Espresso Video: coffee with music

I'm feeling a little bit inspired today so I have taken the video of this morning espresso ritual. For today, I'm using the Nuova Simonelli Musica which is a plumbed in machine using flojet setup. If anyone are interested about this setup, let me know so I can do a more detailed blog about it. It is working out great so far and making fantastic espresso.

The coffee this morning was a nice medium roasted Rwanda coffee, quite mellow and tasty. I usually like to start out preheating my espresso cup using the hot water from the machine. I find that even if I leave the cup on top of the machine, it will not be getting hot enough. This is probably due to the efficient insulation that Nuova Simonelli use on the boiler. No big deal though, I just use the hot water to heat the cup up. Beside making the cup really hot, this also have another benefit and that is refreshing the water in the boiler.

Additionally,  I spend a fair bit of time to wipe down the portafilter so that it is dry and clean which I believe is a critical step that you find so many so call "Profesionals" on youtube skip. Weighting out the bean is the next step for me because I almost exclusively single dose; many would disagree with this method but it works well for me. The Baratza Vario make dosing into the portafilter easy as a peice of cake. Next step is distribution of coffee in the portafilter; I use my finger to level the ground in the portafilter; I think this step is not too critical as the Vario already does a great job. Perhaps I should test this out: finger distribution vs. not: a subject for future post perhaps.

Tamping is next! I admit it! I'm spending way too much time tamping which is not nescessary. I think as long as the tamp is even, you are good to go.

Flushing the HX is next; I think this is a cake-walk and do not understand why so many complain about it. Just flush and pay attention to the end of boiling of the water coming out. For the Musica which is quite a stable HX machine, the flush routine is for medium temperature good for this particular bean.

The espresso taste as good as it looks!