Sage BCG820BSSUK the Smart Grinder Pro Coffee Grinder - Silver

Product Information

TWO FREE BAGS OF COFFEE BEANS. You'll receive a 250g bag of each of our ever popular Breakfast Favourite and Everyday Espresso coffee bean blends. Whilst these two blends work well for all brewing methods, they make an amazing espresso with super rich crema when used with any of the sage barista machines. The other thing I wasn't quite sure about was grind time or grind amount. What this relates to is dose, which means the amount of coffee we “dose” into our espresso basket, Aeropress, or V60 filter, for example.

I know a lot more about grinders these days, so I understand that these don't have “true” burrs, they have “flat grinding wheels” which crush beans, and it's a common misconception that this is what burrs do, but actually, burrs are made to more or less “chew” beans into uniform chunks, not so much to crush them. So it's this crushing with these types of grinders that is the problem. At the time, the cheapest budget grinders on the market were the De'Longhi KG79 & Krups Expert, and I mainly swerved them because it appeared to me at the time that they weren't as user-friendly as the Sage grinders, and that the grind performance wasn't the best. The grind adjustment dial changes the number on the digital screen, smaller is finer, bigger is coarser, and if you didn't think it could get any simpler, it can, because it tells you on the screen what brew method the current grind relates to, so at the finer end you'll see “espresso”, and then that will change as you move it, so if you're grinding for espresso for example, you can just start off somewhere in the middle of the “espresso” range, and adjust from there.It has a pair of 40mm stainless steel conical burrs, as do most of the other cheaper grinders on the market. So if you're looking at the Wilfa Svart, Gaggia MD15, Baratza Encore, etc., when it comes to particle uniformity in the medium to coarse grind sizes, it's unlikely that we're going to find much of a difference by going for the Smart Grinder Pro instead of the Wilfa Svart, which is just under half of the price.

So if you have one grinder which creates a huge range of particle sizes at one grind setting, and another grinder that creates a much more uniform range, meaning more of the particles are a similar size, you're going to get better cup quality.As I've said, this grinder is one of the cheapest grinders that is capable of espresso, with standard baskets, and it's a great all rounder grinder, but a question I get quite often, is how is it for manual brew methods. Most of the time this question is related to pourover (V60/Chemex/Kalita/Clever Dripper), stovetop, or cafetiere. I bought this grinder for pairing with my Gaggia Classic, which was a used 2003 model, but also for Aeropress, cafetiere, and V60, and this is the main reason I was looking at the Sage grinders in the first place, as they appeared to be perfect for varied use. So if you don't need the espresso capability, it's fair to say that purely talking about grinding performance, you're probably not going to experience a great deal of difference in the cup from your extra spend. What you will benefit from, however, is the amazing user-friendliness, ease of use, and lots of features that you won't find on most other options. In these cases, these beans being so hard that the grinder treats them as if they were stones, means that if this failsafe wasn't there, there's a good chance that the grinder would be damaged, possibly irreversibly. Some other entry-level grinders (and some not so entry level grinders) are known for stripping gears for example when they try to grind beans that are too hard for that grinder. I didn't see anyone complaining of this for the smart grinder pro, and I can confirm that in my case at least, there's absolutely no issue with statically charged coffee grounds. Mess

The dose programming is just about setting the time for the number of shots, to get you close to the required dose, and this is separate to the grind size setting. You can’t really rely on timing for dosing, you really need scales, and the timing then is just there as a guide. The best grind size if you are extracting your coffee as an espresso for both the dose control and a smart grind is somewhere between 8-13.

Reliability

FREE YOUR GRIND The Smart Grinder™ Pro lets you grind directly into the portafilter, an airtight container, gold tone filter basket or paper filter. The choice is yours. So my opinion with hoppers is to use them as temporary storage only and keep your beans in air-tight storage, preferably in a cool and relatively dark location (such as a cupboard, or on the moon, whichever is easiest). Don't do what most people do, which is to open your beans and empty them into the hopper as soon as you get them, and leave them in there until you run out. If you're doing this, you may as well leave them in the bag and just leave the bag open, as the hopper (any hopper, not just the hopper on the Sage grinders) doesn't protect against the environment. With 60 unique settings, this programmable conical burr coffee bean grinder maximizes the potential of any brew. Choose between 'cups' for French Press or Filter and 'shots' for Espresso to get the right dose for the coffee you're brewing. Grind coffee beans directly into a portafilter or an air-tight container. If you do want to work with light roasts, by the way, just keep in mind that you'll need a more commercial-grade grinder for that. Grinders that can cope with much harder beans often have a much higher powered motor, and a gearing system that transforms the motor power into torque, and all of the componentry would usually (hopefully) be sturdy enough to cope with grinding much lighter roasted beans. How Good is The Smart Grinder Pro for Manual Brew Methods? I was using the double shot basket, so it was obvious to me that I needed to press the 2 shots button. By the way, the reason the text “shots/cups” appears under this button, if you're grinding for espresso the digital screen will display “shots” allowing you to toggle between 1 and 2 cups, for the single or double shot baskets, and if you're grinding for manual brew methods this will change on the screen to “cups”. Have I mentioned how smart this grinder is!? 😉