The concept of specialty coffee has been in China for over thirty years, and has experienced rapid development in the last decade. At the same time, people have raised questions about the concept of specialty coffee—pour-over is generally considered specialty coffee, but are Americano, espresso, and the like also specialty coffee? In fact, in international coffee competitions, especially in Northern Europe, espresso has always been an important part of evaluating coffee quality.

Just as we often use the split-pour method to test the feasibility of pour-over brewing recipes, what effect would this method have if applied to espresso extraction?

Front Street Coffee this time will1divide the espresso extraction into three cups—beginning, middle, and end—to separately test the flavor and appearance differences among them. Using the shop-exclusive Sunflower Warm Sun blend, which is composed of7Honduras Sherry coffee beans and3Yirgacheffe sun-dried Red Cherry coffee beans (on a separate roasting line),its flavor profile shows chocolate, cream, vanilla, sherry wine aroma, and caramel notes.

For testing accuracy, a parameter of 20 grams of coffee powder extracting 40 grams of espresso in 28 seconds was used, and calibration was performed multiple times.

This time, equal-volume splitting was adopted, meaning the 40 grams of espresso extracted in 28 seconds was evenly divided into 3 cups of 13 (+1) grams of espresso each.

Actual extraction data

Beginning phase: 0-15 seconds: 13.2 grams

Middle phase: 15-21 seconds: 13.7 grams

End phase:21-28seconds:13.8grams

Appearance comparison:

【Beginning phase】Dark color, relatively rich crema in dark brown, with a texture like set yogurt when swirled;

【Middle phase】Slightly lighter color, crema is light brown, with a texture like whole milk when swirled;

【End phase】Even lighter color, thin crema, crema color close to pale yellow, with a texture like water when swirled.

Flavor comparison:

【Beginning phase】The overall flavor is relatively intense with a full body, with lemon-like acidity that is slightly sharp and a bit salty, with a bitter finish, and a complex floral aroma on the nose, overall on the rich side.

【Middle phase】The overall flavor is relatively balanced, with a medium body, featuring dark chocolate, nut, and cream flavors, and a caramel sweetness in the aftertaste.

【End phase】The overall feel is very thin, with a weak body and watery mouthfeel, featuring cocoa and fermented wine aroma flavors, with an overall comfortable concentration.

 From the above comparison, we can see that the obviously high concentration of the beginning phase represents the vast majority of the flavor substances in espresso, but because the concentration is too high, it is not palatable to us. The middle phase has a slightly lower concentration, allowing us to taste more flavors, such as nut, cream, and caramel notes. The end phase has an overall poor mouthfeel, but its suitable concentration allows even the scant flavor substances to be faintly perceived.

Note that the beginning, middle, and end phases discussed by Front Street this time are all results obtained under stable grinding and extraction conditions through adjustment. The three-stage splitting method is also often used to test espresso extraction plans, for example, extracting in stages into3cups, to find out which stage the defective flavors are concentrated in, and thereby adjust the extraction plan.

The above content is compiled by CoffeeHunters, a coffee news website.