Grinding your own coffee beans

keodell1966

I’ve been buying my coffee beans already ground because I need them coarse. Just this past week I tried using my stores grinder. Not a good thing. Some came out very very fine, some just a little coarse. I guess I need a grinder. Any tips on a good one that won’t break the bank?

mmapags

A krups burr grinder. Costs around $65. Has replaceable burrs when they wear, about 8 to 10 years. Is well built and will last forever.

As a bit of background, I used to roast my own coffee from green beans and grind fresh daily. I now live in Oaxaca, MX and can get fabulous organic fair trade beans at a great price. I grind fresh each morning and use the grinder I'm recommending to you. It has a wide degree of settings from coarse to very fine. There will always be a little fine grounds. It's just the nature of it. But overall texture is excellent.

OldHobo

I use a Hario Ceramic Coffee Mill -"Skerton Pro." This Japanese company has been well known and respected for manual burr grinders for years but the knock on them was that with very coarse grinds like you would want in a French press the vertical shaft becomes unstable. The "Skerton Pro" model has solved that problem and improved the mechanism for making grind adjustments. Both issues are important to me since I roast some beans darker and grind very coarsely for use in a French press. Others I think are better more lightly roasted with a medium grind and brewed with a pour-over method.

I'm very satisfied with the Skerton Pro but to my knowledge, it is the only manual grinder I would find satisfactory.

nicsflyingcircus

mmapags wrote: »

A krups burr grinder. Costs around $65. Has replaceable burrs when they wear, about 8 to 10 years. Is well built and will last forever.

As a bit of background, I used to roast my own coffee from green beans and grind fresh daily. I now live in Oaxaca, MX and can get fabulous organic fair trade beans at a great price. I grind fresh each morning and use the grinder I'm recommending to you. It has a wide degree of settings from coarse to very fine. There will always be a little fine grounds. It's just the nature of it. But overall texture is excellent.

Same grinder we use (gift from the husband for Christmas) and we grind on the daily for our drip coffee maker, then sometimes I grind super fine for my Aeropress or very coarse for the French press. Whicher way I set it I get a very consistent grind for what I want/need.

amy19355

another vote for a burr grinder - I'm not sure what brand I have, but the hopper holds about 1/2# of beans, and the grind options have 15 setting adjustments possible.

I use an aeropress and grind setting 8 is perfect.

OldHobo

amy19355 wrote:

another vote for a burr grinder - I'm not sure what brand I have, but the hopper holds about 1/2# of beans, and the grind options have 15 setting adjustments possible.

Grinding ½ pound of beans at a time would come in handy if you needed to brew 3½ quarts of coffee at one time.

Sorry, couldn't resist.

keodell1966

Thanks for the info everyone!

sgt1372

I've used a cheap $20 Bodum blade grinder for years to grind my daily coffee French press brew w/satisfactory results.

Bought a cheap Bofum conial burr grinder for about $50 because everyone seemed to say it was better. The grind was better, more even and uniform, but the grinder died in only a few months of use, which is a recurrently reported problem w/cheaper burr grinders.

To avoid this problem, based on the reviews I've read, you apparently need to buy more expensive and durable burr grinders in the $200+ range but I don't think the quality of the grinding is SO MUCH better that I need to spend that kind of money on a grinder.

My $20 Bofum blade grinder is good enough for my needed and I've got a 2nd one that I use for spices too. ☺️

icemom011

I use Capresso burr grinder. It has many settings from super fine grind to very coarse. I've had it for a while, using almost daily and it was under $100, don't remember exactly now. I'm very happy with it, consistent, even grind.

wilson10102018

Beans should be ground and then they should sit for a bit. Somewhere more than a few days and less than a few weeks. The aromatic esters that are lost are not good flavor components. They are acidic and sharp notes.

And, the fascination with Starbucks like dark roast is really misplaced. A cheap way to get a strong but bad tasting cup. Buy a can of Folgers and use 1.5 times the amount you were using. Very few home made formulas will equal it.

OldHobo

wilson10102018 wrote: »

Beans should be ground and then they should sit for a bit
....

This has the ring of misunderstood truth. If you were to change it to, "Beans should be ground roasted and then they should sit for a bit..," you would be on the right track.

mmapags

OldHobo wrote: »

wilson10102018 wrote: »

Beans should be ground and then they should sit for a bit
....

This has the ring of misunderstood truth. If you were to change it to, "Beans should be ground roasted and then they should sit for a bit..," you would be on the right track.

Agreed. Beans oxidize far more rapidly once ground. Far more surface area exposed to oxygen. When roasted, beans are at their peak at about the 48 to 72 hour point. For the first 24 to 48 hours they are off gassing CO2.

There is then a few day window of peak flavor. After that they gradually oxidize and loose flavor. After a week or so, it not stored under airtight conditions, they degrade somewhat. Good storage conditions, airtight, dark, dry, can extend the flavor life somewhat.

runningjen74

OldHobo wrote: »

I use a Hario Ceramic Coffee Mill -"Skerton Pro." This Japanese company has been well known and respected for manual burr grinders for years but the knock on them was that with very coarse grinds like you would want in a French press the vertical shaft becomes unstable. The "Skerton Pro" model has solved that problem and improved the mechanism for making grind adjustments. Both issues are important to me since I roast some beans darker and grind very coarsely for use in a French press. Others I think are better more lightly roasted with a medium grind and brewed with a pour-over method.

I'm very satisfied with the Skerton Pro but to my knowledge, it is the only manual grinder I would find satisfactory.

I used one of these, just the added time to make coffee when half asleep was too much for me. I ended up preferring a not quite as good but electric one.

wilson10102018

OldHobo wrote: »

wilson10102018 wrote: »

Beans should be ground and then they should sit for a bit
....

This has the ring of misunderstood truth. If you were to change it to, "Beans should be ground roasted and then they should sit for a bit..," you would be on the right track.

I worked in the Folger product research lab for two years at P&G's food research facility at the Winton Hill Technical Center. We could not actually come up with an exact number of hours after grinding. But, the esters are not released from the bean until they are ground. Then they are purged with nitrogen until they can be sealed.

drmwc

I have two burr grinders. A I have a Niche Zero as my electric one, which is a wonderful pieces of kit. It gets very consistent grind sizes with very little static or lost grinds.
https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/niche-zero-the-best-conical-burr-coffee-grinder#/

My hand grinder is a Field 2 by Knock. This is pretty good, but at home I now just use the Niche. James Hoffman did a great review of hand grinders:
https://youtu.be/dn9OuRl1F3k

CalgaryMac

We have a Cuisinart coffee maker that incorporates a grinder into the coffee maker. The grind can't be changed but the coffee is always great. We don't buy ground coffee unless we are traveling and don't have a grinder handy.