Square Mile: Red Brick Espresso
Initially I found this coffee difficult to brew and I was getting what seemed to be quite delicate results which seemed at odds with the description. However after a little experimentation I upped the brew temp (in my case via the Auber pid) I went up to 108/9°C at the boiler which equates to somewhere in the ball-park of ~95°C at the brew-head (sadly I’m not measuring the brew temp currently though that’s a mod I’d love to do at some point).
Once everything was dialed-in it felt like I was starting to taste some of the cherry/rosehip notes in the espresso. The mouthfeel became more full and that made the espresso sing a lot more.
With milk I didn’t really find the knock-out flat-whites I’d hoped for (perhaps I'd been spoiled by my recent daliance with the Havana X-Blend) but this espresso is more subtle than that. To put that in a different way I’d say this is an interesting blend. It’s not all about warmth and cocoa notes and huge sweetness but more about quality fruity dark chocolate flavours with some delicate spicy overtones and with that it’s well worth some experimentation.