I just got back from Spain where we enjoyed several coffee shops/bars with caffeinated beverages. One I thing I noticed was several grinders had a little built in tamp sticking out of the front and the people pulling the shot just barely press the portafilter to the tamping arm. Similar to the tamper on this guy.
Is tamping with any force just not necessary? How can they pull a good shot without that being part of the process.
by extrastupidthrowaway
19 Comments
You can dial in your grinds to the tamp force that you use. I definitely dont tamp to the 30lb force that people quote.
I am currently in spain and can tell you, they aren’t famous for their coffee quality. At least they brought the cortado to the world
Consistency not force is the key, you don’t have to try to push the tamper through the portafilter…
Just until the coffee stops compressing is enough.
I’d say that doing your WDT thoroughly, leveling out the grounds, and tamping level, is more important than tamping with force. Finger pressure is all I need, not even 1 kg of pressure if I put the portafilter on a weigh scale.
Europe is a big place. Did you see this anywhere else outside of Spain? It sound like you just went to more ‘traditional’ cafes, rather than third-wave. Not uncommon in Portugal and Italy.
Spanish are just lazy /s
Think nobody said the OP is from the US.
Overall bad quality, no options for good coffee (except for some rare good coffee shops).
Light tamp is the last of the issues with Spain coffee however.
Main issue is torrefacto.
Second, dirty machines.
Were they pulling good shots? I would bet that they weren’t.
I will get flagellated for this but Europeans do not know what a fucking cup of coffee is. I have been all over the continent and it is always the weakest, wateriest, lukewarmest slop. I think their anti-freedom laws make it so that they’re unable to serve drinks above a certain temperature or caffeine level. A “latte” is not a latte to them, it is a cup of brown milk warmed up slightly. Every time I go now I just end up buying beans at the store and pulling them at a friend’s house.
Thank you for explaining what the hell that piece on my grinder was lol
Weirdly enough, as I was coffeescrolling Lance Hendricks videos yesterday, I remember him mentioning how you can see Italian baristas barely tamp the grounds because they use Robusta beans which are pretty easy to extract the coffee from.
I had coffee at a cafe recently in Crete. (yes, it’s part of Europe.) It was not watery brown swill. not even close.
Putting some physics background out there: The analogy I like to use is that if you think of the prepped coffee in the portafilter is like a marshmallow, the roughly 9 bar water pressure hits that puck like a bulldozer driving over the marshmallow.
It matters absolutely zero if your puck is even/parallel to the floor across the top or how firmly it’s tamped *as long as* it’s tamped enough that when the water hits it, the grounds don’t get caught up in the moving water and wash about.
TLDR: a light tamp will do. The rest is voodoo/superstition/ritualistic magic/a matter of faith.
ETA: So what do so many people think tamping is critical? Because it’s been popularized and most people aren’t physicists. It’s not bad to tamp but it’s not helping, either. Give a light but firm tamp a try and see if anything changes.
Spaniard here…. We’re not not known for espresso. Most our coffee is drowned in milk. Want good espresso? hit Albania up…. Every little shop excels at it 🙂
There’s a link somewhere where someone CT scanned prepared filters tamped at different forces and more pressure made practically zero difference in grain packing
No need to press that hard
How was the coffee? Cafes are optimized for speed and consistency. Also dark roast from a grinder that produces enough fines means the puck will always hold pressure even with a light tamp.
Puck prep is more critical with lighter roasts that are harder to extract properly.
Since i learned that you can’t over tamp i decided to not waste money on a wdt.
Most of the regional hospitals have a proper barista and espresso machine in the coffee shop.
When the organisation i work for moved buildings, they provided us with a full time barista and commercial machine, just to provide our staff needs. Gone are the days of having a cup of instant or one of those commercial pour over style machines burning sludge in the corner.