Flair PRO 2 Archives - Flair Espresso

Espresso University: Guide to Coffee Grinders for Espresso

Jeff Walcott — Fri, 08 Jul 2022 15:31:29 +0000

What grinder should I get for my espresso setup? How does the relationship work between the grinder and its burr set? Should I get a flat burr grinder or conical? In such a fast-growing industry with continuous innovation in technology and so many emerging options, it can be overwhelming to select the right coffee grinder. With this article, we want to help you think through these questions, so that you can make a thoughtful and informed decision that will take your espresso brewing to the next level.

Let’s start by reviewing and discussing a few of the different options on the market for coffee grinders at different budget levels, and looking at their differences.

Normcore Grinder - $90

The Normcore grinder is a hand grinder with a 38mm conical burr. Conical burrs function with an inner cone burr and an outer ring burr. When you crank that handle around on a hand grinder, it spins the inner cone burr, pulling the coffee beans through, crushing them evenly along the way until they come out the other end as coffee grounds. Changing the space between the two burrs is the way we adjust our grind size. The Normcore grinder has twenty-two steps per rotation. For a hand grinder that is not bad, and for most people this grinder will work great. It is important to understand, though, that there will be limitations to a budget grinder like this. It is definitely not truly espresso capable, as it does not have the micro-adjustments necessary to dial in true espresso.

Flair Royal - $159

The Flair Royal is an all metal grinder with a bigger burr geometry. The burrs are 45mm Etzinger burrs. It has a ring to be able to make smaller stepped adjustments, which is so helpful when it comes to dialing in espresso. Being able to adjust your grind in small increments is absolutely critical when grinding for espresso. This is because espresso is so finnicky, and every little adjustment can make big changes in the espresso that you end up with. The Royal is great for that, and one of the unique benefits that it has over others, is the grinds catch cup has the same diameter as the Flair PRO 2 portafilter. This will be a huge benefit if you are a PRO 2 owner or are considering buying a Flair PRO 2 espresso maker.

Option-O Lagom Mini - $374

Electric grinders are very convenient, and while this grinder boasts an extremely compact size, it will do all of the work for you. A huge benefit of this grinder is that it has a stepless grind adjustment system. The adjustment ring that changes the burr spacing doesn’t have clicks, but glides along smoothly. This means that there are infinite adjustments available, perfect for making those micro adjustments for espresso. For how small and compact the Lagom Mini is, it is also very quick and doesn’t take long to grind for an espresso dose.

DF64 - $445

The DF64 is a grinder that operates with flat burrs. Flat burrs rotate against each other just like conical burrs do, except they are designed in the shape of two rings that sit flat, one against the other. The coffee beans are fed through the burrs and pushed out through the small space in between them toward the outside. Flat burrs can achieve great results for espresso. They need a higher RPM, so you never see them on hand grinders, but they are great for elevating the clarity and complexity that you can achieve in your coffee. The DF64 has a bellows system as well, allowing you to pump air through the grinder to expel any grounds that may be stuck inside after grinding.

Niche Zero - $525

The Niche Zero houses a bigger, 63mm conical burr. This is especially helpful for grinding large quantities of coffee, as the burrs resist heating up more than smaller burr sets that you may see in other grinders. These burrs will also typically grind faster simply due to a larger surface area. Another aspect of this grinder that makes it so popular is its focus on low grinds retention. Retention refers to the amount of coffee grounds that get stuck inside the grinder and don’t make it out into your dosing cup. Ideally, you would have zero retention, and that is what the Niche Zero is named after. The Niche is also a very quiet grinder, due to its incredible build quality.

Should You Choose a Flat or Conical Burr for Your Home Espresso Grinder?

Ultimately, the choice between a flat or conical burr when selecting your grinder comes down to personal preference. Flat burr flavor profiles are often higher in clarity and complexity, while lacking some of the texture that you would get from a conical burr. Conical burrs produce this texture because they often have a wider grind distribution (more particles at different sizes with less uniformity) and typically produce more fines. Flat burrs often produce a more uniform grind, especially if you opt for a unimodal type of burr which has an extremely tight grind distribution.

How Does Portafilter Size Affect the Home Espresso Grinder You Should Buy?

You may have experienced the struggle of producing the same quality of espresso when switching between machines or upgrading your setup. One of the biggest factors to consider when thinking about dialing in your shots on different machines, is the portafilter basket size. Different espresso makers will often have different portafilter sizes. For example, the Flair PRO2 has a 46mm portafilter basket, whereas the Flair 58 has a traditional 58mm portafilter basket. Is bigger always better when it comes to portafilter size? Ultimately, the answer to this question is going to come down to your needs and what you are looking to get from your espresso experience.

Portafilter Baskets and Coffee Bed Depth Affect Espresso Grind Size

A 46mm portafilter basket is very capable of pulling delicious shots of espresso. In many instances, it can pull shots that are just as tasty as a bigger, 58mm basket could. What you need to understand is that different basket sizes will produce different styles of espresso.

To explain this, consider the 46mm basket of the Flair PRO2. It can hold doses of 16-18g, even though its walls are closer together with a lesser diameter than the 58mm portafilter of the Flair 58, which also holds 18 grams. The reason they can still hold the same amount of coffee, is because the two different baskets have different depths. The 46mm basket is considerably deeper than the 58mm basket, and this is a very important factor in considering how they will extract coffees differently. The 46mm basket will have a smaller surface area where the water will initially contact the coffee, but the water will have a further distance to travel through the coffee grounds. In comparison, the 58mm basket will enable a larger surface area, but a much shorter distance for the water to travel through the coffee. For this reason, you will often have to grind slightly coarser for the 46mm basket with more depth, and finer for the 58mm basket with less depth.

Picking the Right Style of Coffee Grinder for Your Espresso Setup

How does this apply to the grinder that you select? Well, when it comes to espresso you will have to get a grinder that can grind fine enough and uniform enough for the size of your basket. Most of the grinders we have discussed so far in this article are capable of doing that. However, for something like the Normcore grinder, at those very fine settings each stepped click in grind adjustment is just too large to make the small adjustment that you need. What we would recommend if you want to use the Normcore (or another cheaper entry-level grinder) is an espresso maker like the Flair NEO. The NEO has a flow-control portafilter basket, meaning that it will create the resistance required to brew espresso for you, even if your grinder is unable to do this consistently.

For the Flair 58 or any other machine with a standard 58mm portafilter basket, you will need a grinder that is able to create that consistent resistance in the coffee grounds so that it can build even pressure. The grinder must be able to make very small micro adjustments. The DF64 and Niche Zero grinders discussed earlier are examples of great grinders that meet these requirements.

Remember though, that smaller portafilters are not inferior. One of the benefits of going with a smaller basket size is reduced channeling. A 58mm basket, with its lesser bed depth, creates more opportunities for this as the water has less distance to travel through the coffee and more tendency to take the path of least resistance. With a smaller puck diameter and more depth, because the water has more distance to travel through the coffee grounds, it is more resistant to channeling. If you seek to achieve a similar bed depth in the 46mm and 58mm baskets, you can use very similar grind sizes and profiles between the two. You may want to try this because you enjoy the texture or clarity of a particular brewing profile, or because you just want to play around with your extraction and find what you like best.

Summary: Choosing the Right Coffee Grinder

We hope that this article has given you more of an idea of different factors to consider as you find the grinder that is the best fit for your espresso setup. To sum up, for a 58mm, commercial style basket, make sure you have a grinder that can grind very fine and uniform – fine enough to produce the pressure you need. For a smaller basket, you definitely have more options for more budget friendly grinders, and even hand grinders that are capable of grinding for espresso. If you have something like the NEO that creates resistance for you, you can spend even less on your grinder while still creating pressure as you pull your shot.

The post Espresso University: Guide to Coffee Grinders for Espresso appeared first on Flair Espresso.

Making Espresso At Home Without A Fancy Machine

Jeff Walcott — Thu, 02 Sep 2021 03:54:22 +0000

Xris is a caffeinated content creator based in Boston documenting his journey into the world of specialty coffee through YouTube videos and Instagram

Making espresso at home can look intimidating. If you’ve put in the research, you might be overwhelmed between all the different options. From sub-$500 single boilers to heat exchangers and dual boilers worth thousands of dollars, the options are plenty and pricey.

Guess what? You don’t need any of that to make and enjoy delicious espresso right from your home. In fact, here’s everything you really need to pull some great tasting shots in just 5 simple steps – without a fancy espresso machine.

Let's Talk About Espresso

First, let’s talk about what espresso is before diving into how to make it at home. Espresso, in the most general sense, is a concentrated coffee beverage that is made by forcing hot water, at high pressure, through a bed of coffee in a very short window of time. The pressure is what makes all the difference! This pressure ensures that the fats, acids and sugars in your bed of coffee extract at a higher rate in a short period of time. This is what creates the thicker, more syrupy texture of espresso. It also means that it is typically higher in caffeine per volume compared to other brewing methods.

While espresso machines at your local café or roaster look very fancy, and they are, they really have one major job; forcing water through your coffee at pressure to create espresso. So, in theory, to replicate this process and brew espresso at home, all you’d need is the ability to generate pressure in your brewing chamber. Easier said than done right? Well, with the Flair Espresso Maker, it’s easily said and done!

The Flair Espresso Maker

The Flair Espresso Maker was designed to be an affordable manual espresso machine that was able to generate the pressure needed to brew espresso – all from your home – without any extra gadgets or doo-dads. It’s just pure and simple espresso, handcrafted manually.

Upon first look, you might be wondering, ‘how in the world can this little lever espresso maker replicate what happens inside a big commercial machine?’ Well, the answer is as above: pressure! The Flair’s lever-based espresso system uses a stainless-steel cylinder with a plunger at the top and portafilter on the bottom. Seals inside the brewing chamber prevent pressure from escaping, and as the lever is lowered, the bed of coffee acts as another partial seal, generating resistance until the pressure builds enough that your brew water is forced through the grounds.

And voila! Espresso in your cup from a humble little espresso maker that you can place right onto your counter.

The Materials You'll Need

Now let’s talk about the process for creating delicious espresso at home without a fancy machine.

First, you’ll need your Flair Espresso Maker! You’ll be glad to hear that the Flair Espresso lineup has options for all budgets, from the affordability-focused Flair NEO to the Flair 58 with an industry-standard 58mm portafilter. For the purposes of this demonstration, we’ll be using a Flair Classic, which was the original manual espresso maker created by Flair way back in 2016.

Flair Classic Manual Espresso Maker

The Flair Classic is the original manual espresso maker from Flair. Brew anywhere and get café-quality espresso all while benefitting from the immediate feedback and control of a manual system.

Add a Flair Classic to Your Cart

Second, fresh beans. This is an absolute no brainer when it comes to getting great tasting coffee. Check out a local coffee roaster for some freshly roasted options!

Third, hot water! Unlike some fancy pour over methods, a variable temperature controlled gooseneck kettle isn’t necessary, but surely helps with the precision of your pour. Depending on the roast level of your beans, you may also prefer to set your water to a desired temperature.

Finally, the grinder. A high-quality burr grinder will always result in the most consistent and fluffy grinds for your espresso: It’s a must when using a non-pressurized portafilter. The Flair Royal is a great hand grinder that travels nicely alongside your Flair Classic and With steel burrs and 72-steps of 0.02mm, you’ll have no trouble dialing in the perfect shot of espresso.

Steps to Follow:

Step 1: Preheat the Brew Chamber

As mentioned above, the Flair Classic is an entirely lever-based espresso machine, no messy cables or outlets necessary. Heck, you could pull a fantastic shot of espresso easily in the middle of a forest with the included travel case!

Be sure to put your brew chamber in a bowl, deep enough to submerge it, and pour hot water to completely cover the chamber or purchase a preheat cap from their website so you can ditch the bowl.

Step 2: Grind Your Beans

To dial in your Flair, we recommend starting with a 12-16g dose and to time your shot in the realm of 35-45 seconds. Too long or too bitter? Grind coarser. Too fast or acidic? Grind finer!

Don’t have a good grinder? No problem! You could easily swap to using the pressurized portafilter, included standard on the Flair NEO, and pick up some of your favorite pre-ground coffee.

Step 3: Prep the Portafilter

Add your coffee grounds into the portafilter with the included funnel, and give it a light tamp and set it up on your Flair Classic portafilter base. If you have something like the Flair Shot Mirror, which I’ve used in all the photos, you can remove the spout to convert your portafilter into a bottomless, letting you see your tasty shot pull.

Add your preheated brew chamber (careful, it’s hot!), fill it up with hot water, and add your plunger.

If you want to really geek out over your shot profile, you can even grab the Flair Pressure Gauge to monitor the pressure profile of your shot! As a general rule of thumb, aim for between 6-9 BAR of pressure. The custom Flair Pressure Gauge even features an espresso target “zone” to help you while you’re pulling your shot. These can be purchased as an accessory, or they come standard on all Flair Signatures, PRO 2 and 58 manual espresso makers.

Gently start your pull, aiming between 30-40 pounds of force (tip: you can use a body weighing scale under your Flair to monitor your force). Make sure you’re hitting those ratios and timings!

If you’re not seeing any drips or a steady flow, you’ve likely ground too fine or tamped too hard. Simply dump the remaining water and clean out the portafilter to try again.

Step 4: Enjoy

Now for the best part. Enjoy your delicious and tasty shot of espresso that you’ve made at home, all without the need for a fancy espresso machine! Without a doubt, the espresso that can be brewed with a Flair manual espresso maker will rival the quality you can get from your nearest third wave coffee shop or fancy espresso machine. With a Flair espresso maker, you can now make all sorts of espresso-based drinks from cappuccinos to flat whites- whether you’re at home or on the go.

The best part is, you don’t need a fancy steam wand either. Also available on the Flair shop, you can grab the Nanofoamer: One of the best and portable solutions to get latte art quality milk foam at home.

Did you know that most cafe drinks are variations of ratios of espresso to steamed milk and milk foam? Cappuccinos typically have a thick layer of foam on top, flat whites – a bit less. Lattes largely have the greatest ratio of espresso to milk, making great iced drinks on warm summer days. Add a few flavored syrups to your pantry and suddenly you’ve got all the options your local cafe has, made right at home without a fancy machine.

The Flair lineup has options for all budgets, from the smaller and simpler Flair Neo all the way up to the Flair 58 featuring an industry-standard 58mm portafilter. Check them out here and start handcrafting your own espresso, right from your home, without the need for a fancy espresso machine.

The post Making Espresso At Home Without A Fancy Machine appeared first on Flair Espresso.

Flair Espresso and the Art of the Affogato

Jeff Walcott — Tue, 29 Jun 2021 16:45:09 +0000

Guest blog written by Jerney, a content creator based in Canada who loves coffee and photography. You can follow his work on instagram @jerney

If there’s one treat I love to splurge on in the summer, it’s affogatos. They’re creamy, sweet, cold and just the right hit of espresso. It’s the perfect summer drink with a mix of coffee and ice cream. For those that haven’t been exposed to an affogato before, they’re typically made with one scoop of ice cream and a shot of espresso, either pulled over top of the ice cream or added after. The word affogato literally translates to “drowned” in Italian, where the recipe originates.

While you can get an affogato from a café, I believe the best way to enjoy one is to make it at home with the exact espresso ratios and recipe – both in terms of your espresso and your ice cream – to suit your taste. I love to use my manual Flair espresso maker for pulling shots and playing with recipes. It’s great for travelling or home use. I have the Flair PRO 2 and love how the compact design can pack up in a travel case when I’m not using it.

Because the Flair is a completely manual, lever espresso machine, it’s easy to pressure profile with the use of the included pressure gauge. This gives the brewer complete control over their shot of espresso. Manual espresso can be a great methodical way to pull a shot, the whole process is very tactile and the barista really gets a feel for how the shot is extracting as they go. I love to slow down and enjoy the process by handcrafting my espresso shots.

While the recipe might sound simple with only two ingredients, the coffee and ice cream choices are super important and of course will have big impacts on your affogato. Let’s look at the ice cream first.

Selecting Your Ice Cream

Start with a good ice cream – I recommend staying away from supermarket owned brands – and try to find something more local or fresh. For this recipe I’m using a vanilla ice cream from a local place named “Four All” ice cream. I would stay away from coffee flavored ice creams because they are usually a disappointment in flavor and likeness to coffee. I would also avoid any flavors like mint or bubblegum as they won’t mix well with the espresso. The taste of a good vanilla bean ice cream and a great shot of espresso will be better than any flavored ice cream. If you really want to mix it up, chocolate ice cream is another great one to try, although I generally go with vanilla because it’s the classic flavor and mixes well with any type of espresso!

Selecting Your Coffee

The coffee I choose for an affogato can depend on my mood. I generally stick to single origin, light roasts from my favorite roasters and I always make sure the beans were roasted within a few weeks of using them. If you’re unsure what coffee to use, try anything from your local specialty coffee shop, and always make sure it’s fresh whole bean coffee that you can grind immediately before extracting.

When I want something that really evokes summer flavors, I’ll choose a light roasted natural Colombian or Ethiopian. Coffee like this will give you lots of fruity notes and be great cold, mixing well with the ice cream. But, if you want a more traditional espresso taste choose a medium roast coffee; something with lots of chocolate, caramel, nut or dark berry tasting notes. You can’t go wrong with vanilla and chocolate! I always stay away from dark roasted coffees. Dark roasts are generally over roasted, more oily and feature a more bitter and burnt flavor that doesn’t pair as well in an affogato.

Making Your Affogato

In terms of brewing your espresso for your affogato, you can either do a cold press or a regular hot press. Personally, I love to press my espresso hot because of how it melts the ice cream when the two are combined. There’s not much better than the melty soupy-ness from warm espresso and cold ice cream. But, if you prefer that your ice cream melts slower, or for days that are extremely hot outside, a cold-pressed espresso can do the trick. To learn more about how to cold press your espresso with a Flair Espresso Maker check out some of their tutorials online.

To make an affogato start by preparing your espresso machine: If you use a Flair manual espresso maker like me, get it pre-heated and setup. Have your coffee dosed and ready. I use 16g of coffee for my shots. Using smaller doses like 16 grams is much easier when starting out. If you mess up your extraction and need to dial-in further and re-pull you also waste less coffee using a smaller dose.

For your ice cream, scoop roughly 90g into a small glass and set aside, if you want it extra cold keep it in the freezer until right before you add the espresso. Once your Flair is heated and ready to go, distribute and then tamp 16g into the basket. Pull your shot into a glass or over the ice cream. I pull my shots with a two to three second pre-infusion, then ramp up to nine bars of pressure aiming to finish the shot around 35-45 seconds with double the volume: That’s 32g out or 1:2 ratio. Once you have your beautiful shot of espresso just dump it over top of the ice cream and enjoy!

Depending on how you like making your affogato you can adjust the ratio of ice cream to espresso. In my recipe, the ratio of espresso to ice cream was a 1:3 but you can do a 1:4 or 1:2 if you want it more or less creamy. I prefer not to dilute with too much ice cream because I love that punch you get from the espresso, but definitely experiment to find what you like.

That’s it, my go to affogato recipe. It’s only two ingredients but it’s absolutely delicious and creamy. It requires a little more work with handcrafted espresso from the Flair, but once you get that shot dialed-in and poured over the ice cream you won’t be disappointed! Good things take time and I think it’s important to enjoy the process as much as the final results.

To recap, here are a few key things to keep in mind.

Ingredients matter, both in the coffee and the ice cream.
Press hot or cold.
Enjoy right away and with a friend. Like all coffee related beverages, affogatos are best shared with someone!
And never forget, if you’d like to make your affogato an adult beverage, you can always combine your espresso and ice cream with your favorite liquor. More on that later.

The post Flair Espresso and the Art of the Affogato appeared first on Flair Espresso.

Flair vs. Robot – An Independent Review

Admin — Thu, 27 Aug 2020 14:30:13 +0000

The market for real, handcrafted espresso is growing as people around the world begin to understand what is possible with all-manual lever espresso presses. Of course, we’d love to consider ourselves as one of the leaders in this space, but other players have emerged as contenders for a spot on espresso lovers’ countertops.

We see posts and reviews from customers and aficionados around the world daily, and the question keeps coming up: in the battle of Flair vs. Robot, which manual espresso maker should you choose?

Thankfully, the good people at Alternative Brewing, a powerhouse in the coffee world around Australia and the Pacific, decided to run their own test and reveal their results in this informative Youtube video, below.

While both espresso makers are very capable, and customers should pick which is best for their own needs, this reviewer at AB personally chose the Flair due to a lower price point and the ability to travel with our custom carrying case. Their synopsis of our Flair PRO 2 says:

“The Flair range has added value in this series by including the very best of features so you can achieve a premium espresso extraction with control and precision.

This espresso machine is elegantly designed, durably constructed, and empowering to espresso brewers & filter aficionados alike. This easy-to-use espresso maker can generate pressure to a style of espresso more commonly found in commercial espresso machines. It’s capable of producing full-flavored, full-bodied espresso; rich in crema.

Additions to the PRO 2 such as a stainless steel spout that clips on to the bottomless portafilter for a concentrated flow of espresso, silicone grips to the handle and pressure gauge for improved work flow and an enhanced-flow bottomless portafilter make this the superior espresso maker to take with you anywhere you want.”

And not to worry, while the users at AB don’t yet have our split spout, this is now part of our product line, launched in July, which allows Flair PRO 2 users to split each shot as desired.

No matter which you choose, you’ll be able to get delicious, real espresso. But the Flair’s expanded features and ability to travel at a lower price point make this decision a no-brainer for us!

Check out all our manual espresso makers here!!

The post Flair vs. Robot – An Independent Review appeared first on Flair Espresso.