Why do my lattes taste so much better than anything I get at any coffee shop I go to? And I say better, I just mean a little sweeter (despite me only using whole milk), and more robust of a flavor (i can take a wider range of flavors from my beans). I don’t buy super expensive coffee, just a fresh, local roast, but still I can’t stand getting a latte out at a shop anymore.
by detBittenbinder23
27 Comments
Most coffee shops are terrible, because all they need to do to succeed (in most places) is to be marginally less terrible than Starbucks.
If you are lucky enough to find a truly exceptional coffee shop, it will be very hard to outperform it on taste at home.
The average barista in a cafe is making 50~100 coffees per hour so we’re talking spending less than 1 minute per coffee. At home I think we all spend far longer than that and its all the little things that make a difference.
Naughty boy.
I just ordered a Flat Black at a decent but no-kind-of-wave local shop – I got an Americano. They aren’t super busy but they have a rhythm. They don’t have the grind tuned to my tastes – it’s adjusted to a middle ground of customer tastes and their average coffee. They added a but more coffee and pulled the shot a bit shorter than a standard Americano. But hey … dilute espresso? Why would I care.
When I’m at home it’s all done the way I like it so of course it’s better 😌
There’s something special about the love and pride taken in making your own!
In your own house you dial in your coffee to your own preferences. You can fine tune it until it’s perfect for you.
In a shop, there’s a lot more variables. Are they hiring good baristas and paying them well? Is the shop too busy to be precise with their shots at that moment?
Different beans have different commercial viability, and local preferences also change how they tweak their drinks.
My local shop mostly hires people who love coffee. They actually have decent espresso shots, even if their style is different to what I’d make at home.
Generalizing here, but most coffee shops don’t take care to get amazing products out. In fact, some great shops will use sub-par pulls for espresso in their milk based drinks. Mainly due to the fact that milk will cover up a lot of the imperfections. I had a shop pull 3 shots before giving me one to drink as they were still getting it dialed in. Barista was nice enough to give me all 3 to try and see the difference between the pulls. Amazing what a few seconds on either side would do.
You need to visit Melbourne. Especially for black pours, you will ask the big questions, like how fast can i migrate? What’s the price of a house in Australia, can I find a job here?
Watch how long their shots pull for. Ive noticed that the majority of the shops I go to (even specialty shops) pull their shots way too fast, and I can tell when I go to drink it.
What country are you in? As when we went to the US most coffee shops we went to were absolutely atrocious.
I gave up long ago getting lattes on the economy. SO many bad, bad experiences and not one that was even tolerable. Around me everyone like Tims or Starcucks, both which have poor starting ingredients and often inattentive staff.
I make mine at home in the evening when I have time and in the mood. So much better. A solid quality full fat milk, properly steamed is also great.
I’d put my lattes against any coffee shop
A lot of it have to do with the brand of milk you use.
Anecdote. I went to a little tucked away coffee shop. I ordered and watched as the guy tapped the previous shot out of the portafilter, and with some of the previous puck still in it, proceeded to grind more beans to make my drink.
Final product was way too hot, and tasted burned.
None of these things happen when making coffee at home.
What is absolutely wild is running rancid burnt beans through a 5 figure espresso machine, talk about a waste of resources.
I began wondering what would a freshly roasted batch of beans would taste like if pulled through one of those behemoths. Would it extract something else more divine than my measly several hundred dollar machine?
Because they’re 1/3 the cost of a cafe
I started making my own espresso at home after a trip to italy 2 years ago. I knew coffee shop espresso drinks here were bad, I just never realised exactly how bad they were. Cheap coffee that is dumped without care. I just stopped going out for coffee altogether. The fact that people still line up for starbucks garbage is just baffling to me!
Your standards have risen based on your experience at home. I feel the same way. Except for a local roaster/cafe where I sometimes get beans.
You can better judge the quality of the coffee house if you just order something like an espresso or an Americano. No pretense of flavoring or milk to hide the skill of the barista. Once you find a place that makes good espresso, then you switch to order lattes and don’t go to any other coffee shops
Love
I live in SFV region of LA and always get a shot of espresso along with my latte when I try a new coffee shop and everything is bitter or sour. I was on the hunt for a good budget espresso setup for my home but I’ve literally given up on buying a machine because I have yet to taste good espresso. Is it possible to make espresso that isn’t bitter or sour?
r/espressocirclejerk
Like others said, it’s probably the care and attention to detail. Most cafes around me don’t do a great job, but there are a few that are amazing, run by obsessive craftspeople. If they mess up a drink they will remake it, no exceptions. Even up against that competition, you may prefer your own lattees just because they’re dialed in to your preferencesp
You make it how you like it, shops have to make it the way most people will like it (just good enough to be passable) as well as the speed at which they make drinks/ cleanliness of the equipment vs what you use at home. I agree though making coffee at home really ruins the cafe experience because you know exactly what you like and you can’t guarantee that a shop will be able to match or exceed your expectations
I’ve never seen a barista wdt their ground, probably because it’s not economical. Quality vs quantity.
Don’t discount the fact you are enjoying a custom made latte, you made for yourself on your own time and in the comfort of your own home. Compare that to shelling out six bucks for someone else to make a drink in someone else’s business, when they get to it, with other people around you, talking loudly on their phones, etc before grabbing your drink in a paper cup and off to run errands.
There’s no comparison.
To be fair, find a good coffee shop and you won’t have this problem.