How Often & When Should You Make Adjustments to a Coffee Grinder Throughout the Day?
In this video Jimmy is discussing commercial coffee grinders and more importantly when and how often should you be making grind adjustments throughout the day. It can get quite confusing and difficult for baristas to manage their grind settings with many cafes opting for the set and forget approach however to maintain good consistent coffee extractions changing grind is very important.
There are so many different variables a barista should consider before making any grind adjustments such as puck preparation, age of coffee, weather, temperature and more. Understanding the various elements a barista can then make educated decisions on grind adjustments so they are optimizing extractions and keeping within their brew recipe parameters.
Hopefully Jimmy's tips and advice in this video helps you understand how often and when you should be adjusting your grind settings.
Unedited Video Transcript
0:00
All right I'm going to keep this video really short and sweet for you. I'm going to answer the
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question that I hear all the time during coffee training sessions and that is how often do I need
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to change my grind? if I set it up in the morning do I have to change my grind constantly throughout
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the day and the answer is yes. Cool we're good have you got any more to add to that do you think?
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Uh yeah I can add to that I can add that thank you
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Are you the kind of Cafe that opens up in the morning and you turn the machine on and kind
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of run with how it was set up from yesterday or do you get in and dial-in but then you're
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not really sure how to make the most adjustments to your grinder throughout the day so I do get
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asked a lot during coffee training especially people that haven't spent a long time with a
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coffee machine because they don't realize how many changes will happen throughout the
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day and if you want to be the best Barista you can be you really want to be monitoring
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um not only your grind but a lot of other factors so there's some things we're going to consider
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and one of them is going to be consistency consistency is massive and accountability is
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massive you need your Cafe to be consistent for your customers sake the quality of coffee that
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you produce isn't just from the beans isn't just from the preparation of the beautiful latte art
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it is the consistency that your coffee is going to taste the same today as it did yesterday and
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it will tomorrow and the only way you can do that is try to replicate the things you've done in the
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past now we we've done some videos on recipes that is a huge part of consistency so go back
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we'll put the links down below watch the recipe videos because they are huge part of getting your
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consistency in your cafes not only will mostly for one Barista multiple Baristas everyone doing the
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same thing so you don't just want to be changing your grind straight up without considering all of
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the elements if you don't have a recipe set up for your coffee then you might be changing your
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grind for the wrong dose wrong yields so many other factors so definitely build in a recipe
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and then come back to this video and see if you need to change your grind based on these other
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parameters now a reliability of a barista doing their job I have a tool for you stick around to
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the end and I'll give you a resource that's going to really help consistency and that's going to get
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us checking our grind at at least 6 a.m 10 a.m and 1 p.m now that's just based around a general
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Cafe hours but you should adapt that to your Cafe but that would be the minimum requirement that we
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would be checking our grind but if you want to be the best Barista you can be you should be
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watching your shot times and your coffees all day long that is how you get consistency from cup to
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cup not only from day to day so do we change the grind yes but let's consider a few things first
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Puck preparation is actually going to be a huge part of what's going to change the end result
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now that end result is easiest measured using a shot timer following a recipe for our recipe
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here Champion blend on a commercial setting say an Anfim grinder a La Marzocco machine we'd be
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looking at a 22.5 grams of coffee in 45 grams of coffee out for a normale and we want to hit
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that 30 to 32 seconds for me to get that 30 to 32 seconds yes I would adjust my grind if it
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goes over or below that but before I even adjust my grind let's consider pruck preparation let's
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make sure that we're not adding channeling or other errors to the coffee making process I did
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a video on Old School versus new school and that really demonstrates that when you have consistent
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dose when you use good techniques whether it's an NCD dosing pot so you add good techniques
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during your coffee process you will reduce the fluctuation in shot times so if you're getting
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fluctuations in shot times on your machine you might be changing your grind and chasing
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a dragon that's just going to drive you wild so puck preparation will help consistency between
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shots and then you'll get more to there's always going to be a bit of a range there's also that is
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also always going to be a slight variation that's why we say 30 to 32. when you start your day you
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might come in and your grind might be quite fine because yesterday afternoon it was fine so what we
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actually want to do is start a day on a slightly coarser grind then we can work our way finer while
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we dial in a little tip to that is at the end of your day when you're doing your cleaning process
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you should be moving your grinder back to be at a coarser grind that's going to ensure that when
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you start your day you're not actually grinding yesterday afternoons fine grind traditionally here
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in Australia if you open a cafe at six o'clock in the morning it might be a little bit cooler
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and as the day goes on the humidity will change the sun will come out and those things have an
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effect on the moisture content in the bean and you will see that your shot times will change there's
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other elements like if you have just put a fresh bag of coffee in if you've changed your roast
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date if you know you've also got a consideration consider over time the burrs are wearing out in
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your grinder so there's there is technical factors you've got to consider but mostly it would start
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your day you want to make sure you're on a coarser grind so that when you start you're not running a
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24 second grind that's really fine from yesterday afternoon and that potentially blocking the grind
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up which happens all the time so let's go a little bit coarser start the day dial ourselves back in
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using our recipe and get to our goal time of 30 to 32 seconds traditionally as the day goes on
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you might go finer and finer now as the weather permits as factors change that will adjust and
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the thing that you're watching is your shot times as you start to produce more 30 to 34 second shots
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you will go a little bit coarser speed up your your extractions get yourself back to that goal
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30 to 32 seconds if you do find that your shots are starting to run a little bit slow and you're
if they start to run fast and they're gushing out that faster extraction is potentially giving your
6:10
customer a sour coffee experience much like the 35 second shot that's over extracted is giving them a
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bitter flavor so if you want to nail consistency from cup to cup make sure everyone's following a
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recipe doing good processes adjusting their grind when they're seeing the multiple shots after
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fluctuating above or below your goal recipe shot time so as I mentioned before I've got
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a tool that's really going to help and this is a downloadable PDF I'm going to put a link down
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below you should go and download that right now and that's going to give you a form that's going
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to list the days of the week and your staff can then start filling out a minimum of a 6 AM 10
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AM and a 1 pm time frame for your singles Blends decafs potentially other especially coffee brewing
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devices whether it's cold Brews or the batchies on there so what this goal is to start introducing
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this into your Cafe today so that you can start to see that consistency and it's just putting
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it back on your Baristas to make sure they're doing those minimum checks it's good training
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for them it's really good for them to get used to it great for you if you are very sure if you don't
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have that accountability and it's great for you to look at over time whether you're hitting the
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numbers that you need to be hitting so go and download the PDF today it's going to be really
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helpful in your Cafe. Sorry guys I did forget to mention that there is one other scenario another
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variable is that when you're opening your bags throughout the day and you're cracking a fresh
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bag and it's degassing that going in the hopper can actually change your grind you can be in the
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middle of service and that will drive you nuts because you will have to change your grind hot
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little tip is to open all the bags that you're going to use for that day either the morning of
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or the afternoon before so you're not going to get such a variable between grinds for each fresh bag
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that you use so little tip just wanted to Chuck that in there so to enter the original question
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of do I need to change my grind in my Cafe the answer is definitely yes it is going to be one of
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many factors that it's going to improve improve the coffee in your Cafe so the more you can do
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it based on getting the other parameters right puck prep and everything else the more that you
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can monitor your grind setting the more you're likely to produce a far better cup of coffee
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and don't forget to taste the coffee let's make sure that with all these recipes and tools that
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we're introducing we've got to drink the coffee we're going to make sure it tastes good and if you
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need to adjust your recipe to suit that is a big factor as well so um guys I hope you've enjoyed
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this video I hope it's helpful and you're going to go out there and start making better coffee
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um if you do this already or if you feel this has been helpful and something you need in in
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your Cafe if I can help personally and you're in Australia reach out the contact details are
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there find us on the site find us on Instagram Tik Tok anywhere you can connect with us we'll
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come back to you we'd love to support you in your Cafe if there's an opportunity to do that
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so subscribe to the channel there's plenty of new content coming out supporting Cafe
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owners and Baristas like the video hit the Bell icon and I will see you next time.
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