Transcription
You want to make good espresso with the De'Longhi EC 685 or the 885, which is standing here in front of us. It's been a bit upgraded here, but what we explain in this video can be applied to all De'Longhi machines. And I would say we'll just dive in. We'll talk about preparing espresso, how you can program the machine, and thus get the best out of your espresso. [Music] I'm happy to welcome Felix to my side again, who was not only Vice Barista Champion in Germany, but also won championships in Switzerland, everywhere, actually. Yes, that was a few years ago. The only thing I can still say is that I am the reigning Vice Roasting Champion. Yes, yes, that's true, of course, in Switzerland, in Switzerland, but also because no new roasting championship has taken place for many years. It's never my fault. It's not your fault. You would have certainly defended your Vice Champion title. But Felix, I'm happy. You are also responsible for our gastronomy. You deal with all sorts of espresso machines. Today you'll explain to us what we need to consider if we want to make good espresso at home or in our camper van with the De'Longhi. You've also had such a machine in your camper van. It can be used absolutely everywhere, it's small, it's handy, and we've already discussed the machine in four videos. This is now another upgrade or an update, specifically how to prepare it, and what would you say is the prerequisite for good espresso with the machine? First, we need to make sure we have good water. Longevity, limescale, and so on, of course. So, soft water. We'll link a recommendation for you below. It should be water with a hardness of 3, 4, 5 total hardness and an appropriate alkalinity. If you want to know more about that, follow our link below or the video I'm linking for you above. You need good coffee, that's clear, depending on your taste, something darker, something stronger in taste, or not. And the coffee already determines a bit how I set the temperature on the machine, and that would be the first point we can address. Which temperature is important to set? Exactly. Beforehand, you need to know one thing, and that is that we already have a different portafilter in here. Yes, the problem is with the standard supplied sieve, we don't have a real sieve, but this fake sieve, which is intended for pre-ground coffee. We've made this upgrade and a different drip tray. It doesn't matter for what you're doing with the standard version. This, on the other hand, is essential for everything we're showing now, especially regarding espresso settings and extraction. Yes, and that's also the prerequisite for being able to use a grinder, and that's an absolute recommendation from us. Don't use the fake sieves, don't use the double-walled sieves, but use a small grinder. There are already variations for that, which sometimes cost as much as the machine. But there's also a hand grinder that can grind espresso finely. We've made videos about that, we'll link them for you below as well, and then you're in the game. Today we're using a larger single-dosing grinder, but you don't have to use it, but you need a grinder to grind the coffee fresh, because what happens after grinding? Yes, well, there's what someone once told me: in 15 minutes, 60% of the aroma is lost. Whether it's 60 or 70 or 50, a lot flies away anyway. And yes, it's just much more fun in the cup when you have freshly ground coffee, and it's not just fun in taste, but also in working with it, because then I can react to it, make it a bit finer if the espresso ran too quickly, or or or. Exactly, and indeed, it does have a taste implication again. If the espresso ran too quickly, it often tastes sour, aggressive. Then we want to set it finer to have enough resistance. And if it ran too long, then the grind was too fine, and then we have to adjust the grinder. And if you buy pre-ground coffee, you're buying a pig in a poke, as they say. Yes, a pig in a poke, a pig in a poke, or a sack of potatoes, and you don't know what's inside. Yes, so everything in the bag, everything in the bag is not good with coffee now, is it? We want to know what we'll do with it afterwards. Felix, and then we have the option to choose a coffee, and there's a spectrum of colors, roast levels, tastes, and of course preferences. What do you recommend when we talk about the temperature levels? There are three here. There are three temperature levels. The first one is around 90, 91 degrees, relatively cool. Sometimes it shoots over a bit, which is why we'll also recommend a special protocol for you. Exactly. The second temperature level is in the range that we find very attractive. It's around 92-93 degrees. And the third temperature level is significantly hotter, around 95 to 97 degrees. I would actually hardly recommend that, unless I have a very light filter coffee roast that somehow has to serve as espresso, but I really don't want to recommend it to you. I see it exactly the same way. So, as a basic setting, we can say that this is also a bit of a correction to earlier videos now with the machines we've tested and the comparisons we've made. For most of our coffees, we would recommend temperature level 2, so the middle level. For very dark roasts, which are of course also offered in various places, whether it's an Italian roast somewhere in the supermarket, temperature level 1 might be better. That's why we recommended that to you back then in our video. Exactly, and at the same time, setting the temperature is so easy. You can just try it out. If you have the basic setting, what tastes best to you? How do we set the temperature? Actually, it's quite simple. The machine is already on, and then we just press the steam button until the lights start blinking here. We let them blink, and now I press once for an espresso, and now they blink through one by one: 1, 2, 3. And if I want the first level, I press the first button. If I want the second level, the second button, or the third button. I press it, press it on two, then I have to wait a moment, then it's confirmed by a blink, and that's it. Great. With that, we are at temperature level 2 and can actually make espresso. And for that, we also recommend a specific protocol, from turning it on to the first espresso. That's probably the classic, isn't it? You turn on the machine because you want an espresso right away. That's relatively quick with this machine. In 3 minutes, you can actually make your espresso. How does the protocol work, Felix? Exactly. We've turned on the machine just now, it's already hot. But the portafilter is still cold. That's the problem, however you want to call it, with thermoblocks, that the system at the back is hot, but the front is still cooled down. It's not just the thermoblock, it's simply the short heating time of the entire system. Exactly. If we were to leave it like this, it would warm up a bit more over time, but in 3 minutes, especially the stainless steel portafilter, it's not heated through. That's why we need to help a bit, and for that, we recommend: we'll do a blank shot to the portafilter. [Music] Heating. Exactly. We heard there's always this pre-infusion. It's there with this machine, and we can't turn it on or off. We have to live with it, but you can also live with it very well. It doesn't make life incredibly difficult. No. The portafilter is now hot, so we can get to work and grind the coffee. Or exactly. I'll leave it in there for a moment longer because I'm going to make the coffee with this single-dosing grinder now. About 16 grams fit into our sieve. You have to check a bit what sieve you have, what's a good guideline so you don't overfill your sieve. Felix? Yes, after you've done the extraction, you should check by pressing your finger in that you can make a slight, light imprint with your finger, but there shouldn't already be a large imprint from the sieve visible, no screw or anything. But even if it has expanded, there's still a little space, maybe a small imprint, but not a large one. We grind the coffee fresh. In this case, we're using our Appas, the espresso, which we also use a lot in our training. It's a bit of an all-rounder. Almost everyone who visits likes it. If that's not dark and strong enough for someone, we recommend our Mami. And in the other direction, there are of course various other coffees that show other profiles, but this one is simply easy to prepare and quickly gets to the point in the broad range. Exactly. You've just done something that went very quickly, but yes, you've also talked a lot in the meantime. Yes, I ground it, placed it on top with the small dosing cup, distributed it once, compacted it vertically, and then cleaned it with my fingers to make sure it was straight, tamped it once, and that's it. Especially the vertical compaction is important because the coffee settles and distributes itself again, many inclusions, air inclusions close up again, and then you have less channeling, which is always a danger and which then doesn't taste so good. The coffee seeks the path where there is less resistance. Exactly. Now we need two espresso cups very quickly, and now we have a small hack protocol. We'll start the pre-infusion twice now. [Music] We do this because we then have a better temperature curve. We've really seen that we stay nicely at this temperature of 92 degrees, whereas if we don't rinse, we always break off a bit at the back and fall, and then often end up around 88 degrees. This way, it stays nicely at the height. Exactly. And now we haven't set the machine to our volume, our volumetric setting yet. And now it's actually very simple. If we want to set the volumetric setting, we start the timer and then we just press the button, the middle brew button, for as long as we want the volume in the cup. In other words, you're now actually setting a recipe. We used 16 grams, we want to extract, for example, 32 grams, so 16 grams of coffee in each of the two espresso cups afterwards, so a ratio of 1 to 2. Then we stop again the moment the 16 grams are shown on the scale. Then we can stop, and it's saved. The moment you stop, it saves it. It takes it up again, or rather, it can then be repeated next time at the touch of a button. And then you no longer need a scale. The scale was actually a tool for orientation to set a clean brew ratio according to the recipe. Exactly. I have to say, it's really great volumetric control. Once it's set, I don't have to worry about it anymore. In the ratio of the ground coffee, it runs very, very nicely, unless, of course, the grind is adjusted coarser, if there's less resistance, then it deviates a bit. That's a bit of a problem, but if we've set the grind correctly, then we've had relatively consistent results in the cup. Exactly. And one more thing: if you want to set this brew ratio, the machine has no expansion valve. What does that mean? It means that the pressure that builds up in the brewing chamber during extraction can only go in one direction, and that's down into the cup. Depending on when I stop, if I've stopped at, for example, 14 grams on the cup, then it's possible that I'll have 18 grams in the cup afterwards because it takes a little while for everything to run through. That's just how it is. You have to anticipate it a bit. You can, of course, remove the cups and say, "Okay, I'll stop a bit earlier," or you can factor that in, that there will be a bit of dripping afterwards. Important: if you've chosen a finer grind, be careful when tamping. There's still pressure on it, especially if you work like we are now, not with a double-walled sieve, but with a finely ground, well-adjusted grind. It really still has power, and you have to open it carefully so that the power can be released and you don't create a big mess in the kitchen. Now I would say let's drink an espresso. We've made a super espresso, we can drink it now. I'll get us two small spoons quickly to stir it a bit to dissolve the layering and have a balanced espresso with one sip. We made it with medium temperature. Yes, super sweet, nice nutty, chocolatey espresso that is relatively easy to prepare. Recap again: for whom is which temperature level practical? If you have a medium roast, we recommend the medium temperature level, so level 2. If you have a dark roast and you notice you're a bit too bitter, we recommend going to temperature level 1, the lower temperature level. You'll get better results with that. You might notice from time to time when you use the machine that it turns off quickly. That's an advantage, of course, because you don't have power consumption. But you can also program this auto-off. Exactly. It's set to 9 minutes by default, and I mean, the question is now, do I have the minute and a half time if it's turned off? Or not? You can change it. It works exactly the same way as setting the temperature. We hold down the steam button again until the buttons on the front start blinking, and then I press once for steam, and then I can go and say, do I want the espresso button, which would be 9 minutes? Do I want two espressos, which would be 30? Or do I want the steam button, which would be 3 hours? Press it once, then it's saved, and that's it. And that's it. And with that, you've learned everything important from us that we consider important for preparing good espresso with the De'Longhi Dedica EC 685, with the 885, and the models in between. They all work relatively the same. If you've had further experience with the machine, how you handle it, feel free to write to us in the comments. It's certainly very valuable for the community as well. And otherwise, we'd be very happy if you give us a like or subscribe if you like this video and the other videos we make on this channel. We report from cultivation to the cup about coffee. This is actually something we do practically. We have a small farm in Nicaragua, we roast the coffee here in Basel, we have two coffee shops, and everything we learn along the coffee chain, we pass on in our courses, but also in these videos. And so we test espresso machines, give tips, and make preparation recommendation videos like this one. There's a fourth video in this series, namely on the topic of descaling, which will come in the next few days. And until then, we say, have fun with your machine, drink good coffee, bye and see you soon, ciao ciao.