COFFEE GRINDERS

Here’s the thing about coffee grinders that took me an embarrassingly long time to figure out: your grinder matters more than your machine.

I’ve watched people spend £800 on an espresso machine and then run their beans through a £15 blade grinder that smashes everything to dust.

The espresso is terrible. They blame the machine.

The grinder is where the magic actually happens. Consistent particle size means even extraction, which means flavour you can actually taste rather than a cup that’s somehow half bitter and half sour at the same time.

I’ve been drinking, brewing and obsessing over coffee for about 20 years. I’ve used grinders from a hand burr mill on a trip to Colombia to a commercial Mahlkönig in a Manchester café.

The articles below cut through the noise. Start with the best coffee grinders roundup if you want a direct answer. If you want to understand what you’re actually buying first, the grind size guide is the place.