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Optical Feedback For Perfect Coffee
FOLICOR writes "One man's quest for the perfect cup of joe leads to
a new coffee maker" Somehow I have to hope that this is fake, but it looks like he's using an led to make sure his coffee is brewed reliably. I brew mine on my stove in a syphon cheerfully referred to as The Coffee Bong. Super primitive.
If the beer is slightly a different color than is expected you can dismiss the bottle. The train of thought is that if it is a different color there is something different. i.e. unwanted additive or too much or to less of a product, so throw it away.
The theory is you don't have to actually open the bottle to taste test it and it is more reliable to use a machine then a human to spot the difference.
Actually, there's a Rival coffeemaker with (fancy-looking mirrored) thermal carafe that I absolutely love.
It's been churning out tasty hot coffee for the office for years, at both my last (failed) startup and my current one--the same unit, not just the same model. My best guess is that it's made upwards of 800 pots, and it works just as well as when it was brand new.
I think it's cheaper than an equivalent Krups, at least in the US. Downside is its small capacity--it uses #2 cone filters and only makes 8 cups. But it's so good.
spawn_of_yog_sothoth
All he really needs is a decent thermal pot, so he can scrap the heating element entirely (not to mention the cost of his product). A good thermal pot will keep the coffee hot for hours, without that after taste associated with glass carafes. What use is an LED to measure just how bad your coffee is? As long as it's sitting on a warmer some time, bad coffee is basically inevitable. I haven't really read about his brewing technique, but using a sensor to monitor the badness of bad coffee seems almost comedic.
Oh, one thing's more amusing than a coffee snob on a rant. A martini snob on a rant!
Yeah, yeah... Just admit that you like plain gin straight up.
Chelloveck
Chelloveck
I give up on debugging. From now on, SIGSEGV is a feature.
As for Chock Full of Nuts n Bolts, or friggin Maxwell House, yes, I think they're shit too. But I'll put Kona over Blue Mountain, but only just slightly.
Oh, and french presses suck, IMHO. They're a bitch to clean, so why bother?
It doesn't mean much now, it's built for the future.
Worst coffee (anywhere): the Toronto to Chicago Amtrak. :)
Worst method: Greek / Turkish. At that point, why not just suck on the damn beans?
It doesn't mean much now, it's built for the future.
Somthing to regulate the temperature would be better.
Even consumer level espresso machines do this. Ours does anyway, so this doesn't even approach being a holy grail.
Now, a consumer espresso machine where the steamer had some semblance of power in it? That's a holy grail.
Dave
I write a blog now, you should be afraid.
a telephone handset (think about it!)
Whoa! Dead mobile phone, I even have one around.
Make no mistake, you are the one.
Dave
I write a blog now, you should be afraid.
In this limited space we cannot do justice to the complex chemistry occuring during roasting and brewing but can supply a simplified primer and encourage the interested reader to delve further into the subject.
[...]Clearly, the cellulosic components (hemicellulose, celullose and lignin) are little effected by the roasting process as are the ash (mineral) and fat components (fatty acids, trigylcerides, waxs) since the roasting temperatures are low relative to their decomposition temperatures. Whereas the sugars, organic acids and proteins are dramatically reduced upon roasting. So it is apparent that the rich aroma and pigmentation occurs because of chemistry occuring to and between these components, the sugars, proteins and organic acids (chlorogenic acid). Indeed non-enzymatic browning reactions, called Maillard reactions involve interactions of amino groups of amino acids of proteins and other compounds and reducing sugars to form glycosamines(2,4,5). These condensation reactions with subsequent fission produces aliphatic and aromatic volatiles comprising the aroma. Much of the distinctive aroma arises due to the presence of sulfur and oxygen bearing aromatic (heterocyclic) compounds such as furans, furfurylthiol or furfurylmethyl sulphides and a host of other similar compounds. As of 1985, some 660 separate compounds in the aroma of a roasted coffee have been identified by gas chromotography and mass spectrometry.
[...] the heavier molecular weight components possess varying degreees of extended conjugation [...]. These components which have a molecular weight distribution from 5000-25,000 (1) or greater have energetically closely spaced highest occupied and lowest unoccupied molecular orbitals (HOMO-LUMO) which leads to a myriad of optical transitions spanning the uv-visible range into the near infrared. As a result of the great multiplicity and heterogeneity of the associated compounds the optical absorption spectrum of a brewed coffee is smooth and monotonically decreasing from the far ultraviolet (uv) to the near infrared wavelengths.
Isn't unecessarily complex language one of the signs of a bad patent?
Excuse the long quote, but my intent was to pick out a few sentences that uniquely illustrated that the author is obviously trying to pull the wool over everyone's eyes by distracting them with big words. Unfortunately, the whole "simplified primer" is such an exercise in 10$ words for 10cent concepts that I had a hard time choosing just one or two examples.
Aah, change is good. -- Rafiki
Yeah, but it ain't easy. -- Simba
He's not measuring turbidity (at least, not intentionally).
The principle of tghe measurment is more like that of UV-Cis spectroscopy, measuring some set of exitation bands. This is, of course, overlaid onto the turdibity measurment that is also made, but not used.
--
The circuit cuts the water supply when the coffee reaches the desired strength. I skimmed the pages to find that one tidbit in the first place, because I wanted to see how he regulated coffee strength. It's pretty simple: a partial feedback loop... kinda.
I'm pretty sure that I didn't see anything about pouring more/b> water over the grinds, and you didn't quote or point to anything that suggested this.
Many good espresso machines have high pressure pumps that can sustain 15+ bars, but the extra pressure is for headroom: The machines are engineered to deliver 8 to 9 bars of pressure to the compressed coffee puck, assuming proper packing. Higher pressure can leach undesirable flavor compounds from the coffee and is to be avoided.
For more, see David Schomer's "Factors in a Perfect Cup (of espresso)" or for deep coverage read Illy and Viani's Espresso Coffee : The Chemistry of Quality.
Easy, automatic testing for Perl.
20 January 2017: the End of an Error.
The espresso machine uses steam head to generate the ~18bar pressure (ideal) to force the water through the coffee. I froth a mean pitcher of milk... mmm, foamy..
Check out the rec.drugs.caffeine FAQ (or rec.foods.coffee, perhaps). What happened to the usenet people? :)
..don't panic
....is a well established science. Surprisingly accurate.
....iometry name, but there is proper apparatus to do this - you calibrate with stock solutions using a lightbox and coloured filters, then use it to measure test solutions.
Can't remember the fancy
Why doen't someone make a toaster with optical feedback? The perfect toast colour is at a critical point as the drkness makes it absorb more heat and get blackened.
To quote the Dr. Rev. Dennis Leary:
"Duuude! I made a bong out of my head!!! Put the pot in this ear, suck on the other! Give it a hit, man!"
Or something to that effect...
--Fesh
--Fesh
Kill -9 'em all, let root@localhost sort 'em out.
My God, they've realised that to defeat the rabid hordes of Linux geeks it may be necessary to patent coffee!
404 Not Found: No such file or resource as '.sig'
From his description of how it works: "This method of optical feedback makes for very reproducible coffee strength, independent of the amount of coffee grinds used"
I must be missing something here. If I put in a small amount of coffee grinds, and dial in strong coffee, how in the hell is pouring more water over the grinds going to ever make the coffee sufficiently strong? Coffee makers only extract so much from the grinds. I know this, because I've tried reusing grinds in the past, when really desparate (and broke..). All that you will end up with is lots of weak, crappy tasting coffee. Even percolators, which continuously flow the partially made coffee back over the grinds can only achieve certain strength coffee based on a set amount of grinds.
What it boils down to (no pun intended) is that you _must_ put in enough grinds for whatever strength brew you are looking for.
That, my friends, is the law of conservation of coffee.
I love the smell, but I can't stand the taste.
BlackNova Traders
"One man's quest for the perfect cup of joe leads to a new coffee maker"
Speaking of Joe and coffee, your coffee will have more caffeine in it (i.e. it will be better) if you use Water Joe instead of regular water.
---
DOOR!!
I pledge allegiance to the flag...
of the Corporate States of America...
For perfect coffee, don't use a coffee maker! FRENCH PRESS!!!!
Seems all those reports in the media about Australians having a 'coffee culture' that couldn't be displaced by a US import were as shitty as our apparent taste in coffee.
Those who know me can attest to this;
As I have maintained for the better part of 1/3rd of my life, It aint Coffee, Nor is it beer if you can shine a 1mw neon laser through the mug and see it on the other side.
chris
This communication is secured using Rot-26 Encryption Algorithm, Unauthorized decryption will be subject to laughter.
Seriously, brewing just seems like a slow, agonizing, skunky way to make ground coffee fester.
Make mine an Americano.
*Glares at LinuxHam*
You can NEVER love coffee too much! Bow before the URN, infidel!
My sig does not apply when coffee is involved
He who joyfully marches in rank and file has already earned my contempt. - "Big Al" Einstein
(Ironic note: turn off java before going to their website.)
sulli
RTFJ.
I strongly prefer a good drip maker, and really good coffee - preferably Sulawesi or Kenya AA. It depends on the year, though: this year's Starbucks Gazebo Blend is amazing.
sulli
RTFJ.
--
BACKNEXTFINISHCANCEL
Well, that explains Jesus then...
"Shit man, like these fish, they're so totally huge, they could feed like five thousand."
"Nah, screw that dude, I feel so light I bet I could walk across that water over there, then float away on a cloud!" "Yeah bro, I dig what you're saying. All these glowing joints [later recorded as coals] in our mouths and it feels like I can understand every language there ever was!"
In the now lost final book of the new testament, they went on to talk interminably about Star Wars as all stoners seem to do, thinking their every word pure genius. Understandably, when they came down, they realised how stupid it was and destroyed it.
The "inventors" have not bothered to learn much about coffee and how to make it. They propose to regulate the strength of the coffee by adjusting the amount of water passed through the grounds, but this method is guaranteed to produce an unpalatable drink. If, for some misguided reason, it is necessary to create weak coffee, one first makes normal coffee (espresso) and adds hot water. Exposing the grounds to water for too long extracts undesirable flavor components.
The ESPRESSO is the answer! poster had some good points, but he should know that "bitterness" is one of the main flavor components of coffee and is not considered undesirable, in the proper measure.
At first I read "biofeedback" for "Optical Feedback" in the title "Optical Feedback For Perfect Coffee", which immediately set off in my mind the idea that you have a feedback loop to adjust the amount of sugar and cream in your coffee, as well as its "strength" (the slidable thing that looks like the sliding scale on your toaster [y'know "bread/charcoal"] ). This isn't what the article actually is, the article just makes sure that there's a 1:1 correlation between the strength you ask for and the strength you get. My problem is I don't know what strength I want, and I don't know how much sugar I want and I don't know how much milk I want. My wife makes me the perfect cup of coffee, but that's because she spent years trying different combinations and thereby adjusting her own internal feedback loop, until she got a "feel" for how much of each setting made for the best cup of coffee.
:]) -- think "alpha channel", where RGB is coffee-strength/sugar level/milk level.
Now if in addition to this new machine in the article, which makes sure that the setting specified is the setting received, there were a second machine that adjusted this setting, and also doled sugar and cream out for you, based on a feedback loop whereby after each cup you would specify 1) how much you liked it. Or, for advanced users, 2) whether it was too sweet for you or too bitter and 3) whether it was too strong for you or too dull. (Too hard coffee or too hard cream). The beauty of this is that with even the most modest OS and statistical software the first variable alone (how much you liked it -- even if you don't know why you did or did not like it) would let the average user approach PerfectCup after about 7 cups (rough estimate) of more grossly suboptimal coffee.
Further tweaks could perfect the milk/cream ratio ("Half and half" is just such a ball-park estimate
Of course each coffee bean would be associated with a particular set of settings, and each member of your household would also. (Just don't let Microsoft find out or you'll need a Passport(R) to get your morning cup of joe.:])
Oh, and you could sometimes ask for something more jolty and sometimes something more sweet. Like one bean for one person might have a "morning" (jolty), "meal" (nice good cup) and "desert" (rather sweet, milder) setting. What do we say, gang? Worth starting on sourceforge?
this reminds me. Tell someone "Say boast three times fast." ("okay. boast, boast, boast.") "Now what do you put in a toaster?" ("toast") "No, you mentally deficient individual, you put bread in. Toast is what you take out." [joint polite laugh.]
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Disclaimer: I am vegan. I would exploit the above software to get me a decent cup of coffee with real-non-dairy-creamer (the kind that isn't laced with whey) or else with soy milk. The real reason I want to make the OS opensource is so I could compile me these custom mods. That and ssh'ing into my coffee maker. ("What are you doing?" "Oh I'm just logging onto my coffee server [ha] to set the timer for a nice big cup of coffee when I get back home. Wait a minute lemme check the web cam to see if I left my mug in. Yep." How cool is that?)
~
I know, and Lincoln, too, wanting to emancipate the slaves -- he just needs a good psychotherapist that can help him understand things and put them in perspective. I think he just has issues and can't understand that slaves aren't people like he's a person -- they're african savages. end satire.
animals aren't people, but they can feel pain and are made institutionally to suffer. why support that?
~
Have the US patent examiners never read the ingredients list on a jar of instant coffee? Antioxidants have been added to nearly all processed foodstuffs (including coffee) for decades.
Better pay him a royalty for the cup I'm drinking now...
Okay. That link shows the Capresso machines. Wanting to know more, I found them at capresso.com.
What I don't get is why the C1000 is a dead ringer for the Krups Orchestro (with that form factor they've got to have the same guts), but costs a good $100 more.
Besides, if it doesn't have a genuflecting duck on it, it ain't really an espresso machine...
--Blair
In my humble opinion, what makes a great cup of coffee is what one is used to drinking.
Different brands probably would have different translumination coefficients. Things like particle size of coffee grounds also would effect this....
Coffee bags? What kind of philistine are you? :-) I tried those once...they're hella nasty. (You are talking about the ones you brew like tea, right?)
There's no substitute for proper brewing (drip) of freshly-ground beans. Ideally, you use a coffee maker that takes a cone-shaped filter (nearly the only kind you'll find in Europe; the inferior basket-type coffee makers are much more common in the States), and a permanent filter (one of the gold-plated thingies) won't impart flavors in the way that paper filters can. With the same beans (Colombian supremos), I noticed a big difference going from a 4-cup Mr. Coffee with paper filters to a regular-sized Krups with a permanent filter; the latter rig produces a smoother cup.
20 January 2017: the End of an Error.
In the 1970's my father made a visit to Brazil, where
as you know they are serious about coffee. He
invented a coffee strength tool using the same principle, but
somewhat simpler, no computer required -- you just take a plastic ruler
and dip it into the coffee, and then read off the
strength by seeing where the last tick on the ruler is that you can still see. A manual optical
strength meter.
Or do you have a coffee machine that creates a seal then pumps up the pressure before it makes the brew?
Yes, it's commonly called an espresso machine...
More from Denis Leary: http://www.maths.tcd.ie/~hades/ncfc.html
I never got into the whole Starbucks thing. I like good coffee and I like coffee made right, but I can do it pretty simply.
First of all, you start with good coffee. Most people can get it at their grocery store (I'm not talking Folgers). Second, you get a coffee maker. Even a Mr. Coffee is fine, but I prefer a percolator myself. Once the coffee is made, you put it in a thermos. The only thing that makes good coffee go bad is to let it cook.
I may be a simple person, but just like I know good beer and wine, I know good coffee, and the mechanics don't make much of a difference.
A friend of mine did the "teaspoon test" on every cup he made. If you can see the bottom of the teaspoon it's too weak. He is VERY particular about his coffee. When he drops in for a visit he brings his own device and supply with him. He stopped just short of growing his own beans.
That's all the optical feedback I need.
--------
Bleah! Heh heh heh... BLEAH BLEAH!!! Ha ha ha ha...
I find that putting the same amount of good quality coffee (e.g., beans from my local organic coffee shop, or from Peet's and filtered water makes for a good pot of coffee every time. Put garbage in, and you'll get garbage out. If you're worried about the coffee getting stale, put it in a thermos to keep it hot so it doesn't get that skanky burned taste that leaving it on the hot pot can give. It uses less electricty that way, and you can take it with you to your computer^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H breakfast table with you, too. My sister in Germany has a coffee pot where the carafe is a thermos, and it shuts off the heating element as soon as the coffee is brewed.
I don't care what he's using to brew his coffee, but using a glass carafe and keeping it warm on a hot plate is quickest and easiest way to get bad coffee. If he was serious, he'd at least use a thermal/insulated coffee pot and scrap the heating element. A good thermal pot can keep your coffee hot for hours. Of course, Krups seems to be the only decent manufacturer of thermal coffee brewers that sells in the US and there is some kind of import restriction against that product :(
PS: If anyone knows of an online retailer that sells Krups thermal coffee brewers (without that new fangled "Aroma" crap), please reply! Thanks
- US05724882
- US05956151
- US06228410
I reckon the best thing about is that it will probably sell as the marketing guys will love the idea. I suppose it is up there with fuzzy logic washing machines, which were a big hit in JapanJumpstart the tartan drive.
Someone should tell this guy that if he's looking for the ultimate coffee he ain't going to get it from a drip method.
Coffee needs to have its flavour force extracted by water at about 18 bar pressure....
Take a look at:
Gaggia
Capresso
Seaeco
and remember, the more money you spend - the better it gets. Or go to your local coffee emporium, but remember kids - Starbucks are evil!
...technology that DESERVES to be patented!
"And like that
Who was it who said that "the problem with marijuana isn't that it leads to other drugs, the problem with marijuana is that it leads to fucking carpentry"?
rark!
Let me be blunt: If you aren't drinking espresso -- good espresso -- you haven't tasted coffee. And I mean espresso, not cappuccino, not latte, not frapparichinomochalaloopy. That's the kind of stuff you make when you want to cover up the taste of bad espresso.
Good espresso is nothing like the over-roasted, over-extracted, bitter and charred-tasting stuff you've had when you finally worked up the courage to try an ``espresso'' at *$s or some other gourmet coffee chain. If you're lucky, they gave you 3 or 4 ounces of unspeakably bitter drek. If you weren't lucky,... Well, I'm just thankful that you're still with us.
Good espresso is like heaven in a cup. Deep, rich, dark, and luxurious, good espresso has no bitterness. Its potent perfume only hints at the depth of complexity that awaits you upon the first sip. Creamy, caramelly, exploding with flavor, with a touch of sweetness on the tongue: This is what good espresso tastes like. No need to add sugar, the real stuff is quaffed straight.
Oh, and does espresso help your coding? You betcha! Nothing cuts through code fog like a double ristretto. Fires up the brain into smooth working condition. Clarity? You own clarity. With espresso cup in hand, ease in to the Captain's Chair: You are in command.
Face it, you need the real stuff. Here's how to get it:
- Stop buying stale coffee at stores and ``gourmet'' shops.
- Get an old hot-air popcorn popper and start homeroasting.
It's cheap, it's easy, and it's so worth it. You won't
believe how much better truly fresh coffee tastes. If you go no
farther than this and get a french press and a cheap grinder, you'll
have better coffee at home than you'll be able to find anywhere else.
- Get a decent espresso machine. No steam toys. Read the
user-contributed reviews on www.coffeekid.com. Plan on
spending at least 250 USD for a decent machine. Spend the money:
you'll pay for it in under a year from your coffee-chain savings.
- Get a good grinder. You can't make real espresso without
one. This is the one that people skimp on and later wonder why their
fancy 1000-USD espresso machine can't make good espresso. Plan on
another 200 USD, minimum. Again, it pays for itself.
- Lurk in alt.coffee
and drink in the wisdom. Learn how to pull a ristretto that extracts the deep, beautiful essence of
15g of freshly ground, freshly roasted coffee into 1.75ounces
of pure bliss. Once you've had a "god shot", you'll never be able to go back to bad coffee again.
Do it. It will change your life.P.S. Here's a good starting roast/blend for espresso: 2 parts brazillian cerrado, 1 part sumatra mandheling, 1/2 part monsooned malabar, 1/2 part monsooned cherry aa robusta. Roast each part individually, just a bit into the second crack. Blend and store in an airtight glass container. The next morning, open the container and try to contain your amazement at how great the stuff is.
Easy, automatic testing for Perl.
Thinking about that...
Basically, a coffee percolator is an inverted bong, as the heat comes from the bottom, forcing the water around instead of suction forcing air around.
Thinking along those lines two weeks ago I took an old percolator, and with the help of some duct tape and a hacksaw I made a bong! The top, where the glass knob normally is where you can see the coffee bubbling, has been replaced by a bowl, which leads down into the former coffee chamber that has been sealed airtight except for the tube leading down into the water.
There's a pipe-tube-hookah thing leading into the spout, also sealed airtight. The pipe is built with a little tiny piece of plastic PVC so it's easy to disconnect it and put it inside for safekeeping.
Yes, ladies and gentlemen, ANYTHING can become pot smoking paraphenalia. Just be creative!
My other pipes include an old wireless Nintendo controller (where the thumbpad was,a bowl is now) and a telephone handset (think about it!).
Enjoy, and study plenty at four twenty.
Is it RFC 2324 compliant?
sulli
RTFJ.
My friends and I were doing something similar for potheads all over the world. Ours was a regular straight-pipe bong with a red LED and a CdS photo-detector. This controlled a small air-pump near the top of the bong. One started, the airpump would shutoff once the voltage dropped to a sufficient level due to the smoke in the chamber.
Somthing to regulate the temperature would be better. Boiling water impares the taste - Too cold and you don;t extract all thr flavour.
93 degrees centigrate at 18 bar pressure will produce the ultimate coffee.
Also, I would imagine that the use of different beans would create variations in colour which this machine could never deal with.
- - Sha la la la . . .