What's the Difference Between Bottomless and Spouted Portafilters for Espresso Machines? Which Portafilter Should You Use for Single and Double Baskets? Which Portafilter is Best for Espresso Extraction?

The Rise of Bottomless Portafilters: Why They're Preferred for Espresso Extraction

In recent days, many renowned coffee bloggers have been discussing the portafilter issue, suggesting that bottomless portafilters are more suitable for espresso extraction than spouted portafilters. The so-called coffee machine portafilter is essentially a tool used to support the portafilter basket during extraction. Whether it's the single shot basket that FrontStreet Coffee discussed yesterday, or the double shot baskets we commonly use today, they all need to be locked into the portafilter to withstand the coffee machine's pressure for espresso extraction.

The Question: Why Bottomless Over Spouted?

So the question arises: do you know why bottomless portafilters are more suitable for espresso extraction than spouted ones? The answer to this question is actually related to the birth of bottomless portafilters, so let's first explore why bottomless portafilters were created!

The Evolution of Portafilters

Since the invention of pressurized espresso machines, people used portafilters with bottom spouts for a long time. These portafilters mainly come in two types: one is the single-spout portafilter for extracting single espresso shots. As its name suggests, it has only one spout. The other is the double-spout portafilter for extracting double espresso shots. As the name implies, its bottom has two spouts that can divide one coffee serving into two.

The Birth of Bottomless Portafilters

Later, people discovered that each extracted espresso would have certain variations in taste—sometimes normal, but sometimes with obvious negative flavors. This situation troubled many people. So in 2004, Chris Davison, co-founder of the American Barista Association, and his colleagues developed the bottomless portafilter. By removing the entire bottom, they could more intuitively observe the state of espresso during the extraction process.

The Discovery of Channeling

Then, people noticed that splattering phenomena would occasionally occur during espresso extraction, and the appearance of these splatters always brought certain negative flavors to the coffee. So, people began investigating around this observation. Eventually, they discovered that this splattering phenomenon was indeed the core issue causing taste variations. This is what we now know as the concept of "channeling."

Advantages of Bottomless Portafilters

So we can understand that one of the biggest advantages of bottomless portafilters is the ability to directly observe the extraction state of espresso. Of course, the advantages of bottomless portafilters don't stop there. Other advantages include:

No Time Delay in Liquid Output

When using spouted portafilters, although the coffee liquid has been pressed out of the basket, due to the large space covered at the bottom, the coffee liquid can only be seen when it flows from the spouts. Simply put, there's a 1-2 second error between the actual liquid output time and what we observe. However, bottomless portafilters have no bottom, so when the coffee liquid is pressed out, it can be directly captured by us. This is very important for our timing calculations. Therefore, friends using spouted portafilters must make proper adjustments to the start and end times of espresso output~

More Crema Retention

Because coffee extracted with bottomless portafilters doesn't pass through longer flow channels, relatively more crema is retained. This is more friendly for milk coffee lovers! After all, rich crema performs better whether making layered Dirty drinks or for coffee latte art~

Easier Cleaning

Bottomless portafilters are extremely easy to clean because there are almost no dead corners, so the portafilter itself can be thoroughly cleaned even without removing the basket. However, spouted portafilters are different. Due to the presence of the splitter, they require removing the basket for cleaning. Additionally, some more complex spouted portafilters require small cleaning tools to clean the channels, making the entire process relatively more cumbersome.

Conclusion: Making the Right Choice

Therefore, nowadays most coffee shops use bottomless portafilters for extraction. However, this doesn't mean that spouted portafilters have no advantages at all. They can divide espresso more quickly, improving overall extraction efficiency. So how to choose specifically still depends on the shop's own needs. Good or bad is ultimately subjective and varies from person to person.

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