Brewing Guides

In order to prepare a nice shot of espresso - used as a base for many other delicious beverages - you’ll need at least a proper flat burr or conical burr grinder (this is where you want to invest your money) and an espresso machine or a manual espresso maker such as the Flair 58 or the Picopresso.

For specialty grade coffee, we would honestly advise you against buying cheaper espresso making appliances made of plastic. These need too much tweaking to get the desired output and their lifespan is way shorter than a proper machine.

Should you not want to invest a lot of money into something that you only want to try out, there are good second hand options available.

Tip: Stick to the known brands when looking for second hand!

To pull a shot of espresso on a espresso machine, these are the basic steps that you should minimally follow:

1) Grind your dose of coffee beans finely into your portafilter. This is 10-14 grams of coffee for a single shot and 16-22 grams for a double shot.

2) Level the ground in the filter basket either with your fingers or a leveling tool.

3) Compress your grounds finely by applying pressure onto them with a tamper. Pay attention that you tamp evenly, level and when you’re done, lift the tamper slowly out of the portafilter as there might be a vacuum. We advise to slowly lift while turning your tamper.

4) Clean the portafilter of all loose grounds around the rim and insert it into the machine’s group head.

5) Start by extracting your espresso with a 1:2 ratio (see below) and stop the shot at the calculated output weight (promise, it’s easier than it seems once you get the routine). The extraction time should be between 25 and 35 seconds, otherwise it will taste sour (under extracted) or astringent (over extracted).

6) Your espresso shot is ready and can be enjoyed or used as a base for other drinks such as flat white, americano, aerocano, latte, cortado, affogato, etc.

Ratio defines the relation between the weight of the coffee grounds used and the weight of the final beverage (in this case espresso). The classic ratios are the following:

Espresso: 1 : 2 (2 grams of beverage for every gram of ground coffee)

Ristretto: 1 : 1,5

Lungo: 1 : 4

Basically the ratio only defines the intensity of the beverage, while the recipe is what you’ll really need! For example our classic recipe for an espresso is the following:

18 grams of coffee in for 36 grams of beverage out (1:2 ratio) in approximately 25-30 seconds with 92°C and 9 bars of pressure.

This cold, fluffy recipe is as close as it gets to a nitro brew, but you’ll just need your espresso machine to enjoy it at home!

Ingredients: double shot of espresso, cold water, ice cubes.

1) Add 120 grams of ice cubes, 100 grams of cold water in a big enough milk pitcher.

2) Extract a double shot of espresso on top of it.

3) Steam it for 15-20 seconds depending on the power of your steam wand until reaching the fluffy texture you’re looking for. Pay attention that the pitcher doesn’t get warm.

4) Pour it into a glass containing some more ice cubes and enjoy!

The easiest way to enjoy a cold coffee and milk based drink! It works both with diary milk as with Oatly Barista Edition (or your own favorite non-dairy alternative).

Ingredients: double shot of espresso, milk or non diary alternative, ice cubes.

1) Fill a glass with ice cubes and cold milk.

2) Extract a double shot on top of it.

3) Yes, that’s it! Enjoy! :)