Your first shot on a bean-to-cup machine
Fill the beans, pick strength and cup size, press the button, then fine-tune the grind.
⏱️ 5 minEasy
Starting recipe
Strongest strength setting, about 36–40 g (a small double) in the cup in 25–32 s, at a medium-high brew temperature.
Grind: Fine, like powdered sugar that still feels a little gritty
You need
- Fresh whole beans (a medium or medium-dark roast is easiest)
- Fresh cold water for the tank
- A small pre-warmed cup
- Optional: a kitchen scale to weigh what comes out
- Your machine's manual (for where the grind dial is)
Step by step
Fill the tank and the hopper
Fill the water tank with fresh cold water and pour whole beans into the bean hopper. Close the lids. Skip oily, very dark beans at first: they can clog the grinder and the chute.
Filtered or bottled water with some minerals tastes better and means less descaling.
Warm up and rinse
Switch the machine on and let it finish its warm-up rinse. Run a little hot water into your cup to warm it, then empty it. A warm cup keeps the shot from cooling too fast.
Choose strength and cup size
Set the strength (often shown as beans) to its strongest setting: that means more coffee per shot. Set the cup size small, about 40 ml. Small and strong is the closest a bean-to-cup gets to a real 1:2 espresso.
If your machine lets you set the temperature, pick medium-high.
Brew and time it
Place the cup under the spout and press the espresso button. Count or time from the first drop. Around 25–32 seconds is the sweet spot. If you have a scale, weigh the cup afterward: 36–40 g is the goal.
30 sTaste and adjust the grind
Sour or thin? Turn the grind one step finer. Bitter or harsh? One step coarser. Most machines only let you turn the grind dial while the grinder is running, so turn it gently during the next brew. Check your manual.
The first one or two shots after a grind change still use old grounds stuck in the chute. Judge the third shot.
Empty the grounds and drip tray
Empty the grounds container and the drip tray when the machine asks, or every day if you use it a lot. Wet grounds left for days get moldy and smell.
Clean the brew group weekly
If your brew group pops out, remove it once a week, rinse it under lukewarm water (no soap), let it air-dry and put it back. If it doesn't come out, run the machine's cleaning program with the tablets it asks for. Descale when the light comes on.
Common mistakes
- Using a big cup size and expecting espresso: more water through the same coffee gives a long, thin, bitter drink.
- Changing the grind and judging the very next shot, which still uses old grounds.
- Turning the grind dial while the grinder is stopped, which can damage some machines.
- Using oily dark-roast beans that clog the grinder and chute.
- Never cleaning the brew group, so old coffee oils make every cup taste stale.
Tastes off? Fix it
| If it… | Try this |
|---|---|
| Sour, sharp or thin | Grind one step finer so the water spends longer with the coffee. If it was already slow (over 32 s), keep the grind and let a little more coffee run into the cup instead. |
| Bitter, harsh or dry | Grind one step coarser. If the shot was already quick (under 25 s), keep the grind and use a smaller cup size so it stops earlier. |
| Weak or watery | Turn the strength up for more coffee, or choose a smaller cup size so less water goes through. |
| Too strong or intense | Choose a slightly bigger cup size so the shot runs longer, or turn the strength down one notch. |
| Watery shot with no crema | Usually stale beans or a grind that's too coarse. Use beans roasted within the last month or so and grind a step finer. |
| Machine says the brew group is blocked | The grind is probably too fine or the group is dirty. Clean the brew group, then go one step coarser. |
Words you'll hear
- Dose
- The weight of dry ground coffee in the basket, in grams. 18 g is a common starting dose for a double shot.
- Yield
- The weight of liquid espresso in your cup, in grams. Weighing beats measuring by volume because crema makes millilitres misleading.
- Ratio
- Yield divided by dose. A 1:2 ratio means 18 g of coffee becomes 36 g of espresso. Longer ratios taste lighter, shorter ones more intense.
- Extraction
- How much flavor the water pulls out of the coffee. Too little tastes sour and thin; too much tastes bitter and dry. You're aiming for sweet in the middle.
- Crema
- The reddish-golden foam on top of a shot, made from gas and oils. Fresh beans make more of it. It's a nice sign, not a measure of taste.
- Portafilter
- The handle with the metal basket that holds the coffee and locks into the machine's group head.
- Tamp
- Pressing the ground coffee flat and firm in the basket so water can't sneak through loose spots.
- Puck
- The packed disc of coffee in the basket. After the shot it's the damp cake you knock out into the bin.
- Channeling
- When water finds a weak path through the puck and rushes through it. The shot runs fast and tastes sour and bitter at once.
- WDT
- Stirring the grounds in the basket with thin needles to break up clumps before tamping. Short for Weiss Distribution Technique.