Espresso

A devilishly exacting art that we can’t get enough of

Expressly for You

  • Prepping the Puck

    The quest for great espresso is often foiled before the water ever hits the grounds. We walk you through the pitfalls and the best practices for dependably well-extracted, delicious shots.

  • Under Pressure

    Espresso may seem miles away from other brew formats, but we’ll show you exactly how the element of pressure defines the method and how to reliably create and re-create a pressure profile perfect for your beans.

  • Unlike Anything Else

    With espresso, we win big and we miss big. Learning to taste your shots is essential to getting the most out of your beans and equipment—that’s where we come in: helping guide your tongue to recognize the sour, the bitter, and the sweet among all that body and flavor roiling in your demitasse.

Book a Session

All about Extraction

Figuring out why your espresso isn’t giving you all the rich, chocolatey, caramel-ly goodness you deserve can be so very frustrating. Our espresso class gives you all the tools you need to understand where your issues are occurring and troubleshoot your shots to perfection.

 

  • Manual or automatic

  • light roast or dark

  • single-origin or blend

  • 3rd Wave or Italian

Yes, we do love “prosumer” espresso machines (home models with professional-quality builds) but our true superpower is coaxing shockingly full-bodied and delicious shots with whatever equipment you’re working with. We’ll show you how.

It’s science—but it’s not rocket science.

Our building blocks of great coffee in order of importance.

 

  • Understanding what is happening and why in the brewing process is our Coffee Educator superpower. Knowledge sits in the driver’s seat at Home Brew, and sharing our hard-earned barista knowledge with you is the foundation of all of our teaching.

    Because the most expensive equipment and rarefied single-origin coffees in the world will only yield brews as good as the barista unlocking their potential. Period.

  • Just like any decent chef would say of their food: You must honor the ingredients if you want to unlock the awesome bounty of their flavor.

    Learning how to understand, buy, and store your coffee like a pro will yield the greatest improvement in your morning brews…right behind gaining a little know-how from us.

  • Who doesn’t love gear? We certainly do, and we fully understand the impulse to throw a few dollars at a coffee issue and hope that it will resolve itself.

    But as we can attest, the trick isn’t to acquire as many coffee tools as possible—it’s to get the best tool for the job.

    We teach you how to use everything you have on hand to its full potential, and if you have a need or a desire to expand your set-up, we couldn’t be happier to lead you to the best option for your tastes, needs, and budget.

    Once you’ve got the know-how and the beans, the gear will send you right over the top—into coffee paradise (which is either Melbourne, Copenhagen, or Portland, depending on who you ask).