Walt's Corner

This is the third installment of four articles for what I refer to as the 4 Bs for a great cup of coffee. You can catch up on Bean and Burn if you’re interested.

A huge contributing factor to a great cup of joe is the burr – or how it’s ground. Burr type grinders are typically higher end coffee grinders. They work by grinding, or crushing your beans down to the proper coarseness. An almost powder for espresso or up to large chunks for French press. Cheaper grinders will use blades, like a blender. These types chop your beans instead of grinding them. They cost less to produce at the cost of uneven grind yield.

Different types of coffee brewing require different size grounds in order to properly extract the coffee taste from the bean to the water. You don’t want to over or under extract the coffee flavors from your grind. But more of that in my final installment of these four Bs – the Brew.

I’d say Starbucks (or any coffee house) exceeds at this particular B. They’ll have the money to purchase multiple quality burr grinders for different types of brewing.

For my Bunn commercial coffee brewer, I use the Bunn LPG-2E that provides an even medium grind and dumps your coffee grounds directly into the brew basket – the perfect amount every time. This particular model has two hoppers and could hold two different types of beans. You select which side you want to grind from. You can control the courseness and the amount of time you want it to grind when you hit the go button. You can also end it early if you don’t want to grind for the entire period of time you have it pre-set to.

I also use the Rancilio Rocky grinder for my daily espresso needs. The portafilter of my espresso machine sits in the holder directly under the chute and provides a powdery-like grind for use in espresso machines. This grinder is intended for espresso however it can handle a wild variety of grinds from espresso to French Press.