Ah, Espresso

I remember when I was little, and I used to eagerly crowd the breakfast table next to mom or dad, and watch them drink that mysterious steaming black brew. It had such a wonderful aroma, and I suppose it's every child's dream to emulate the sophistication and importance of his parent's mundane daily activities. So the simple act of taking coffee in the morning became, for me, part of a large, mysterious world that I might one day become a part of, if only I would hurry up and grow up.

One day, to my great surprise, my mother asked me with a sly smile on her face, if I would like to try a cup of coffee? Try it??!! OF COURSE!!! ...black, of course, just like my dad had it.

Well, childhood is filled with a myriad of eye opening, painful, and unexpected surprises; and coffee was one of those. It wasn't painful, not to my senses; but it was painful because it was such a tremendous disappointment to me. How could this bitter, biting concoction smell so wonderful? And taste so awful? I had implicit trust in my nose, and still do... but this was one of those rare times when the aroma just didn't match up to what my taste buds were telling me was passing over my tongue. A ton of sugar and cream later, I managed to nod to my mother that all the coffee was gone from my cup (she offered to take it away when she first observed my expression, but I knew that this was a rite of passage and I was damned if I was going to forfeit any claim to manhood).

Well, over the next few years I made a few more half hearted attempts at coffee, but without inordinate amounts of cream and sugar, I could never stomach that bitter, black brew.

Then came Grunge, and small cafes popped up overnight, seemingly everywhere, with something new... called CAFE MOCHA... and the first time I tried it, the images of my mother and father and our small, tiny kitchen nursing their steaming mugs late at night or early in the morning came back to me, unbidden. Cafe mocha and cappuccino finally delivered on the implicit promise made years ago by the aroma of coffee that I always so fondly remembered. Needless to say, I became a mocha freak, going out almost nightly to seek out new cafes to try it from... and one of the very first things I discovered was that there was a large discrepancy in the quality of the brew that I paid $4 a cup for, mostly dependant upon the person behind the counter drawing the cup. Determined to get to the lowest common denominator and work my way up, I purchased one of the very first Krups thermoblock machines to hit the market, perhaps 4 or 5 years ago... but discovered, to my disappointment, that although it could struggle and produce a passing cup, it could never deliver a truly great cup. I don't know how to adequately describe a great cup... it has a certain HEAD, when you quaff a mouthful of brew, that comes up in the back of your throat and your nostrils; and tingles a bit, notifying you of the caffiene and aromatic oils present. I could never quite get that out of the Krups, try as I might.

A month ago, I was skimming the ads under "restaurant equipment" and saw that a restaurant had recently closed and was advertising a slew of commercial equipment, at greatly reduced prices. I found and secured a 6 month old La Pavoni BAR-V model, which is quite large, weighs perhaps 200 lbs and #@!!##$@$!! like an idiot, I didn't even measure it up because I was so excited at the find. Some of my kitchen cabinets are still sitting on the spare bed in the guest room as a result. I discovered later it lists for something like $10,500 for the espresso unit, and another $900 for the grinder... I purchased both for about $1200, with another $200 for shipping. A lot to pay for a cup of coffee, but par for the course in my life; everything seems to fall into two well defined categories in my life, so far... excessive as hell, or else just "ok." I don't know many others who share such a binary existance, but it makes for some interesting times.

The unit is very nice, and has adjustments internally for brew pressure and steam pressure, but keep in mind that if you buy a commercial unit, you will have to hard wire it for water (I tapped off the refrigerator water feed line, but the dishwasher line would work as well... and you have to install a water purifier, or your steam wand and boiler won't last very long), provide for drainage (I just use a catch bucket under the counter the unit sits on since it's on the opposite side of the kitchen as my basin), and also wire the unit with 220V.

It takes approximately 10 minutes to reach operating pressure, although I like to run lots of cups of water through the holders to heat them up; another 5 minutes... and it has taken me this long to figure out the proper combination of ground size, tamping pressure, water pressure, and dose sizing to get a really excellent cup. Crema is no problem with a machine like this, you can get as much as you want; and of course with a commercial rig, steam is never in short supply and will quickly overpower any amount of milk you care to throw at it, even if you live on a dairy. I am, and continue to be, ecstatic with this machine, even though it's just on the other side of practical. I'm not rich; far from it, but for the things that are REALLY important, you just need to find a way.

Walt

PS 9/7/00 I've just posted a very blurry pic of this machine: if interested, go to: www.iav.com/~wtani/coffee1.jpg for a frontal shot of the machine; sorry it's so blurry, my camera is a cheap Sony 640x480. The second pic at www.iav.com/~wtani/coffee2.jpg is a closeup of the guages that monitor city water pressure, water pressing pressure during the extraction process, and boiler tank pressure. Readout is in bar (one bar=one atmosphere, about 15 psi... and yes, i think the proper spelling is "barre" but between the Italians, Americans, French and we modern Hawaiians, I don't think it makes too much difference) If you look carefully in the first pic, you'll notice the cabinets on the upper left that are supposed to continue above the machine... and the marks on the wall where i had to tear out the existing cabinets to make room for this monster. The specs say it weighs 208 lbs, but with the water tank filled it's probably closer to 240 or so...