the Skerton for almost the same money. The Timemore C2, the 1Zpresso Q, Kingrinder K1, P1, and P2 are the same price or only $10 to $20 more than the Skerton and all produce far better grinds.
I have a pair of Breville/Sage SmartGrinders (which I didn't pay anywhere near list price for).
One for caff, one for decaff.
I love them, as once I've dialed in the grind size for a bean, and set the timer per shot to hit the correct weigh, I can just bonk the button with a portafilter, and get a correctly sized dose.
While I love experimenting with coffee, once the conclusion is reached, I like to nail down the process so I don't need to think about it until the next bean change.
I do this with my 1zpresso Q2 except I just chuck it directly into the grinder which I find helps keep the beans from jumping out of the grinder.
I do the same thing (with a different grinder) when I need a large quantity of ground pepper.
I used to grind beans at home. But I just don’t care anymore. I just run them through the grinder at Costco.
I tried this with exactly this bur grinder and it melted the plastic washer in the assembly
Granted, I was using it for flax seed instead of coffee (it was my spouse's idea), but be careful with that drill my friend
Yes
I have a special drill at work that is just for grinding coffee
At home I my grinder was half the price of my espresso machine.
Seems like I might be a bit bougie. I have a Breville Dose Control conical burr grinder...
Did the same thing for a while lol, just had to keep the drill going as slow as possible.
Potentially, you could also melt the grinder and mess up the grind of the coffee.
I had that Harrio as my first grinder, it was alright but the adjustment of grind size was annoying and a single espresso shot took like 10 mins to hand-crank. Within a week I ordered a Eureka Mignon Chrono. Best decision.
Ive since retired my budget espresso machine because having no time to dedicate to upkeep ment it was constantly getting nasty and was just too much hassle, now I have found my happy medium with a chemex.
I'm not sure I prefer the "actual properly motorized versions" over yours - this is absolutely awesome!
I have one of these too. I concur it does a fine job.
Jokes aside the only negativity I've heard about these is they are not fine turnable enough at the lowest end of the scale.
I find I can get an excellent shot with good crema from most beans, but there are still a lot I feel I could go finer on to get a better result. Or just the beans suck.
I have one of these too. Actually, I have two, I picked one up second hand for decaff.
First world opulence for fifty quid!
Interestingly, the second hand one goes a LOT finer than the new one.
I normally grind between 2 and 6 depending on the bean with the first, but the second one if I take it under 8, it happily chokes the machine.
So I wonder if there is mileage in adjusting the burrs inside (which Sage are keen to tell you not to do!)
interesting
Having a second modified machine is a good measure.
I have no issues with mine getting choked up so it tells me I probably have more room to move on it.
I did that with mine. But I found that I had to feather the drill a lot to keep the grind consistent.
Eventually I just went back to buying pre ground.
Edit: actually I think I have the pro version of yours. Ended up buying a steel ring to go between the mill to stabilize the central steel pin. Got a more consistent grind after it. But felt I needed to keep the drill at a lower speed.
Eventually I just went back to buying pre ground.
This sound!! I recognise this sound! Do you hear it? It‘s the doppler effect of pitchforks being dragged over the pavement.
The 10-15 dollar grinder at Walmart or Target, I forgot which. Can't tell any real difference between that and my wife's burr grinder that is much larger.