[goodfood]

Ok just checked with Felix. Coffee Assembly opens at 1 pm - 9 pm ! And only open Sun - Thurs.

So no go !

[jayinhongkong]

Darn, sorry to hear that! I'll try and get over there on Monday as I'll be relatively free then.

[goodfood]

Did you make it to Coffee Assembly ?

[jayinhongkong]

Nope, but I did get 200g of Hawaiian Peaberry from HKCoffee. Smells GREAT, but not very good in the cup!? I'm going to have to try it again before I make my final decision on it.

[renHK]

Finally got a chance to go to HKcoffee and buy a Feima grinder, as recommended by boblam. Without changing anything else (in the interest of control), the difference was like night and day. Fantastic! It's such a pleasure to be actually tasting the coffee, rather than the dusty residue. Thanks for the advice!

Now its time to try a change of beans.

The guy who sold me the Feima wouldn't let me go until he'd showed me how to make espresso properly and watched me get it right. Very helpful guy. He didn't really speak any English, though, so I was lucky to arrive when he had English speaking customers/friends willing to translate.

Also tried the Peaberry while I was there. Didn't find it mind-blowing when it was drunk as a plain espresso, but when he added a little milk, it really brought out its sweet and fruity fragrance.

[jayinhongkong]

In my case, it might have been the roast levels. The Peaberry might have been better at FC - FC+ instead of just FC.

The Costa Rican coffees taste fabulous with my grinder/french press combo, but I was a bit disappointed by the Peaberry. I always use milk and dried organic sugar cane juice (sucanat) from Costa Rica in my coffee.

[boblam07]

Originally Posted by renHK

Fantastic! It's such a pleasure to be actually tasting the coffee, rather than the dusty residue.

Congrat on your coffee journey.

The guy who sold me the Feima wouldn't let me go until he'd showed me how to make espresso properly and watched me get it right.

That sounds like Mr. Shing (pronounced more like seng) to me. If that's the case, he's the master roaster there and the one who did the youtube video. He can speak some english but not fluent, to my understanding.

Also tried the Peaberry while I was there. Didn't find it mind-blowing

I would reserve most single origin (SO) beans for filtered coffee, not espresso.

If you insist SO for espresso, try some Yirgh or Ismaili if it's still available. Tell him you do espresso so they can roast accordingly. Espresso is rather finicky on almost everything so if you have doubt, ask/visit the shop for advice. Espresso takes time and $$$ so much so that I don't want to venture in there even though the final reward is very tempting. Also, you may start with blend beans which is less expensive until you nail your espresso.

On a different note, Fuel Espresso, a New Zealand based espresso shop is coming to town. I don't know much about Aus-NZ coffee scene first hand but seemed to me that they are very demanding for their espresso, much more than North America. Hopefully, we'll be able to judge them soon when they open the door at IFC. Here's more detail

CoffeeGeek - Regional: Australia, New Zealand and Asia, Fuel Espresso opening in Hong Kong

[jayinhongkong]

Looks like things are warming up! Thanks for that Bob!

fuel espresso > Home

[jayinhongkong]

My mom just got back from India and brought me 250g of preground ( ) Mangalore Peaberry. It's actually quite good, but unlike any coffee I've ever had in my life. It was ground very, very fine and it only cost $1 US!

[boblam07]

Originally Posted by jayinhongkong

My mom just got back from India and brought me 250g of preground ( ) Mangalore Peaberry. It's actually quite good, but unlike any coffee I've ever had in my life. It was ground very, very fine and it only cost $1 US!

US$1...

Wow! How's the caffeine kick, ie I incline to think it's more of a robusta than arabica.