A coffee grinder is a must have for anyone who loves coffee.

The bean is not tolerant of being ground poorly and a good grinder makes all the difference to getting that great cup of coffee.

Any of the many coffee roasters in the world will tell you that a coffee grinder is an essential part of kit for anyone who is serious about coffee it is just not possible to get one without it.

The best coffee and espresso is freshly ground moments before brewing, and owning a coffee grinder is the surest way to achieve this.

Controlling the Grind

There are two different types of coffee grinding mechanism which you will find in automated grinders: blades and burrs. Most of the cheaper machines will have metal blades which grind the coffee. This blades spin round and chop the beans into increasingly small particles, so you simply leave the machine on longer for a finer grind. You must be careful not to leave them on too long though, as they generate quite a lot of heat and can actually burn the beans, which will affect the taste of the brew. A coffee grinder with burrs will allow better control over how fine the coffee is ground. This can be important for getting the right quality of grind for the brew you want, and I will talk about this a little more in the next feature. Instead of chopping the beans, burrs crush them, and by choosing the position of the burr, you can control the grind. There are two main types of burr: wheel burrs and conical burrs. Conical burrs are usually found in the most expensive coffee grinding machines, but are worth paying the extra money for. These are the types of grinder predominantly used in coffee shops and will give better tasting coffee.

Getting a Range of Coarseness Levels

As I said, the coarseness level of the coffee you grind will affect the type of brew you get. There are three main grades of grind which are references in most coffee-making instructions: coarse, medium and fine. For example a coarse grind is best to aim for if you use a press pot to brew; a medium grind is best for use in a vac-pot brewer or if you use a drip-pot style brewer; a fine grind is best if you wish to brew espresso. Some machines offer a feature which will let you select how coarse you want the grind to be, while others offer only one setting. Choosing a machine which has multiple settings for each of the three main grades will let you experiment until you are able to get the best tasting coffee.

Bean Capacity

As the name suggests, this feature determines how much coffee you can grind at once. So if you only usually make one coffee a day then you can go for a machine with a small bean capacity, but if you want to grind a whole day’s worth of beans at once then you may need a slightly larger one. To get great tasting coffee, you should try and grind beans fresh before you brew, but for many this is impractical, and having a coffee grinder with a higher bean capacity can save you valuable time.