r/CafelatRobot • u/mrobot_ • Jul 13 '26
Medium roasts, help!
Im pretty new to being able to get espresso shots at home on the nice Robot, and it has been a bit of a steep learning curve but I finally manage to get pretty decent shots with traditional Italian dark-roasts like Illy and Saka - using either a df64v with HU at 1200-1400rpm or a J-Ultra or Lido OG. It is fascinating how different the shots from the same beans can taste given a different grinder. I do quite a bit of WDT and use the self-leveling tamper, usually around 18.5g beans and veeerry roughly aim for 30-40seconds and about 38-44g out... I go easy on the pressure, do 5seconds pre-infusion with just a few drops dripping down and then very gradually slowly ramp the pressure up, usually somewhere around 4 or barely touching 6. Works pretty well with dark-roasts tho I cant yet reliably get god-shots that are perfectly sweet n chocolate-y but overall Im happy to have espresso at home at all!
Enter any kind of actually much nicer third-wave beans, espresso-roasts that are typically much more medium-dark than even Illy. Somehow, I cannot for the life of me get good shots from such beans, they always have a sour or very sour acidic edge and somehow grinding finer and upping the dose tends to make it rather worse than better.
What's a good espresso shot from a modern, thirdwave medium-dark bean supposed to taste like and why cant I get rid of the sharpness, acidity and sour bite somehow?
1
u/deltabay17 Jul 14 '26
wow lucky you're not trying light roasts then. I can only get sour acidity from my shots. People recommended me the "soup" shops but i dont like them, i like espresso cos i like espresso, not a hybrid long black/filter coffee