Barista Renato 16Gr.

Importance of the shape and the hole position.

BoB and Renato are the first well pronounced round bottom basket in 60 years of espresso History.

Normally filter baskets have either " straight " or tapered walls but always finishing their shape with a flat bottom and, in the majority of the cases, with holes for the all surface of it. something like this:

During the first part of the extraction the water is pushed to the outside perimeter of the basket ( pressure tends to expand) opening a channel between the basket walls and the coffee puck. This channel creates the weak spot where the water will have a FASTER FLOW compared to the middle of the puck for the all extraction time.

BoB and Renato are designed to avoid this problem thanks to the round bottom shape combined with the hole positions.

Holes are not reaching the edges of the baskets, its middle point is lower than the side walls creating the perfect funnel for the smoother water flow.

Those 2 characteristics help the water from the top and form the sides to be regrouped into the middle of the basket stabilizing the pressure and the water flow uniformity. Here what you should aspect in the cup from them.

How to set up the machine and grinder to taste the difference

Please follow these directions:

• Set your machine and grinder with the basket that comes with it, measure the amount of coffee in dispensed by the grinder.
• "Pull the shot": measure the preferred amount of coffee out with a scale ( normally is 1:2 ratio but 1:1.5 could be good too) , check the time at the end of the extraction and taste it while is just made, but dont drink it all. leave some for a later side by side comparison.
• Swap the orignal basket with BoB and repeat the process paying attention to coffee in, coffee out and time at the end of the extraction. Taste the espresso and feel where engage the most in your time ( help yourself with the BIT tongue picture).
• Swap BoB with Renato and repeat the process one more time.
• At last sip all three espresso and try to feel the difference comparing them side by side. This will help you to understand more about the flavors and the evolution

Conclusions

After this test you will discover that in majority of the cases with BoB and Renato the extraction are longer ( time-wise) than with the flat bottom classic baskets.

Even with BoB and Renato longer extraction, compared to the classic basket ( in some case up to 20-30 seconds longer ) the espresso in the cup will result less over extracted ( bitter, astringent, with off flavors ) than the one with the classic flat bottom basket. In fact you wont even taste the astringency and in some cases a really low or no bitterness.

We can at this point announce and testify that the over-extraction is not directly related to the extraction time, but instead with the way and paths that water pass throughout the coffee puck water flow and the channeling related).

Enjoy your new cup of espresso.