Holly_Bastin

Hmmm....been thinking hard on this one, because I truly don't have many! I would say that I have a really hard time with the idea that there is only one way to make coffee. Or that the coffee that someone personally likes is "wrong". I mean, I'm not going to tell my dear Grandma that liking her burning hot Maxwell House is wrong. It was what she liked! It was familiar to her - what she grew up on. And, likely tastier than the coffees she had access to in her younger years (the 1930's &40's). If there is one thing I have learned after 20+ years in coffee, it's that coffee is *deeply* personal to folks and highly subjective. That my #hottake :)

Cold Brew is actually my daily coffee go to! For me, I go for a 6:1 ratio of water to coffee and I have found the sweet spot to be around 18 hours. 12 wasn't enough (funky and sour) and 24 was too much (bitter). splitting the difference has given me a lot of balance in the cup. I don't actually refrigerate the coffee while it's brewing, but I leave it at room temperature. I hope that helps!

Great question!! I got into this in another answer, but the grinder is, in my opinion, a little more important than the machine. The machine is a gorgeous hot water heater at the end of the day. As long as the temp is in range and the pressure is around 9 bars, it should be capable of making good coffee. The grinder is where all the action is - the adjustments for espresso are super refined and you need a grinder that gives you infinite settings, ie- control over the extraction. There are some techniques as well that will make or break it, even if you have awesome equipment, but if you have an unrefined grinder, there's not a whole lot you can do to make up for it.

And I have a Rocket Espresso Giotto Timer Evoluzione R Espresso Machine

https://www.curated.com/products/6154001/rocket-espresso-giotto-timer-evoluzione-r-espresso-machine

​

And for my grinder I have a Mahlkonig K30 Twin - Which, to my point, is a commercial grinder that cost more than the machine ;)

​

I hope that helps!

Funny you should ask! We did a tasting at Roast Ratings of the cold brew/iced coffee from major chains. In our experience, Dunkin Donuts had the most reliable cup. I know in the past they have taken great care in sourcing really solid coffees from Colombia fwiw :)

For the record, when it comes to buying random coffee at the grocery store, they also did well in a blind tasting. Not saying it's going to beat out a really well produced single origin from your local roaster, but it'll do in a pinch ;)

If you liked that profile, you might check out Nguyen Coffee Supply, based in NYC. They are a Vietnamese owned roaster and they source their coffees directly. Not all but most coffees from Vietnam are Robusta (rather than our more typical preference for Arabica), which has a LOT to do with the flavor profile you are talking about.