It's Finally Here!
Charlie's Espresso Lovers February Edition
So I finally received my Odyssey Argos after 10 months of waiting. I’ve pulled a few dozen shots on it in the first 3 days of owning it, and it’s a VERY exciting machine…
…but it’s certainly not for everyone.
It uses a pretty novel method to get to perfect temperatures, and when I’ve gotten good shots out of it (more on why I haven’t in a moment), they have been phenomenal.
So what it does is the boiler heats up and uses a PID (Proportional-Integral-Derivative) controller which turns off the boiler once it reaches a certain temperature. Simple enough.
On the Argos the machine calculates the difference between the boiler temperature and the group temperatures (both visible on the app), and then adjusts the PID. When the boiler water goes through the group (which is at 40ºC) it will be cooled, so the PID sets the boiler to (for example) 125ºC to precisely reach the temperature you defined with the temperature knob. Very cool stuff.
There are lever specific techniques you need to employ to make sure everything runs well though. I’ve not used a spring lever like this before (The Nurri L-Type was a very different beast) and so learning how to do things like the Mini-Fellini to add water and build pressure, and using the Argos’ air bleeding zone to reduce puck tampering is a lot, and I’ve screwed up quite a bit in the last few days since it arrived.
I have very quickly missed having the ease and simplicity of the Meraki on my bench, but when I put Origin’s new Taiwan coffee through it, I got some shots that just were out of this world. I haven’t done enough testing on this yet to know why, but lever machines always surprise me with the brilliance of their extractions.
More on this machine as I learn more, and please ask any questions (or give any lever advice) in the comments.
Things I’m Testing
Obviously the Argos is number one on my list, but I’ve been sent a lot of other cool gear that I’m testing now. MHW3 Bomber sent me their new WDT combing tool and their new blind shaker, and I have some thoughts on both of them.
The needle distribution tool is better than their previous version, but it has the same problem they all have which is leaving a small dimple in the middle of your bed of coffee grounds. The mechanism is nice though and if I am in a rush I sometimes use this over my manual WDT, which takes a lot longer and more focus to do correctly.
The other one is a strange one though. Their new blind shaker feels very overengineered to me, though this actually does a great job of providing a level bed of grounds. Blind shakers generally aren’t my thing, but I do recognise that the data shows that they are quite effective. I’ve just always found them too much faff, they rarely fit under coffee grinders properly so it’s just adding too many steps to my routine.
With their SE PRo blind shaker the dropping mechanism is designed to remove one of those steps. You don’t need to pull out a stopper and make a ring, you just place it over your portafilter and let the grounds drop in.
But I’m having 2 main issues. One is the grounds clumping and actually not dropping into the portafilter without tapping on my tamping pad at least 5 or 6 times. The other one is that it’s hard to actually shake because the cone doesn’t sit flush to the top cover. There’s a slight gap between them which means if I shake it up and down, the bottom opens up and I spill coffee grounds on the floor. Very unusual to design it this way when the previous version had a small notch to hold the stopper in while you shake shake shake.
I thought I might be doing something wrong, but I can’t figure out how. If all I can do is swirl it around without running the risk of dropping the grinds out, this might even stop the device from performing its main function of improving the distribution of fines and coarses in the bed.
But this new tamping mat is gorgeous and perfect for what I wanted. I especially like the puck screen holder at the back, cos I never really had a decent place to put these and left them either on my drip tray or my jug rinser. Great addition.
By the way you can get 10% off if you use code “CHARLIE” at checkout on MHW3 Bomber’s Site.
Coffee of the Month
I mentioned the Taiwan earlier from Origin Coffee Roasters, but this month the one that gets the cup has to be this:
Sweven, El Diviso, Huila Colombia, Advance Natural Process
What a gorgeous coffee. Sweet, very fruit forward and delicate. BOLD Strawberry flavour but not overpowering or fake, and lingers after in a nice way. I had this one mostly just as straight espresso even though I prefer milky coffees because it was just so beautiful on its own.
I do wonder, though, how much of this is carried by the processing method and how much was the cultivation. There’s a reason washed coffees win all the awards, and that’s because they show off the bean and what went into the growing. I’ve had some modern processed coffee beans that, when tasted side by side with high quality beans, taste almost like fruit juice from concentrate and lack personality. So it’s important to make sure that the process is emphasising the innate characteristics of the bean and not covering for poor cultivation.
So while this coffee was exceptional and deserved a mention for the delicious flavour, I will be sharing more about process-first coffees in the near future.
Get some here: Sweven El Diviso
Runner up: Taiwan Qing Yé, Origin Coffee Roasters
I had never tried a coffee from Taiwan before and to celebrate the Lunar New Year I picked up this coffee commemorating the year of the Snake. It was really exciting, very flavourful with floral notes like Jasmine, almost tea like. And I loved the box design, someone clearly put a lot of design skill into that and I’m a sucker for a great all-round package. Amazing coffee.
Unfortunately you can’t get it anymore which is why this is my runner up coffee for the month.
Question of the Month
What do you think about the number of companies copying coffee gear designs? Whether it’s cups, grinder burrs or espresso prep tools the proliferation of companies white labelling and/or just blatantly copying designs is rife in the coffee industry. I’m looking into this now because of a new project I’m working on and also putting the 2nd Edition of The Brew Ledger on Amazon, which has me worried about people stealing my book layout and making a cheap copy.
As a business owner and someone who is trying to make sure everything I make is creating a unique offering for the coffee community, it worries me that I might spend a long time and a lot of money building a product, and then having that product idea stolen and replicated (poorly).
Are there any ways that companies making their own iterations can be a good thing by lowering cost, increasing competition and choice?
On that note, I’m down to about 80 First Edition Brew Ledgers left so if you want one before they sell out, you can still buy them from my shop here.
Thanks for reading you wonderfully over-caffeinated people and I’ll see you on the next one.