Learning the Ropes
Moderator - Please move post if not in appropriate forum
Hey Guys,
I am new to the forums and very new to the world of good coffee. I have recently become obsessed with coffee and would love to be able to explore it in a more full manner. My setup at home is as barebones as it gets, with a french press, Hario Slim Mill, and a Beehouse Ceramic Dripper. I wanted some tips as far as knowledge bases and things to experiment with. Ideally, I would find a low cost way to pick things up from someone locally (Boston area) in exchange for the occasional lunch or just out of the kindness of their heart :) Any thoughts or offers from locals would be greatly appreciated. Again, apologies if this should be in a different forum.
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Jimmy B on
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To be honest, I learned everything about coffee through forums. When I first opened up my cafe, I was under the same name as my cousins shop. Was trained by my cousin. They are more like a "starbucks" type of coffee shop. They dont really pay attention to the shots since everything was automatic volume metric. They didn't have to manually dose and grind since they had the La Marzocco Swift Grinder. Their lattes and cappuccinos foaming was not that great. When I opened mine under their same name and style, I got more involved and did a very in depth research just through forums alone. I hate to say it...but I mostly learned from a different forum before i came across this great forum. Both forums provide amazing information for all whether you are a novice, intermediate, or expert.
I took all the information and implemented it myself. The pros for my situation was that I have all the equipment (commercial espresso machine / grinder, tons of milk, syrups, etc) to use. About 2 months in I changed the store name to separate myself from the other shop and it's been great so far. It's been 9 months in and I'm at the point where I pretty much understand all the concepts from reading forums, testing it out (trial and error).
You don't need a book or anything like that....all you need is passion, dedication, and internet access :)
If you would like to start off simple with a low budget, I suggest you start with drip coffee. Almost all of the brewing needs you need are cheap, however I suggest you buy an excellent grinder and a source of Single Origin beans that you like. French press is not a bad method of brewing coffee. For my shop, I recently added a drip bar using the Clever Drippers. You can buy them online for about $15 each and it works like a french press but uses a filter. Makes a pretty good clean cup of coffee.
Just search around forums and read all of the various threads that interest you. I spent everyday during downtimes reading forums. It won't take long to cover all the bases you need to know.
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