Kostverlorenvaart

LONDINIUM-R BY ROEMER (FILMED WITH LEICA Q Music: The Judge, by Peter Beets New York Trio

Some forum pals asked me for confirmation on the 'shot volume' of the LONDINIUM-R.  The shot volume in itself is irrelevant, but what it indicates is the initial pressure of the shot. If the lever is catching low, that means extraction, pushing out the espresso starts at a higher spring pressure, and therefore the higher overall pressure profile of the shot if you use it for the first 30g of espresso (and let the rest flow away into the drip tray).  The adjustable consistent pre-infusion pressure of the LONDINIUM-R allows you to find and select the pressure profile (and in consequence also the temperature profile) of your personal taste preference. What determines the shot volume with a lever machine?     There is a pocket of air above the puck: between the puck & the shower screen and above that between the shower screen and the bottom of the piston. The piston is first moved up and a little more air is sucked in through the puck. Then wate...

First impressions: At the 2 bar pre-infusion that the machine arrived with, the behaviour and taste were like the very best shots I recall from my time with the 'old' L1 Luxe and at 3 bar pre-infusion it was just as full bodied as the shots I am used to getting from my L1-P (which is named the L1 nowadays). Also, the pump works fast indeed and it's more quiet in sound than I expected. It moves a lot of water in a short time so I expected a sharp but brief whine and in real life it's much less intrusive and over before you know it. Tips: If you get the machine, reserve at least 2-3 hours to get everything neatly unpacked and sorted without interruptions by others. Warm up the panels that you want to peel the white protective plastic off. Observe that to get the side panels off, you first need to get the top panel off. When putting the top panel back on, first keep the water tank out and before applying force, make sure you understand where every part of the t...

This just in. I heard the heavy sliding door of the truck, looked out and indeed there was the delivery, 9 minutes ahead of the noon sharp delivery time estimated by DHL yesterday 4pm. I will now unpack and install. For anyone curious to know the difference between what was until the end of 2016 called the L1 and this machine in the same outer body but with a different and upgraded internal architecture, the following. In short, it has variable pre-infusion and it makes espresso with water out of the fresh water tank rather than water that comes indirectly from the boiler. More specifically, in the words of Reiss Gunson quoted from his forum: the L1/2/3 all share the same architecture with approximately 7 litres of boiler per group and inclined HX tubes that run transverse across the length of the boiler. they are intended for commercial applications, and in my view a bit over the top for domestic use the LR seeks to mimic the above design, but in a smaller footprint...

On his blog , Reiss Gunson posted this first photo of a long row of L-R machines getting ready to march into the world. The home size machine delivering a full bodied shot with great ease. A glimpse of the new compact rotary pumps can be seen in between the frames. From the outside it seems just like the Londinium version built for home users until december last year, what used to be called The L-1 but the changed internal architecture and the compact but powerful rotation pump and its own dedicated user adjustable pressostat makes this a game changing machine. In a conversation on his support forum, Reiss explained that the pre-infusion in this machine allows it to perform like the commercial size one, two and three group machines, the L3, L2 and the L1 (which would previously be called the L1-P): PI is a bit like Goldilocks & the three bears i think - it is a matter of moderation If you run the PI too high the shot tastes weird (L1(2017 on)/L2/L3 owners will be able t...

One can use this beautiful set as a device to simply admire for its nerdiness and super smart engineering, a jewel adorning the vintage machine. Or, if one uses it while being observant of the pressure indication, it can teach one, over time, what shots one actually prefers and it also tells one if the extraction pressure one applies with is really nice and gradual, without hits and drops and ups and downs that one normally does not 'see'. Video below was shot and edited (using my pix) by  Roemer Overdiep Peak pressure this morning shot: Assembly tips for La Pavoni and Cremina owners, by Kavekalmar who took the LM Strada pressure gauge and modified it in signature NAKED fashion: The concept was born about a year ago, like this:

Tije built a new roast chamber which allows a larger load to roast. The (free, donation supported) Artisan software reduces airflow as the beans get less heavy and the Artisan PID follows the designed background. See also https://github.com/artisan-roaster-scope/artisan

A night at the pleasant little Hotel de Zon in Oosterwolde. Even though the coffee downstairs is certainly not bad and there is an Italian Pizza place across the canal I brought the basic travel kit along to enjoy a cup of lovely Kenya espresso in the afternoon after checking in, and another one after breakfast before checking out to return home again. Fellow coffee enthusiast Theo had room #11 and since were going to stop by Peter van der Weerd 's workshop for a service check-up of his Rocket Giotto, we did not leave that one out in the freezing cold either and it sat next to my on-the-road set to enhance the view. 'making of' picture by The Koeten:

(See also:  http://kostverlorenvaart.blogspot.nl/2016/11/the-area-under-curve.html ) Arnoud from Hoofdkwartier  kindly shared the opportunity to acquire some Kenya, Kianyangi washing station arabica coffee from Dorman . A parcel with two 15kg vacuum blocks were delivered by airmail, one for Arnoud, one for me. Certainly not cheap but very promising. The smell of the greens is delightful so I wanted to take care not to ruin the product and I even postponed giving these a shot for a week or so. Before this batch I roasted 15kg's of Brazilian beans and they were much cheaper but very tricky as well. They hardly made a sound so there was no way to know when First Crack was happening. Later on there was the audible rustle of Second Crack and around Dry End there was an amazing amount of smoke coming out, but otherwise the cryptic beans were hard to master. When I'd about given up on them they proved to be great to blend with some other roasts though and now I'm enjoying the ...

http://www.naked-portafilter.com/shop/naked-espresso-gears/

In a correspondence, the current owner of the Artisan Documentation page at Coffeetroupe told me he is currently focused on other projects and he has little time to keep expanding and editing the website to reflect the current new versions of Artisan . It would nevertheless be a loss if these pages were simply deleted since more and more roasters are converting from expensive subscription based roasting software solutions towards the free, open source and donation-supported Artisan project. Below I will accumulate a number of content pages from the Coffeetroupe website so these will remain online in some form. Even though Artisan has been developed further, much of the information may still be useful and I will be able to gradually edit and update it. ------- More soon!

Maarten van der Jagt just posted this clip which he filmed in 2010 in Panama. Interesting details about working in coffee harvesting and history of Panama back from the time that the Spanish explorers 'discovered' Panama.