One of my friends who owns a coffee shop in Taiwan is using WAFO baskets for his business. As he told me, the best benefits of the WAFO baskets are: 1. Shortening the brewing time. 2. Reducing almost 20% bean usage but with better taste compared with his old baskets. 3. Quality is stable and could shorten the training time. He told me his investment payback for these baskets is within 3 months. So I think these baskets are designed for business purposes rather than home purposes. Thank Brian for making such an interesting analysis. Now I know the facts behind the flavor.
Hi, I'm not intended to be offensive, but I'm just curious about that did the boss count the increased electricity cost in? 'Cause higher temperature might be required when using WAFO basket. BTW, g a amateur home coffee lover, I also love my WAFO baskets.🤤
@@zacchiu1171 I do not know if he also checked the power consumption. Maybe he also included the time parameter in his analysis. (I think the easiest way is to check the electric bill) Will ask him when I meet him again. 🙂
@@zacchiu1171 Have phoned my friend about the electricity cost. He told me that he did not see any change on the bill. But he said the high temperature might shorten the seal life and needed to use an ultrasonic cleaner to clean the basket. Overall he loves the new tool to help his business. 🙂
$200? The idea of 3000 holes is intriguing, but... I'll stick with my VST precision basket. I guess since I'm NOT spending $200 on a basket I can feel better about having paid $350 for SSP 83mm burrs last month.
How much bottom paper filter I can buy for 200 USD? Let me check. 3 USD for 200pcs. So about 13.500 papers. I can use papers 2 times so 27000 shots. 2 shots per day 13500 days. So it pays off in about 37 years for me :) heheh All joke aside, for cafe I can see this, but for home Ill stick with paper on the bottom
@@firasfaaiq8260 I've messed around with Weber Workshop's EPF, bought from a local distributor (because shipping from WW is ridiculously pricey for an $11 item). Works great with a VST 18mm basket You should measure the inner diameter of the bottom of your basket for best-fit. If the paper diameter is too wide, it'll curl up the sides and you risk coffee getting underneath between the paper and the basket. If you use a Pullman basket, then James Hoffman recommends getting a 2.25" paper punch and cutting out circles from Chemex filters.
Yes this is definitely geared more towards cafe usage but I wanted to share it as I think many folks who are into the advanced espresso world with bottom paper filters would be interested in the usage/EY boost!
Chemex filters are even cheaper. $10 for 1600 filters. So 32,000 filters compared to one basket. I'm curious if there'll be any performance difference between a paper filtered basket and these new baskets. T workflow improvement is nice but not worth the cost for a home user imo
How much is your time and hassle worth? Bottom paper filters are fiddly, you need to wet them, dab them and then press them centered and flat. Then you need to take care not to damage the filters during the WDT phase. Even if you only spend 15 or 30 seconds on this per shot you could probably recoup an hour or two if your time within a year. That’s not without value. I certainly would pay money not to use filters. At $200, I think the home user base is mostly out of reach. At $100 I would consider it though.
So many baskets over the years. So many extraction yield tests. OK, but does it make for better espresso? By that I mean, taste, texture. The real measurement that matters. Thanks
It definitely makes for different espresso, often discussed as clarity vs. body, fruity or more acidic vs. chocolatey, etc.. "Better" depends on your personal preferences.
This really depends on your definition of better! To me the SOE baskets present fruits and acidity in a way that only the Unifilter/bottom paper filter + good prep can and it is fascinating. It is a different style of espresso but this highly depends on what you are into and what coffees you are drinking.
@@DarkDaash agreed. I'm a bit skeptical of a lot of the claims in this video and would appreciate the Lance Hedrick review treatment. For one example, we're told the puck had no dark spots on the 17s pull, but there's no clear up-close shot to confirm the claim, nor is there any discussion of how the 17s shot tastes;or all we know, it could be super sour from under-extraction even if the whole pick is evenly extracted (and I know we have to take subjective taste claims with a grain of salt in all reviews). Another further claim which raised questions was regarding the heft of the basket, and the relative flex of other baskets. "More durable" is good, but I haven't heard of issues with VST baskets being bent/warped from repeated use so it seems like a fix to a problem that doesn't exist, and unless I missed it, there's no discussion of heat with respect to this basket and its higher mass. Lots of questions like this
This was supposed to be more of an introductory video but I'll see if I can cover everything more extensively such as durability/heat retention at a later date. I only have 1 camera so I added some other clips in the video of the puck being fully extracted + broken apart and in the deck you can see the puck has no dark spots! Regarding taste, pretty much all of these sub 20s shots that extract the puck evenly (turbobloom) on a 98mm flat taste great with the coffees I use. For the EY measurements we used Sey's Worka Site and the coffee is able to handle the higher extraction. It is a different style of shot that traditional espresso drinkers wouldn't be very accustomed to, but it is able to present the coffees in a way I like. Lance has covered the unifilter w/Jonathan which is pretty much exactly what the SOE Spirit does so I'd recommend you check that out too!
@@BrianQuan I appreciate the clarifications and want to also make it clear that I didn't intend it as an attack even though it had a tone of reserved (and hopefully healthy) skepticism. It's a good introduction to an intriguing piece of kit, just one that left me with questions!
I don’t know enough about the business side of things, but as a home enthusiast (Decent, K plus, WDT, paper filters, etc.) I don’t generally stick to 18g doses. Usually 24g, sometimes 15g. It’s nice to have variable options. I’m definitely interested in playing with this! But paying $200 for a fixed basket size I don’t usually prefer is a hard sell. I wonder if it would be practical to create a variable basket size? Something that comes to mind is a WAFO filter bottom that screws onto a basket, so you could swap relatively inexpensive basket sizes with the same WAFO bottom? Or maybe a different way to connect them, if screwing together wouldn’t be stable enough for the pressure. It’s not an issue at lower price points. But at this high end price point, the value proposition can change a bit with these kinds of design choices.
Baskets are rated for 16-18g and are 24.7mm in depth (total height). But you can totally fit more in depending on what beans and style of shot you're going for. I think the SOE Spirit/classic is much more optimized for 16-20g and pulling extremely fast flowing shots whereas the other baskets can benefit from slower styles of shots.
I love your channel and videos…but this one felt a bit dishonest. You are reviewing a basket that is stupidly priced at 200 dollars and you don’t mention the price until you are 22 minutes in? That is like reviewing a kitchen blender that weighs 200 pounds but failing to mention it’s weight until the end! Talk about burying the lead!
Like all new trendy things, the cost will be exorbitantly high for these "first of its kind" products. If it catches on and becomes more in-demand, other companies will eventually make their own version (maybe IMS/E&B Labs?) and with having larger-scale production facilities, the cost ought to come down substantially.
Yes these are expensive and geared towards the shop but it really depends on what your perspective is towards chasing diminishing returns or ease of use if you are a home enthusiast. I think it's a really nifty piece of gear and I believe basket innovations are going to be the next trend that will trickle down more into home enthusiast world.
I will be brutally frank, this video is reading as a sales pitch. And I admit, they will need a ton of them to sell a basket for $200. $100 because we’re some coffee nerds, I would understand, but $200 is non sense.
Very interesting concept for sure. I like the faster shots times, could make for better turn around while busy. Might be worth a look at some point for our coffee shops. Cheers
These could be worth it from a workflow and cleanup perspective, for a coffee shop that might pull 100-200 shots a day. For everyone else, use paper filters until the 20-40 quid aliexpress knockoffs show up.
So basket A elimiminates those bad black spots and this basket B puts makes more bad black spots???? I'm sure marketing will sell them to stupid people. Sure they'll make a difference in the cup but so will bad prep and putting a bit of (name any foreign body) in the puck. It seems a lot of the description here of outcome would be better achieved through a change in bean/roast/grind.. A basket with more smaller holes over the whole surface makes sense, but the others don't imo
Why is this the 1st time I'm hearing people using paper filters for their espresso? I don't know of anyone that uses paper filters on the bottom of their espresso pucks.
As im sure this will definitely change the way your espresso turns out I just simply wouldn’t want to pay $200 for a basket. Im sure theres going to be a ton of brands copying this and will make it way more affordable, but I guess you can compare it to the acaia scales since those are made for commercial environments and these baskets are the same.
I don't know why you're defending the price. A VST basket is also cnc produced and costs 20 bucks. Yes, the baskets are thicker and have more holes. But is that 10 times the price? Come on. They just saw Webers price and made it the same. It's a shame really.
I mean he literally said it in the beginning of the video that hes a consultant for them and helping them with marketing so of course he will defend the price.
It's alright to support a company. The idea is great. I mean brewing better coffee is a goal for a lot of us. No one says they should also take just 20 bucks. But 200? Come on.
Nice work Brian. Your review is excellent. I look forward to getting my hands on some of these filters. The price is also quite reasonable for the results that you are getting.
Well they need to make money back on their R&D somehow. The cost will eventually come down when other manufactures make their own "high flow" baskets. For now as home enthusiast, I will stick to puck screen and paper filters, an extra minute or so in prep work is nothing in comparison. However I can see the benefits in a commercial environment like a high volume cafe/roaster.
If these were $50 everyone interested in 3rd wave espresso would buy one. $200 is too much IMO when other "professional" (VST) baskets are only $25. Are these really that much more expensive to manufacture?
1. what are the difference btw soe filters vs weber unifilter 2. what are the difference btw typical holes vs line shape holes 3. wafo also suggest to use lower dose with 98℃. any comment on that
If anyone here has machined stainless steel before, they'd know that the price is not unreasonable. The problem is low production. If they invest in some deep draw tooling, they should be able to pump them out for $40-50 a pop retail.
Interesting I always found the Precision baskets with more holes that require finer grind size were MORE picky over puck prep and more likely to channel, I've had best results with my Stock ECM basket (and/or Stock Quickmill Basket before that) although I think the precision baskets while trickier to get good looking results may have a greater potential (maybe the look of the shot isn't always related to taste). I was thinking the new baskets like the integrated Weber Workshops unifilter with much more holes would be even worse for channeling and puck prep, which I think it is, so it's interesting that this one seems more forgiving! Sworks Designs is also coming out with their own baskets.
Yes because you can grind finer you can get potentially more channeling on traditional baskets which is why people started to use bottom paper filters to help even the extraction out (increasing flow, EY, and allowing you to grind even finer lol). If you have more holes you get more flow and extract like you do with a bottom paper filter so that's why these can be even more forgiving and eliminate the center dark spots you may experience with no paper filter.
Your channel popped up on my feed a week ago maybe. Have enjoyed your content. These baskets look super cool and is a definite new idea. 4:17 I use a puck screen for keeping the shower head and gasket clean
I don't get the use case for the basket that deliberately cause uneven extraction. Would this not just introduce sour and bitter notes like channeling would?
No chance they have reached EoS with these baskets atm. Very good chance that they reduce in price heavily by the time they reach global markets and sales.
Well if the Baskets are all individually CNC machined and then the holes laser drilled 200$ could be a good margin on their side. I would expect a price tag of at least 125$.
That's very much how I'd describe the blend baskets and how they render coffees. It's quite interesting whereas the SOE baskets are like a 6/8k image downsampled to 4k if 4k was considered your normal basket haha.
The spirit basket made me switch away from dark roast and lever profile to light roast turbo shots on light to medium. I was focusing on getting Aries but heard HE Baskets don’t go well with conical. What type of grinder/burr goes well with those baskets? How well do they go with DRM burrs?
@@heyble Boomer, lmao? Just realize many of us have espresso figured out and don't piss away time/money on the piss poor pathetic Turd Wave fad. Hilarious how many of you don't know WTF you want and simply follow the leader.
I’m in. Yes it is a bit expensive but so is my forthcoming Kafatek grinder. Isn’t this what this is all about here? Trying out new and different and pushing the envelope? Excellent Brian
Yep! Pushing that last % (literally lol) is what is interesting with these. I do believe the price will go down over time but these innovations are what drive progress in what is possible.
@ all you people in the comment section shouting snake oil.... Relax. The tech will become cheaper, but the data looks like its there. Nice to see that a basket that makes puck prep forgivable, and increase extraction. It's also cool that this isn't an adjustment based 'upgrade' and it's a static change to the way that your espresso machine pulls shots, and it doesn't change workflow which is huge in my opinion. Pretty tiring to see a ton of innovation like rdt, spinny tool, wdt, filter screen that gets in the way of you and your espresso. At the end of the day, if it can do everything that brian is saying, this tech is going to trickle down to enthusiast-level machines pretty quick on the industry level, or a basket competitor with a better supply chain will find a way to compete against this product and drive prices down--even if it isn't going to be this year. Edit: But holy heck the cost is like 12 bags of beans for me which converts to about half a year of coffee for espresso. I think I would trade max 4-5 bags of beans for this thing.
Count all the tools, screens, spinners, tampers, burr sets that you’ve brought and throw away so far. Not to mention the baskets that you all tried and dumped. Those are more that $200 AND they don’t work as effectively as this baskets. Crazy people. Everything stepping up from 90 to 95 are multiple times more expensive. Grinders rockets from $300 to 3000 but you all still stand by it. C40 is 2 times more expensive that K-plus while using plastic inside and you guys still buy it like hot cakes. All I see is bias.
Hi Brian. I have some question about 3’45” when you extracted with standard Wafo basket: Does this look like side channeling (donut effect) to you? Extraction started from the edge and then everywhere else. Does the extraction look blonde to you? I have the billet baskets and observed similar extraction. Just wondering about your thoughts.
Hilarious how much some will spend in an effort to try making 'modern' coffees more palatable. Maybe roasters should actually try reaching a bit more development instead of the Turd Wave movement that is a serious letdown in many ways.
These sound like very interesting baskets but you completely lost me when you mentioned the extremely high price. We all know these high end equipment have diminishing returns and to pay for a basket 200$, for my opinion is way to much
Excuse my ignorance here as I haven’t really looked into it, but I see lots of people talking about increased EY without really going into any detail about why a higher EY would make a better cup of coffee.
Brian, you are saying that no paper filter is needed at the bottom, but Weber, with their newly released Unibasket, insist that a paper filter is essential. To quote from their paper filter blurb "Paper filters under the coffee puck reduce clogging of the portafilter/unifilter basket holes, thereby facilitating a more even extraction. It also prevents higher flow right at the basket holes, allowing more even water flow throughout the puck, especially in the bottom section. This enables the use of a finer grind, which increases extraction yield while keeping shot times the same. It does introduce an extra step, but the effort is rewarded with a perceptibly improved shot of espresso." I do not know which is right, I am just surprised by these opposing views.
Is the SOE Spirit better suited for one type of roast vs. another, e.g., a lighter roast, higher yield vs. a darker roast, more syrupy ristretto style?
It's so funny. If you want to charge more than common sense would allow just say the product is for professionals and voila... a basket is now a pro basket and costs way more than any other, calibrated, coated, competition etc. basket. An Brian, no... it doesn't make sense for professionals or coffee shops if it's to expensive for home coffee enthusiast.
Where to buy? wafo's website is a static page with no option to purchase.. not able to find them anywhere in the United States.. no link in the description
IMO the evolution of the french press is something like the Tricolate/Next Level style of brewers. Amazing immersion brews with high extractions without the muddiness!
Really curious about those SOE baskets! What's the main diff between the SOE Classic and Spirit? I know they recommend the Classic for milk drinks, but how does it compare to the Spirit when it comes to straight black coffee/espresso?
Hi Brian VERY interesting!!! If these WAFO basket can help getting a more even extraction, when all other parameters stay the same, MUST I have one 🙂 Thanks for sharing ❤ Br Jacob Land Jensen, Denmark
These look awesome, but I wish they would launch sooner. There’s at least a half dozen brands launching similar products, but nothing earlier than 2023
Sorry if this was addressed already, but if the bottom of my puck has dark spots dispersed across the bottom or in one area more than others, does this mean I’m grinding too fine??
This means you are getting uneven extraction, potentially because of channeling. Channeling is more likely with finer grinds, but can also be impacted by puck prep.
Yes so if you have dark spots across the bottom (and you break the puck apart and see) that means you are getting channeling either by grinding too fine or having bad puck prep. If you grind coarser for something such as Turbos you should have less dark spots as your puck will be extracting more evenly.
I have a Weber Unifilter which is, I suppose, closest to the SOE Spirit basket. It does produce very high extraction, sometimes piercing acidic, shots which it might be nice to tone down with one of the Blend Wafo baskets. I look forward to experimenting in the new year. Thanks for such an interesting video.
Yes if you already have the Unifilter I would suggest the Blend basket for a very different presentation of espresso. I think the Unifilter pairs really well with these baskets and gives you insane flexibility of what coffees you are pulling!
I drink espresso most of the time and I love the idea of owning both of them and using the SOE basket for espresso and the other one for milk drinks, so I wouldn't have to buy separate coffee for a very occasional milk drink, however the price is just too much for me. Also, an unrelated question, what is the carafe that the orea dripper is sitting on in the video? I'm looking too buy one to use with my orea and it seems prefect, great video as always
It looks to me like a Kinto Slow Coffee Style Specialty Coffee Server with the shape of the walls and the handle. But when I squint at the corner of my screen the markings look a little different? Edit: The logo looks like “Pair” as in Pair Cupworks in Arizona? But…their website doesn’t have a carafe. Maybe it’s a shop-branded Kinto?
