Coffee grinder hype and buyer's remorse | Hacker News Reader

Coffee grinder hype and buyer's remorse

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As a child one of my chores was to grind coffee for my mom in an antique coffee grinder. It smelled great and was good exercise for my arms. Plus I drank coffee starting at a young age. It tasted just fine, no need for anything fancy. I think the exception might be for making Turkish coffee, that antique grinder would need a second stage with finer teeth.

Nowadays I just use a cheap single speed grinder that works great. [1] I can not envision ever spending more than $19 for a grinder.

[1] - https://www.amazon.com/Brentwood-CG-158B-Coffee-Spice-Grinde...

I'm thinking about buying a manual grinder because there are more selections of beans out there than grinded ones.

I'm sure if there is hype for "high quality" beans. What do you think? We don't drink much so price is not a big issue.

I've got a manual grinder that literally came free with a pack of beans. It takes about as long to grind beans as it does to heat the water.

High quality beans really are a big difference. It's not just hype. However, the differences are heavily muted by milk, so if you're just making lattes with it it may not be worth the effort.

(I enjoy lattes anyway. I have a cheap frother from IKEA.)

Pre-ground beans are actually just fine. It's just that they go stale kinda quickly. It might help to keep it in a vacuum seal in the freezer (though honestly, people disagree on the merits of that). But it's easy enough to spend a few minutes grinding by hand right before you brew.

The main thing here is that you get to enjoy the differences. It's not so much that one coffee is better than another, or one brew time, or one grind, or whatever. Coffee is interesting because there are so many differences you can note in just beans and hot water.

If you're not interested in exploring that... well, you'll still be happier investing in high quality beans. The difference there really is enormous and you don't need to be an expert to taste it.

Why buy and worry about a home grinder? I get a 12oz bag a week from a local roaster and have them grind it. Does ground coffee really go bad after seven days in an airtight bag in the freezer?

Because some of these idiots (myself included) are interested in chasing the best possible cup of coffee. That requires grinding high quality beans at the time of brewing. That's just the start though. There are seemingly endless rabbit holes to go down in this pursuit.

If you're not into that then yeah, get someone else to grind ahead of time.

It's fun having the ritual of grinding coffee. Maybe I can't tell the difference but I enjoy it!

Keeping the grounds in the freezer attracts moisture to the cold grounds

You lose some aromatics immediately on grinding and much more rapidly from ground coffee than from beans so grinding right before brewing preserves as much flavour as possible

No. If you're going through 12 ounces a week, you might as well let them grind it for you.

I suppose you could do the experiment: get next week's coffee a day early and compare it to the last dregs of last week's coffee. I bet you can taste the difference if you really look for it... but I bet the differences are too small for you to care about.

Great idea for an experiment

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