Around 2010 I was helping a good friend of mine set up a coffee machine in his new business.
We were “dialling in” the machine, literally pulling hundreds of shots of espresso, trying to find the right balance of grind consistency, tamping pressure and the shot duration.*
We were tasting the first couple, excited by the new machine and hoping to hit the magic mixture early on.
Some were OK, but the variance was far too high.
We soon saw that this was a bit of an art. A lot of things had to come together in order for it to work. And even if we got a decent taste, it wasn’t consistent.
We realised that the final pièce de résistance would have to wait a while. We needed far more practice.
We needed the volume. We needed to pull the hundred shots.
Quality is important, but without quantity, it’s likely just a once-off anyway.
*I’ve butchered the description here. I was very much the assistant/work horse for the others who actually knew what they were doing.
