Subscribe to join fellow home baristas and get better at brewing. Sign up today!
The technical side of better coffee, made approachable. Guides on extraction, water temperature, grind size, and brew ratios — written for people who want to understand what they’re doing, not just follow instructions blindly.
Cold brew coffee is one of the easiest ways to make coffee at home, and it doesn’t require any special equipment, heat, or precise timing down to the second. It’s also fundamentally different from iced coffee, even though the two get confused constantly. This guide covers exactly what cold brew is, the ratio and grind…
You don’t need an espresso machine to make genuinely good coffee at home. Some of the most highly regarded brewing methods in the world — French press, pour over, AeroPress — don’t involve espresso at all, and most of them cost less than $50 to get started with. This guide covers everything a complete beginner…
If you’ve spent any time reading about espresso, you’ve run into the phrase “dial it in” — usually said as if it’s obvious what that means. It isn’t, especially if you’re new to this. This guide explains exactly what dialling in means, why it matters, and walks through the process step by step, using a…
If your espresso tastes sharp, tart, or reminds you of lemon juice or green apple, you’re dealing with under-extraction. It’s one of the most common problems home baristas run into, and the good news is that it almost always comes down to one variable: grind size. This guide explains exactly why sour espresso happens, what’s…
Bitter espresso is one of the most common complaints from home baristas, and the good news is that in the vast majority of cases, it has nothing to do with your machine. It’s a technique problem — which means it’s fixable right now, for free, with what you already have. This guide walks through every…
