Pu’er Coffee

 A while ago, a friend of mine updated his La Marzocco Home App , and he turned off the pre-infusion function. I asked him why he did that, and he said it felt useless. After I emphasized how important pre-infusion is, he quietly turned the setting back on. Haha. That little incident gave me an idea—why not make a post dedicated to talking about the importance of pre-infusion? To be honest, whether pre-infusion is truly important doesn’t seem to have a single absolute answer. For people chasing the ultimate flavor in espresso, it’s a core variable. But for someone who simply wants a stable, decent cup of coffee, it’s just another machine parameter. Before we decide whether it’s important or not, we should first understand what pre-infusion actually is and what role it plays during espresso extraction. Simply put, you can think of pre-infusion as watering a dry sponge . If you skip pre-infusion and start extraction right away, high-pressure water blasts through the coffee puck im...

 As mentioned earlier, most cases of channeling occur due to improper handling. So if we want to minimize the chances of channeling, it’s worth taking a look at the following points and see which ones you may need to improve. 1. Uneven Distribution of Coffee Grounds Distribution and tamping are the two key steps before pulling an espresso shot, and the correctness of these steps is directly tied to the likelihood of channeling. Let’s start with distribution. The purpose of distributing the coffee grounds is simple: spread the grounds evenly across every corner of the portafilter basket. Only when the grounds are evenly placed can the puck create consistent resistance throughout, preventing hot water from concentrating on a single area during extraction. Although the goal is simple, many people still trigger channeling frequently because they don’t distribute properly. Some want to save time, others assume distribution isn’t important, so they casually swipe the grounds to “get it ...