Yes, I saw Nancy's grinder; I actually own one of those. (It's on the "decorative items" shelf along with that manual grinder I posted the other day.) I'm not sure I'm the target consumer for a coffee grinder. I actually like the ground coffee I buy, lol. The little Krups works fine, though it is a small batch grinder.
Nope. The Cuisinart has a setting for the # of cups, but that's really a timer that adjusts how long it grinds before shutting off. That's what that little printed circuit board in the "full of dust" pic is for...the coarseness setting is mechanical. Bonavita recommends 10 grams per cup. But you gotta define what a cup is. I just tuned my 8 O'Clock/Hills Bros. blend down to about 9g/cup (8g was too weak), but that's gonna change when I try the Drip grind. As an aside, I gotta remember to scoop the coffee on to the scale so I know how many scoops to use versus weighing it every time (not that it's all that big of a deal...at least I won't lose count when I use the scale, and I keep my scale out on the counter.) Regarding reading comprehension, I told Bill Boggs that I've been chasing a coarse grind when the commenter who claims to have worked with Bonavita Tech Support really said "coarser," meaning "not fine." He found his Nirvana with a "Drip" setting on his grinder. We see yet we do not see.
My Ninja coffeemaker does do a presoak. I hadn't noticed that before, but it runs a little bit of water then pauses for a while before continuing the process.
I must have missed this. I think the apostrophe fell down from where it belongs, next to the 'o'. "Land o' Lakes"... because typing that f is just too darn much trouble. They were busy virtue signaling and having the Indian girl removed from their stupid logo anyway.
She, Uncle Ben and Aunt Jemima are filing a joint Wrongful Termination suit. Stupid Karens... Regarding that apostrophe...every time I would see those stupid things at work, it set my teeth on edge. It's as though apostrophes are small & cheap, so why not throw one in...just in case. Way to advertise your ignorance. ps: I'm in contact with Bonavita Customer Service to see if they can help me get a decent pot of coffee out of this thing. They asked for data on the coffees and quantities I've tried...I think I overwhelmed them. They replied with another email asking for the output water temp, which I provided. That was 1:30PM their time. I've not heard back. This might be headed back to Amazon. I have until the end of January, but I've been using my Mr. Coffee. It's not good coffee, but at least it's drinkable.
Aw, man. Sorry it's not working out for you. I think any time we make a change to something that's familiar there is a period of adjustment. It's annoying wasting perfectly good coffee on experiments. I still prefer coffee made by the Keurig to the Bunn, but both are actually OK. I know what tastes good to me... which is the point, really. I'm kind of fascinated by the coffee snob rhetoric and sometimes wonder what I'm missing because I think some of what they drink is actually quite crappy. Reading comments on Youtube coffee paraphernalia videos provides hours of entertainment; the "Authorities on All Coffee Matters" versus "Ordinary Wise Guy Sipping Yesterday's Microwaved Brew and Liking It." How about the grinder? Is it working as expected?
I don't know how much of this is due to a change. I kept track of the size grind and the number of grams of each coffee and still could not get anything really drinkable. I mean, there's not all that much to it...I can dial in the strength but every brand I try is still bitter and harsh. I bought a bag of Pete's on Wednesday to try, and it did no better. Perhaps this is the taste that everyone else values. I want a bold mellow cup, like you get in restaurants, not the Swillbucks stuff. And I'm not sure about the grinder, either. I was hoping for a more coarse grind, and the machine makes much more of a mess than my Black & Decker does. The mess thing is kinda weird. There's a fine over-spray of grounds behind the collection receptacle on the Cuisinart, even though it *clicks* in to place whereas the Black and Decker just shoves in until you engage the safety switch but fits tighter. I'll probably keep it, since the grind is very consistent. I'm not certain if I'll buy another coffee machine. The whole thing mystifies me. Why would coffee be great when I manually pour over hot water, yet consistently suck when I effectively do the exact same thing with a higher temp machine? I wish the Amazon comments were more interactive so I could get input from those who have figured this out.
So I heard back from Bonavita: I asked about recommended coffees and they said: From the Amazon comments, I expected more interaction as I implemented their recommendations & reported back. Link to blogspot The blogspot has some good tips regarding coffee/water ratio. I found this chart to be of interest, mainly with their pre-ground coffee recommendations: Notice how they fix the pre-ground problems by keeping roughly the same coffee/water ratio yet reducing/increasing the total volume so as to shorten/lengthen the brew time. The recommendation for fresh-ground coffee is to always brew a full 5 cup pot (although Amazon commenters have posted success brewing less.) Before I received that last email this morning, I had made another pot with the Bonavita. This time I used maybe 75% 8 O'Clock/Hills Bros blend and 25% of the Peet's dark roast. It seems to be getting closer to what I want. I forgot to add some of the chicory I purchased...it would have helped take the remaining edge off. So right now I have a fresh starting point. As an aside, I have noticed that the Bovanita consistently extracts a very high level of caffeine. I get more jolt out of a single cup of this than I do out of several cups of Mr. Coffee. If I can cut back the volume, I can afford a higher quality coffee.
@John Brunner -- I'm the type to simply try another brand of coffee if I don't like what comes out of the brewer. Nice that they offer to replace the machine, but honestly I don't think that would make any difference if the one you have is heating the water properly and dispensing coffee. For more interactive discussion about your Bonavita, why not google for coffee forums such as Coffee Geek or Barista.com and see if any of those guys have any ideas. If you are on a coffee enthusiast forum you are more likely to get the type of responses you want, as opposed to "reviews".
Funny, I was on Amazon earlier today adding some medium roasts to my Wish List. Good idea about seeking coffee forums. I shall try to not use "Starbucks" and "burnt" in the same sentence. I may get the Ban Hammer.
So I checked out a couple of forums. Coffee Geek is shutting down their forum and retaining the rest of the site. I found one legacy review there on the 8 cup Bonavita and the guy said that not only is that machine VERY sensitive to dialing in the proper grind, the proper grind for paper filters and mesh filters is different. But he likes the machine. I joined a site called CoffeeForums and posted my tale of woe there. I saw a number of recommendations there for the Breville, but no discussions on struggles with the coffee quality. We'll see what folks say.
I, uh, hope that's a good thing. My post over their ended with "I feel like an idiot asking for help with brewing a pot of coffee, but I'm asking for help with brewing a pot of coffee." It truly is undrinkable...every darned pot. It's embarrassing. The frustrating thing is that my ad-hoc pour-over with the Mr. Coffee apparatus is exactly what I am seeking from a machine.
So the guy who responded says it's the cheap coffee I'm using. He has his own business. He sells coffee, and only one maker: the 8 cup Bonavita (mine is a 5 cup.) We are dialoging. I may buy a bag of coffee from him so he'll have a vested interest in offering continued help. The arrogance(?) over there is quite thick. Not on my question, but just the general conversations regarding coffee. I still want to know how my boiling kettle pour-over can make 8 O'Clock taste good, while the Bonavita makes it taste like crap.
@Beth Gallagher Here is an article I read today regarding grinders. Since I was thinking of turning in the Bonavita, I was also gonna return the Cuisinart grinder, since so many people said "conical is better." Well, the above-referenced article disagrees. I was surprised. Every forum comment I read regarding grinders praised the conical and spat on the regular burr.