What I can't believe is the difference a cheap Bodum French Press makes for smooth coffee. Our oldest son had given us one probably ten years ago and it was still in the box. You can get them for around $20 on Amazon if you buy one of the glass ones with the plastic handle and base. Nothing fancy.... 34 ounce.. perfect to fill up my 30 ounce Yeti Rambler every morning.Nice to see you around Kim, improving your coffee life, one step at a time.
If you got the Timemore Black Mirror Nano scale, as seen in my pictures above, then you secured yourself one of the best coffee scales on the market. Just an FYI, keep the table surface that it is on stable, the scale is super sensitive due to its .1G abilities, and any external vibration or movement, can make the numbers jump up/down. I find it to be incredibly accurate, much more then your typical 1G kitchen scale. And shipping scales can't even compare at all! lol
To be perfectly honest Kim, I don't really think you made a bad choice personally, with the grinder you chose. It does appear to use a conical steel burr if I remember correctly. I mean, you did pay like what 126 dollars for that grinder, so its not like you bought cheap 10 to 20 dollar garbage. Sure, it won't measure up to the quality of a 1ZPresso K-MAX grinder, but what the real question we should be asking is, does the grinder you chose work for you?
From what I can tell from your post, the answer is yes, it does work for you. And you said its producing a consistent grind. Well guess what? With all that I have learned about quality coffee grinders is, a consistent grind is key, to producing a good tasty coffee, as the consistent grind, allows for proper coffee extraction. So you did good Kim, and you did good on your scale purchase too!
I too agree with everything you said about the Cuisinart DBM-8 grinder, which I also own. Those ceramic burr's get hot! And when a burr gets hot, it makes static, its a static generation in its own right lol. And Yes, the thing is very loud, you will wake up the undead to come knocking on your door, looking for a brain snack, BRAINS!
My experience using a stainless steel conical burr matches your own, in regards to static, their is practically none, and 0-grinds retention can be achieved, which makes me happy. Also, the finer you go with your grind, the more work it will be with a hand grinder, so yes, a course grind for French Press, will be very easy to produce, very little muscle power required.
Another thing I've experienced Kim, is that I find, that grinding a light roasted bean, requires more work to grind, as I believe its due to the fact the beans are tougher, from being roasted for less long. So, I certainly feel it, when I am grinding my Stirling Ethiopian Yirgacheffe beans, using setting 6 on my K-MAX grinder, to produce a medium fine grind. Where as when I am grinding my Stirling Kenya dark roasted beans, using the same setting of 6, its far easier to grind those beans.
This coffee experience has been amazing for me, all be it my wallet getting more empty each time. Story of our lives right? HAHA! And, things are not going well for me at the moment, because my Hamilton Beach 49987 The Scoop single serve brewer, decided to tear its mesh filter, (Which I have since learned is a well reported occurrence with these units) and to get a replacement filter, I'd have to shell out 26 bucks directly to the company, because they don't make replacements available elsewhere, sad, cause the brewer is less then a year old.
Soooooo, I think I am going to be buying a new coffee brewer in a couple months. Of course, its gonna be much more expensive then what I paid for this Hamilton Beach unit. But as it is with all things, 99% of the time, you get what you pay for. I already have a model picked out, but its too early for me to divulge what I plan to get right now.
As I've mentioned in a few threads, our Cuisinart coffee brewer died after almost 20 years. I ordered a current replacement from Amazon and even though it was Prime, it was direct from Cuisinart so it was going to take 4 days... so we broke out the French Press... After two days... we tried to cancel the Amazon order but it was too late. I didn't even open it when it arrived... just did an "unopened" return.
I also owe @Eric_75 because he uses a French Press every day so I was inspired to try it anyway... the fact we had one sitting around was cool... I did order my wife a Red Bodum.. so we each have our own. LOL
As far as the grinder, I got the cheap KINGrinder K1... their least expensive grinder @ $70. I tried to determine the differences between their models and other than a coating on the burrs vs. naked stainless steel.. or the number of micro adjustments and coffee bean capacity, they look very similar in design. As I said, I'm not pushing the envelope for grinds because I'm doing coarse grinds for French Press.. not fine grinds for Turkish or Espresso, etc. I have one of those $20 grinders I got years ago... hard to use due to the handle/crank design... and very slow grinding and small capacity. This KINGrinder is worlds better.
