Recently got my first order from CoffeeSnobs, two lots of roasted beans totally 1kg, probably the most amount of coffee I have brought at one time! I really need to taste soem of the premo stuff to get an idea of where I am at with my super roasting skills 😉

Anyway, I can definitely recommend Andy Freeman from CoffeeSnobs, I ordered this on the Sunday evening and received them in the post on the friday – labbeled with a roast date of the wednesday! can’t get much fresher than that from mail order!

In terms of what I got;

Peru Ceja de Selva Estate
Organic certified at origin by Naturland this high grown coffee comes from an estate at the base of the Andes

I have only just had a single cup from this lot so far, still getting the grind right (currently at 10 on the rocky) but, wow, it is something else!

Ethiopian Yirgacheffe
Apparently only found in Yirgacheffe.

I have gotten through about 25% of this lot, nailed the grind at 11 or 12 on the rocky and depending on how hard I feel like tamping. This stuff is great, very mello and easy drink, can easily pull this through twice on the La Pavoni and still have a nice smooth taste  – very different to a typical espresso bean. If your into tasting various flavours, this one has a caramelly (is that a word) aftertaste/undertone.

The Ethiopia bean is the smaller of the two.

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well its pretty easy, these cos lettuces are a prime example, these make the world of difference to a caeser salad, crispy freeesh leaves, great!

Coffee? well this was the runt mix from the roast the other week.

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I could be onto something here…..why yes of course I would love the ‘jolly’ La Pavoni coffee bean grinder but when the financial crunch hits what better way than to improvise 🙂

Now, the hand grinder was generously supplied by the petti-coat government, however by the time the coffee beans were ground ones elbow was also ground and clicking….so rather than spend $200 on a good burr grinder – note any self respecting coffee maker must use a burr grinder, refer to here for the difference between burr and blade grinders – I decided to do a quick mod to allow the hook up of the cordless drill. Now these wheel burr grinders can be noisy and messy so the poor neighbours now suffer the morning pain of me grinding away 🙂 But it is substantially faster than the hand options….

So after years of looking on ‘that auction site’ and visiting the local Distributor, conveniently located in Annandale Sydney (http://www.euroespresso.com.au/), I finally picked up one of these bad boys. The price was right, secondhand and only used a handfull of times I picked it up for about half the retail price – still alot for a freakin’ coffee machine. However considering I will save on my daily coffee costs it should be ok….

So, the La Pavoni Europiccola (http://www.lapavoni.com)is basically the base model in their range of Lever Handle machines, keeping in mind the only differences between the base model and the ‘Pro’ version is the inclusion of a pressure gauge (yes that looks cool) and a bigger boiler. So all things considered I am happy with the base model.

For once I did read up before plugging it in! I tested some crappy old old coffee that I had lying around…and surprise surprise..it was crap! Next try was with some fresher stuff in the freezer, this round tested out the cappucino nozzle thingy – WOW….that tasted better than the stuff I get up the road from my local Cafe!

This is only gonna get better. However one crucial piece of equipment is required, a decent, and correct sized tamper, the one supplied was a 51mm which is too large for the 49mm basket – maybe one from here! http://www.coffeetamper.com.au/

or I will get one done up from a local machine shop!!

couple of links…

http://coffeesnobs.com.au/

http://www.coffeeitalia.com.au

Spare parts:

http://www.espressoservices.co.uk/shop.html 

http://www.coffeeparts.com/