Sage BCG820BSSUK the Smart Grinder Pro Coffee Grinder - Silver

Product Information

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!? 😉 It didn't take me too long, however, to realize that this is just because the paddles on the side of the portafilter have to be parallel with the sides of the cradle, and because of where these are on the Gaggia Classic, you just have to put the portafilter in with the handle over to one side. As you can see, I needed to insert the portafilter with the handle to the left.

We're not talking about bells and whistles, either. A couple of the features could possibly be referred to as unnecessary I suppose, although I can't think of any that I don't think are useful, but some of them are genius, one of them in particular, which is the internal burr adjustment, which I'll talk about shortly. If I've just confused you re baskets, pressurized baskets come with the most entry-level domestic espresso machines, They're easy & convenient, but they don't give the user the ability to tweak things towards perfection, which is known as “dialing in”. If you want that level of control, you'll need standard, traditional baskets, and working with this kind of basket requires more of the grinder. It's been more than a few years now ;-), and my opinion now is that this is one of the most reliable grinders you're likely to get at this price point. My Smart Grinder Pro is still fine, I actually lent it to someone recently but up to that point it was still going strong, and I was still using it mainly for manual brew. If you've not used a grinder before, you might be slightly intimidated when you first get any coffee grinder out of the box, as grinding coffee beans seems like quite a geeky & complex thing to do, to the uninitiated. Looking at all the dials and buttons on the SGP I must admit did set the alarm bells going, to begin with, but I soon discovered how simple it is.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. It's just ridiculously user-friendly, and that's the main thing I have to say about most Sage machines, really, they seem to think of just about everything to make them as idiot-proof as possible, although to be fair even Sage couldn't do quite a good enough job of that with this idiot, as I couldn't figure out to start with how to get the Gaggia classic portafilter to rest in the portafilter cradle. What I mean by this, is that the hopper on the Smart grinder pro is great as hoppers go, in fact overall it's probably one of the best hoppers I've seen, but hoppers should in my opinion be used as temporary storage only, and not as permanent storage solutions. 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.

I know this grinder inside out, I very much doubt there could be any question about this grinder that I haven't answered many times, so hopefully, I'll cover all of your questions, and more, in this review, but if I haven't done, please use the “comment” feature at the bottom of the post to ask, I always respond to comments. Sage Smart Grinder Pro Nutshell Review 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?Fresh is best. The quality and precise dose of freshly ground beans is key to creating great tasting third wave specialty coffee. If spending a few hundred pounds on a coffee grinder is a bit over the top for your budget, there are some lower-cost options that will produce a good cup of espresso and will combine well with any machine that doesn't have an integrated grinder. This article explains more in detail:

You will also find that making the coffee grind finer will decrease the weight and volume of your coffee grounds. Sage Coffee Grinder Problems? 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. A much fairer comparison would be the Sage Smart Grinder Pro vs the Baratza Virtuoso +, as the Virtuoso Plus is only slightly more expensive, and is sold as being mainly a brew grinder. I've used both (and the forte, and most other Baratza grinders), and again, the SGP has a lot of pros vs the Virtuoso, mainly where features and ease of use are concerned, and I think they're incredibly evenly matched where cup quality is concerned, in fact, this more scientific comparison resulted in the Smart Grinder Pro being awarded the title for the best particle uniformity. Automated Shimming There are actually some areas where I think the Smart Grinder pro actually wipes the floor with its much more powerful cousin (Baratza is owned by Sage, well – by Breville Worldwide, which is kind of the same thing, Sage is the brand name they're sold under in Europe because they sold the brand name here in the 80s), but that's one for another post. It's worth pointing out that they didn't have a clue who I was, I didn't even bother saying on the phone “I run coffeeblog.co.uk” etc., even if I did, coffeeblog probably had three readers at the time, and one of them was my mum, so I doubt it would have made much of a difference ;-).

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. If you're looking for a more in-depth review, though, carry on reading :-). Sage Smart Grinder Pro Review – 7 Years Later 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. When you hear people talking about “performance” where grinding is concerned, what we're mainly going on about is the consistency of the grind or the size of the range of particles at one grind size. This is actually quite complex, and it's a hotly debated subject, but most experts agree that the most important element of coffee grinding is the consistency of particle sizes. verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{