Grinding coffee

Best is to grind your coffee yourself. A good coffee grinder is very important in grinding coffee. Coarseness and uniformity of the grind is important. There are different types of coffee mills for sale.

But first, how the coffee beans should be ground? This is very important. The right grind depends on the type of coffee you want to prepare. Practice makes perfect only through trial-and-error and a lot of tasting. Here are some basic rules:

• For espresso you need grind as fine as possible;
• For regular coffee, the coffee beans are ground coarser;
• Do you think the coffee tastes too weak? Try a finer grind, so the water needs more time to go get through the coffee;
• Is the coffee too strong or too bitter? Then try to make the grind coarser.

Hand grinders

For a long time people used to grind their coffee themselves at home with a hand mill. These are squared (often made of wood) mills with a small content. Often, no more grind fits in than for one pot of coffee. These hand mills are relatively cheap. Grinding with a hand mill is nevertheless a time consuming task.

The result of these mills is very good though. In particular, the fineness of the grinds is excellent. The fineness can be set, from medium to coarse to fine. Quality hand mills are produced by e.g. PeDe, DEVE, Armin Trosser, Zassenhaus, Lehnartz, KyM and Peugeot.

Turkish coffee mills

The real coffee guru has a Turkish coffee mill at home. The Turkish mill is called the king of coffee mills. In Turkey and the Middle East, this type of mill is commonly used. The mills are tall, made of copper and bronze and therefore often heavy. Under the cap (which you can screw off) are the beans. The grind is being collected in the bottom of the mill. This collection reservoir can also be unscrewed. Turkish coffee should be ground very fine, something that a Turkish coffee mill can do like no other.

The gradation of the coffee fineness can be set by the adjustment screw on top of the mill.

Electric coffee grinders

There are several types of electric coffee mills for sale. The older type includes propeller blades. These blades ‘slamm’ the coffee beans into pieces. These mills have two major disadvantages. Firstly, the evenness of the grinding result is very poor, resulting in poor coffee. Larger grinds are being wasted because the water cannot really penetrate into them, while the finer particles saturate too quickly and can result in a bitter taste. Secondly, the mill can only be run for a short time to prevent scorch coffee beans by overheating.

The real barista has a mill with metal disks. But again there are big differences in quality. Often going for cheap is the wrong choice. Coffee grinders with cheap disks do not always deliver the desired result. Most electric coffee mills grind the coffee beans with a good uniformity. Although they often make much noise, it is worth investing in a good mill. Most of these mills have a wheel or button with which the desired gradation can be set. Experiment with this until you have found the desired result.

Some coffee grinders with metal disks have an espresso dosing mechanism where you can ‘plug in’ your machine’s filter holder. The filter will be automatically filled to the desired quantity. This prevents messing around with scoops or measuring cups, and you do not need to grind more beans than is strictly necessary, so freshly ground coffee is always guaranteed!

Click on the link to read more about preparing coffee.