I enjoy a high acidity bean for espresso because of the burst of flavors that to come with it. If they’re roasted too dark I feel the heavy body and bitterness overwhelm the drink and take all the good out of it.
What attributes do you look for in espresso?
Well, it’s a very good question. Espresso machines are not designed to handle anything except a dark roast, but I also prefer lighter roasted espresso. Mind you that I’ve stopped using my e61 machine for some time now. If I want a concentrated beverage, I’ll make myself a nice cup of Turkish coffee or a Moka pot, with an immense difference in water and electricity consumption. I also use a v60 and the Hario Next Syphon. I dislike the French Press and can’t see much difference from the syphon, other than a slight advantage in the ease of use.
Back to the topic. As in most parts of the world, I’ve also been raised on burned beans. They have the advantage of always being the same, no matter what bean you roast. Once you burn it to a crisp, it’s anyone’s guess. I’ve also heard some Neapolitan “researcher?!?” - “scientist?!?” say that the palate of people over there underwent some sort of evolutionary change which makes them prefer extra dark coffee. This was on national TV. As for me, once I took a shot of some medium roasted Sidamo somewhere, a long time ago, I knew there was no turning back. It was acidic, fruity and you didn’t have to add sugar to kill the awful, but it was sweet in and of itself. Then I ordered some from one of maybe 2 roasters that were selling these coffees, and it was catastrophic. I ended up getting my money back. Then I found out you could buy green coffee in small quantities online. There was one site and they were Dutch. So, there was no other choice. Since they were also selling the Gene, I ordered that too. Then I could go as light as I want. And I went. This was decades ago. But I think it was my habit of drinking espresso, not the superiority of the method, which is clearly beaten by anything else. As I’ve said, I only turn on my machine now and then. When I do, I’ll usually use Cuban coffee barely into medium. It’s not that other coffees don’t taste well, it’s just that they taste better with other methods, once you understand that it was the habit, and the much contested, criticized and maligned “Little Albert Experiment”.
Unfortunately, although people would like you to believe otherwise, the quality of coffee has gone down significantly and the trend will continue. Once, you could buy any “single origin” bean and have an amazing experience for an amazing price. This is a wider and off topic argument, but to get back on I’ll say that, in more or less 25-30 years, I might go back to drinking only espresso, as the method won’t have any importance once the green quality reaches the abyss.
In conclusion, anything that goes beyond the beginning of medium roast range is too much for me for any method, including espresso. When I roasted for myself I always tended to go lighter.
I tend to agree with what you say, we have been over exposed to dark roast and it takes a strong experience to shake us off the strong bitter, roasty notes. I went to Costa Rica some years back and that was when my eyes were opened. Before I had gone I was experimenting with very high elevation coffee beans that could withstand high finish temps and not dissintegrate. I now think back on it and shake my head, but there was a lot that I learned from it. Mostly that high density beans can take a hell of a lot of heat, and low elevation beans need o be handled gently. Currenly I do use high heat, but as I approach maillard I taper off significantly, then finish at a significantly lower end temp with about a minute of development, sometimes less.
I use a ceramic pour over for a great majority of my coffee and once in a blue moon I’ll pull a shot myself ( I have an Ascaso duo). However I make a point of whenever I go to a coffee shop to ask for a black ( no sugar no milk ) drip coffee of whatever they have, and an espresso. Specialty shops usually care a lot about each coffee they serve and it helps me gauge just how much. I don’t believe I have had a good espresso from a specialty shop that was over roasted. The best espresso I have had was light to medium roast and like you said did not need to have anything else added to it.
After visiting Costa Rica I was able to truly start to appreciate different coffee, and that has led me to be strongly against anything dark roasted, including espresso. The fact that they call dark roasted coffee espresso roast no longer holds any bearing for me, I get plenty of pressure and pull the tastiest espresso shots with medium roast light brown beans.
Thanks for sharing your experience, I feel so wet behind the ears hearing about people that have been roasting for decades, it’s crazy that I just stumbled upon this side of coffee when there have been many that were onto it for so long.
Yeah, Ascaso does consume much less power and is ready to brew in much less time than the traditional boiler machine, which is my case. As for roasting style, I have a very similar approach, save for some coffees which I’ll push a bit further into medium. And trust me, it was a chore and a tremendous slog starting early. Now everything is more accessible and available, so you didn’t miss much. All the best and happy roasting.
This past weekend I tried a dark roasted espresso at a fancy coffee shop. I know they were fancy because they had a 50 year old lever espresso machine lol and all the high end accesorries one could imagine.
All of their coffee was way too dark for my personal taste but in the name of being open minded I ordered a black filter coffee and an espresso.
It wasn’t a bad experience, but I do still enjoy my lighter roasted home espresso way more. I tasted some sweet mollasses and dark roasty notes that were nice, but nothing has compared to the burst of citrus and frutiness I have gotten roasting lighter. Even if it is harder to calibrate for lighter roasts I am further convinced you can get more quality from them. The black filter coffee wasn’t bad either, but my pallet has gotten used to lighter roasts and I haven’t been convinced of a reason to go back to dark roast.
I am thankful for all of the resources available now a days but I find myself just sticking to the fundamentals. That being experimenting things on a whim and cupping to see what happened. What has been the biggest game changer for you in the last 10 years and has it changed the way you roast or enjoy coffee?
I must say it was in this order:
While it hasn’t really changed the way I roast, other than the obvious advantages of more control and software, it has changed the way I fix things, which is to say primary by color (pun intended). I can’t say that I’d roast poorly on my Gene, because I do pull it out from time to time, it’s just the comfort of the Bullet and a larger batch size.
As for dark roasts, we do agree they’re meant for commercial environments, as we’ve mentioned above, that prefer consistency over flavor or, in other words, everybody having the same taste and drinking the same thing over and over again.