A Rant: Espresso Ratios & Recipes

A short rant on how we might be relying on ratios too much when communicating espresso, and some of the problems when talking about specific recipes.

Music: King Seven - "Slippers"

Links:

[vicholtreman]

This is the calmest rant I've ever heard.

[wexy]

I would love to see your process on dialing in. What you taste for, or how your method may vary depending on the brewing apparatus.

[avinsharma]

I'm 17 years old and i absolutely love coffee and knowing abou it in detail. I make coffee at home using machine. I watch all of your videos and i have been learning so much from them and it really brings me happiness seeing the passion for coffee. Thank you so much sir, love from India. I am huge huge fan 😊

[davidhenson]

After doing expresso for many years, after roasting coffee at home for many years, what I learned was that the data on home barista was indeed useful at putting a person "in the ballpark" of what to shoot for in dose, grind, and what's in the cup. But what I eventually realized is that brewing espresso is like playing a musical instrument. The better you know your gear, the better you can make it work. Learn how to make the shots on your rig sing on lighter roasts, on darker roasts, natural process, washed, whatever, and what changes you have to make to make each of them work. It will build knowledge, skill, confidence, and may save you money knowing you can pull amazing shots on not terribly expensive gear (relatively speaking).

[Gryle]

So, I discovered your channel a few hours ago and I'm fascinated. I have no idea what half of this means, but I enjoy how passionate you are about your bean juice. Makes me happy knowing there are craftsmen in the niche areas of life.

[vicjsch]

Thank you for your always educational information. I run a small coffee shop in Michigan and am constantly talking about you and your videos. We all appreciate the fine work you do here.

[mitchellfink]

Hey James, From the perspective of an Australian barista.

this was back in 2009-2011 era of making coffee. back then, and prior, within the specialty movement, Australian cafes were almost universally pulling double ristretto shots for everything. this was great for roasteries, since cafes would be using more coffee. a 6oz cup would get a double ristretto, a 12oz cup would get two double ristretto. this was terrible for cafes, as the CoGs for a cup of coffee was much higher in those days. Its hard to argue whether this system was better or worse for milk coffee drinkers, but it was terrible for espresso drinkers, since almost everything you were ever served was under extracted.

with the advent of the espresso recipe/ratio, we also saw specialty espresso bars start actually brewing espresso again, so i absolutely agree that it moved us forward as an industry from where we were. from a user end point, i find there's two types of baristas, those that desperately want a recipe because they need guidance to find a good end point, and those who do not because they are smart enough to figure it out themselves (regardless of whether this is true or not). for the first audience, i find a large part of the problem is language. when you ask them what describes a good espresso, they'll make reference to tactile qualities, or use emotionally driven language, and the concept of sour, sweet, bitter/under, ideal, over extracted are foreign to them. for these people, a ratio doesn't help them at all, since they can brew at the ratio indicated, but wont necessarily be able to dial in properly from that point. a recipe would probably be better?

In recent years, I've seen the conversation regarding ratios in the barista sphere start to change. baristas and roasteries in Australia are moving away from a 1:2 ratio in flavour of larger, more dilute ratios. many roasteries are advocating for ratios between 1:2.5 and 1:3. not a huge change, but enough to significantly alter the drinking experience of an espresso. there are positive and negatives to this. on one hand, more dilute ratios tend to be easier to extract well. on the other hand, they have less body. in my experience, many lay consumers of straight espresso enjoy it for not just its flavour balance, but also for its tactile qualities. if you were to dial in a coffee to be extracted to the same degree at a 1:2 ratio and a 1:3 ratio (forgive the use of ratio instead of recipe, ill get to my reason for this in just a moment) you'll probably find that your non coffee industry working espresso drinking customers will prefer the stronger beverage simply by the ethos of stronger=better.

final thought: I find it so interesting hearing about other countries and the recipes they use. doses of 16-19g are completely unheard of in Australia, and id realistically only expect to ever see a dose that small on a home machine. almost without exception, a cafe would be dosing 21 or 22g and then producing espressos of between 40 and 55g in yield depending on the ratio they're trying to achieve. when i think of using an 18 dose in my setup, the two things i immediately ask are, how do you milky coffees taste (keep in mind that 95% of an Australian cafes coffee orders will be milk based drinks) and secondly, how do you use an EK with such a tiny dose? are the EKs being calibrated differently? im often uncomfortably close to my grinders finer settings when brewing with a 21g dose on an EK. how do markets that use doses that are potentially only 75% of this weight making it work?

[meshalalshehri]

About 3 years ago, I had negative knowledge about espresso making. Now I train professionally. That is exactly what I am telling whenever I train baristas . Finding the best espresso recipe for a particular coffee is really a challenge.

Great video, I would love to see your methodology of creating espresso recipe for x coffee. It could be way better than mine.

[lyndonlives]

There was really something wonderfully philosophical about this rant! As someone just getting into coffee making, it made me feel a lot more comfortable about being willing to experiment..

[captainblaze]

I actually enjoy being a "mad scientist" and exploring where the coffee takes me. If I fail.... So be it, but when there is success the enjoyment brought forth in that cup takes away all the pain and misery

[RedmanJones]

I've learned that coffee is an incredibly personal experience, using the areopress has changed my coffee experience for the better, and made the experience a curious one, I've tried many more types and processes than I have in the past

[tom]

Best two pieces of advice: 5:05-5:15, and 6:30-6:46 in the video. "Set yourself up for success starting with a lower dose", and high-grown coffee needs a bit of a lower dose compared with a lower-grown (such as a good Brazil estate). Thank you James!

[teabagfc]

I came here for the sarcastic product reviews. I left knowing much more about espresso :-)

[hosmanadam]

I followed your advice at 6:09 and added a pinch of salt to my ratio. Wow, it had such an impact on the flavor profile. You're a true innovator!

[PetrosArgy]

James, I have to say that your commentary is some of the first on YouTube that I can relate to and respect. I started in the coffee business in 1993 by opening a small coffee bar in Poland. There was no espresso culture in the West outside of Italy to speak of and what did exist was generally related to the Italian tradition. I had to learn with a store grinder, a semiautomatic machine, the portafilter cups that came with my machine (an Astoria single group), a general idea of what the goal was, and very limited access to good coffee or knowledge.
What that did was force me to learn to make espresso and espresso drinks by trial and error and tons of repetition. It seems that nowadays people want to bypass the entire learning curve and dive right into making the best cup of whatever using numbers and formulae - a daunting task for any human being. I think you are advocating for real world trial and error as well and a move away from the numbers and formulae as the best method, which I wholeheartedly support.
The espresso scene here in the US is very developed but I admit, I can't stomach most of the coffees they brew here. They're either too strong (20-30 grams of ground coffee for a single espresso), or single origin (overwhelming flavor notes), or some other combination of flavor issues that make the espresso unpalatable in my mouth. It's as though the baristas here never tasted what a real espresso is and are shooting for some mathematical ideal instead.
Keep shooting that down, please!

[jaffa]

"get me to good quickly" is a great way of putting it. In most things in life there are no shortcuts, it takes time and effort to get to good.

[ReferenceFidelityComponents]

Bravo. Good presentation. As a newcomer to espresso I was almost put off it altogether by the entitled views and comments from coffee forums such as "what are you are doing is not making coffee" because the ratios I enjoyed or the beans I used didn't tally with their rigid views. What really annoyed some was that my grinder "wasnt capable" of making "proper" espresso. I use a sage grinder pro because unlike them I cannot afford a Niche or a Eureka. It works...it grinds fine enough as long as stale or very dark roasts are avoided and is easily consistent enough so what's the real issue there? That there's better? It's like saying you drive a mini when everyone scoffs down from their range rovers at you.

There's way too much entitlement and categorising by intolerant people in coffee circles who instead of working with you to help you maximise your success and consistency instead start with the standpoint that if you cannot afford 3 or 4 figure grinders and coffee macines you should get another hobby...it's a disease on many forums. I prefer your balanced and sensible views and advice.

For me and I suspect for many...dialling for personal preference on flavour profile is where it's at for specific beans....not what someone tells you it should be...or what strength it must be. Like Americano? Great....crack on and ignore the swoons if those who regard it as sacreligious!

[cyrckcm]

How very very endearingly british, this rant. All that‘s missing are long winded apologies at the start and at the end. And in the middle 🥰

[jakubchwieduk]

Good to have all this information in one video. Thanks James! I've been experimenting for quite a long time with super low dose ( less coffee, less fines, finer grind, thinner coffee bed with more even saturation) and had great results. Would love to see someone talking more about flow restrictions, pressure profiling set up with particular grind distribution.

[_boltspeedman_]

Thanks for the interesting video! As someone who hasn’t touched the process of espresso in my home brewing just yet, I liked the thoughts brought out. Now I’m not sure if what I’m about to say is as much a parallel as it seems to me, so bear with me, but I’ve thought this same thing for pour overs. I know where I live a lot of roasters just print a simple 1 to 16 ratio as the target/suggested brew ratio (and it is a good starting point for a lot of roasts) but it’s that dialing in that I’ve found to be difficult. Sure, a 1 to 16 may produce a decent cup, but I feel most times, it’s not the ideal. And again, as a beginner I’m stumbling into this new world of the science of brewing and all the small tweaks to make depending on a multitude of factors... I guess what I’m trying to simply say is, this gives me some ideas for brewing my pour overs from here on out and gives me hope I can tackle espresso one day. Thanks again!