Schooled By Redditors About Channeling!

I said channeling is a myth. They said my beans were too dark and too soft. I triggered a few people over at Reddit when I said that channeling is bollocks and WDT is a pointless ritual. So let's revisit this -- with the RIGHT coffee beans this time!
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#espresso #coffee #reddit
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[@glen.moralee]

The tone was a bit snippy 😂 Love your work challenging the sheep.

[@Tass...]

I saw your video posted in the espresso subreddit and posted something like... "It's good to have a reality check from time to time" or similar words. There weren't many posts in the thread at the time and I didn't go back to check but when I saw it I just knew the dogpiling would start. Much like many subredits it's full of hive mind and echo chamber mentality. There is no room there for alternative thinking. People just repeat the opinions of Lance Hedricks or James Hoffmann over and over and any opinion that differs from theirs is just bulked at. Thanks for this video. I have long been of the opinion that dosing a basket correctly is very important for my espresso. Not many people seem to have wised up to it tho.

[@TomJones-tx7pb]

It is the most important thing once you get beyond the basics.

[@icowrich]

I've watched these people, but my opinion is based on my own results. For instance, when I don't WDT, I get far more spurts from the basket at a given amount of pressure (I tend toward 8 bar). This happens with medium or medium to dark roasts, which is what I use most often. Maybe I'm doing something wrong that then requires WDT to fix...not sure. But, WDT tends to fix the problems I was having, which is good enough for me.

[@TomJones-tx7pb]

@@icowrich I totally agree with your approach. Do what works for you. What happens when you pull a shot is affected by many variables in puck prep and the ground coffee. Because I have a Flair, I am left with a dry puck which I can inspect to see what happened during an extraction. Overall, I would say that a little bit of channeling will affect the outcome far less than other factors. For example how the fines are distributed in the puck can be a major influencer. If you excessively WDT and tap, fines will migrate to the bottom of the puck and may cause the puck to shear about 2/3 down, with a strong side extraction at that point, resulting in the bottom 1/3 of coffee contributing less to the extraction. If the puck has a void in it, it will not be fixed by tamping, and you will get a different sort of channeling. WDT is not very good at fixing this, and it is better to not have this occur in the puck in the first place. With a good grinder and proper technique, all that is required is what is shown in this video.

[@fsi2210]

Excellent video. Your recent videos on this issue struck a chord with me. Other KZbinrs (Lance Hedrick, springs to mind), push new End Game Grinder, Machine, silly gadgets and a new ritual to get the best espresso every other week.

[@ilkzode1822]

The push is annoying. Looking for companies to send new toys to play with. Havent seen anyone being humble , honest and not pretentious beside this channel, aramse, some of real sprometheous and thats about it. Everyone else sound like marketing employees

[@endoalley680]

@@ilkzode1822 How about "Pete's Rancilio Silvia" ? His position is to make the equipment already you have work for you as best as possible.

[@LanceHedrick]

Sorry you feel that way. I'm not trying to push anything. Cheers

[@endoalley680]

@@fsi2210 Nothing wrong with buying cool new stuff if and when you can afford it. Nothing wrong with getting the most out of what you have also. I like making choices using good product information. Lance seems to come up with solutions to improve the coffee experience for those of us looking to spend some $ (best bang for c-note) and for those of us looking to conserve and make the best of what they have. I have been in those both places.

[@mhas9110]

Love your work, you think like an engineer and work like a researcher. I have started to treat coffee grounds like soil and tamp the puck in place based on the same principles.

[@YukonHawk1]

Thank you for this excellent video.

[@ReefBrosCanada]

you do what you enjoy. dont take reddit too seriously. i personally like dark roast espressos

[@ReefBrosCanada]

i always enjoy your uploads!keep them coming

[@spamcan9208]

When I first heard about those mineral kits you add to distilled water to brew with, I scoffed. I thought it was being fussy for the sake of being fussy and coffee snobs being pretentious. But the more I've brewed coffee over the years, the more I've realized its importance. Now I'm wondering if my water is the reason why some coffees just don't taste right.

[@usshunk32]

yeah, I just happen to ahve epson salt and baking soda so I was like "yeah I might try the water recipe at barista hustle". It changed the taste of my coffee to be better and now I've been doing it ever since.

[@chahahc]

Yeah people tend to really underestimate the importance of water quality. I always advocate for a good reverse osmosis system with a good remineralizer. It's easy and cheap to DIY where you can tap off the pure mineral free RO water before the remineralizer so you can add in whatever concoction just for coffee, and then use the water that's passed through the remineralizer for general purpose drinking and food usage.

[@willmitchell8500]

Are you unwilling to make your own water? I find it to be fairly straightforward, using stuff thatll fit in half a shoebox and last for months if not years. you can reduce buidup on your machine and drink whatever coffees ya like. I'm always surprised to hear you change your tamping pressure. To be everything gets tamped until compacted, to take out a variable. Grind size and dose (in or out) are the ones i want to touch. theyre also consistent and repeatable vs tamping. Curious to hear your thoughts

[@lkaravelov]

Why do you assume his water is hard and will build scale? He said that his water is acidic - it's not the same and one does not imply the other.

[@willmitchell8500]

@@lkaravelov youre right, i said the opposite of what i mean in terms of the effects, but im still surprised he doesnt make his own water.

[@coffeecove7058]

Enjoyed the video and will try this.

[@gubz_]

I can’t say that my experience matches yours but I’m glad that you made this video sharing your experience. One huge difference is that I don’t roast my own coffee. Most of us don’t? I don’t know whether there’s anything to it but I’ve noticed a correlation between the roaster I buy the coffee from and how “well behaved” the coffee will be when pulling shots. I don’t believe that can be explained away by simply looking at the roast level. Another matter is the fact that you’re using blends. There’s a snobbery around single-origin and I’ll admit that I can’t recall the last time I bought a blend. However, when faced with a particularly temperemental coffee, I will often “blend” two bags of single origin after the fact which helps a whole lot with the channelling/taste issues that I might otherwise have. You’ve probably spent enough time & energy on this but fwiw I think it would be fun to see you pull shots with single origin roasts from specialty roasters (ie not your roasts). Cheers.

[@BBerg-vf9zl]

Thanks again ❤

[@ricardoj8860]

Thank you, I love your videos I think you are very objective thanks for not going with all fancy stuff, I think that they are clowns

[@TomJones-tx7pb]

Your dump shake tamp was spot on. Lance has jumped the shark. I have to wonder why, given his excellent history.

[@ilkzode1822]

Nailed it " jumped the shark" is precisely what Lances channel feels like nowadays. Its become pretentious where its laughable. When stuff like $3000 grinders, automated pourovers, wdt shakers by weber costing $100 are the content, it makes head turn. Dude needs to relax and stop bring up Dr Smerkie all the time Just enjoy the coffee and making this hobby a joke

[@TomJones-tx7pb]

@@ilkzode1822 I have tried most things Lance has presented on his channel recently, and it is not beneficial for me. WDT does not fix a puck with voids in it and grounds of varying density. The Weber shaker is a joke with coffee that is medium roast or darker. The Weber basket with vertical sides and thick steel makes the puck hard to remove and examine for technique. The IMS baskets with a nanocoating and a slight taper to the basket are all you need. I have no problem with static that needs to be fixed with an expensive grinder anti-static gizmo. And the list goes on. Milk prep, tamping, etc. He does cause me to have ideas that help. For example, when I am grinding into a cup I rotate the cup so that the distribution of grinds is even in the cup. This really makes it easy to dump the coffee into the basket and ensure that there are no voids or clumps - a gentle shake and tap and the coffee is ready to be tamped.

[@ilkzode1822]

@@TomJones-tx7pb one thing most influencers never discuss is the stress of trying to knock a puck out of a High Extraction basket. Ive been adding a wet paper filtet on the bottom like with previous IMS basket but its still a hassle. Im pretty happy to go back to the IMS with bottom filter. If you cant simply workflow, then all that hard work for a wee dram of espresso wasnt worth it. Also like to grind into a dosing cup amd very subtle shale with it upside down in portafilter. Wdt and pooooof no channeling. WEBER CAN KISS MY ASS. One thing i have yet to see are youtubers talking about farms, roasters, terroir, processing, milling Its just run of the mill (no pun intended) lets compare this grinder to that. This tamper to this. Oooo zerno and philos came out. Lets persuade ppl to spend thousands

[@TomJones-tx7pb]

@@ilkzode1822 Exactly so. The shake being subtle is important. The Weber shaker, as demonstrated by Lance, does a terrible job of getting an even distribution of coffee into the puck, and certainly always worse than your method.

[@ilkzode1822]

@@TomJones-tx7pbyoutubers know that theres alot of flaffing going around. As long as they review mostly positive about gadgets/products the more toys companies will send to them. Very very very few youtube channels are by humble coffee lovers. Theres a money-grab scheme to brainwash hipsters into spending I sold away many grinders. Kept 2. The df54 with a slower feed which in actuality provides pretty decent clarity. And a niche zero with chinese conical burrs that im modding. Has about the same geometry as the 1zpresso k ultra. Will pobably sell the niche too as some hipster will offer good cash fot it. I fell down the rabbit whole but quickly rose up and realized how much BS content is actually on here

[@eamobyrne1]

Really interesting video (as was the original). I tried replicating it and....... I got channelling and a much slower shot. Which I wasn't expecting. The shot was bad and that fact wasn't disguised by milk. Truth be told I like the WDT process. It's like a form of mindfulness. Each to their own I guess. I do enjoy your videos though. Always interesting and you take a good approach.

[@fhailywalid]

top noch contents, best coffee channel so far...no BS

[@scottOlsonsoulson]

I roast coffee, I was also a sous chef. I know my way around food, the kitchen, coffee and roasters. I end my dark roasts at the end of 1C. That's as done as I'm willing to go. Anything beyond that gets into burning the coffee. Flavor & body is established during Maillard and Dev is putting frosting on the cake. Taking a Gesha beyond 13 to 14% destroys its floral & fruity notes. The same can be said for Wush Wush, Rainbow Bourbon or the alternative fermented coffees (72 hour Ltd oxy Naturals) that I typically buy. Anything beyond 20% Dev is done to mask roast defects, or hide poor quality greens.. I understand that your preference is for almost burnt coffee; cool for you. But to imply that light roasts are bad, undesirable, or bad tasting is ridiculous. In coffee as in food we all have our personal preferences, correct?

[@TomJones-tx7pb]

You sound emotionally biased, with your adjectives - I think he is actually saying the same as you. Personally, I do not like spinach salads or cooked avocado. There is a zone of cooking that balances the pros and cons of the ingredient being cooked. We all can intuitively taste this zone unless we have persistently abused our body. Arguing about the best coffee extraction is similar to arguing about the best tobacco, IMHO.

[@iconindexsymbol]

Water chemistry plays a large role in flavor, it’s not all in the roast.

[@colinbriggs1963]

Another informative video - thanks for standing up for what you believe.

[@ritaweygint4038]

Yum! Think I’ll have a nice light roast tomorrow morning! My water goes through reverse osmosis and is re-mineralized. I wouldn’t even give San Diego tap water to my dog.

[@mosconi4539]

Those Reddit kids.........

[@user-lr6zd6dt6y]

What is the correct fill for the Cafelat robot? Thank you.

[@wiredgourmet]

It's a different principle than the e-61. Mine seems to work best between 14-20g depending on the coffee.

[@destructoooo]

When looking at my bottomless, the coffee comes out fine, but when I examine my puck by layer, I can sometimes see small circles/areas of dark grounds, to me it means unextracted flavors, also means channeling, no one can see what's going on with the puck when brewing (yet), but I guess the best we can do is examine the aftermath.

[@wiredgourmet]

A lot of the surface features are just from turbulence disturbing the fines on top, or bubbles from CO2 release, etc. You shouldn't worry at all unless there's a flavor penalty. If the coffee tastes good, it IS good.

[@chrisdturner]

I think that you don't always see channeling because of the viscosity of the coffee exiting the basket masking it, unless it is particularly bad and it squirts out. I believe channeling will always happen to a small extent even with WDT, and more so with poor puck prep. Puck integrity always breaks down as solubles are lost from the puck, leaving larger gaps between grinds and making channel formation more likely.

[@Pentaprysm]

Which roaster are you using to roast your coffee?

[@wiredgourmet]

kzbin.info/www/bejne/q6DUlXemrJWDors

[@khalid0790]

Can you please review the scale you are using? I was thinking about getting one and I would like to know if it is worth $60…Thanks

[@wiredgourmet]

It will be a while. I can say, it's a good size for espr, consistent to around 0.2g, and the battery charge lasts. No data on durability, obviously. I'd pay $60 for it. I see no point buying a $250 one prolly using the same $6 AliBaba loadcell.

[@jonas5666]

So, you demonstrate that light roasts are easy to work with by using a medium roast? I mean I like the no nonsense approach and it's better to have some opinions than none, but you're probably well aware that lots of people use both lighter and darker roasts. Both extremely light and extremely dark roasts are difficult to work with in their own ways, calling them defective is just making up a different myth.