Have you ever had a coffee from a fresh ground coffee bean? It is surprisingly good and you can actually taste the difference between the pre-ground and the fresh ground, even if you are not a coffee connoisseur. Fresh ground coffee is filled with flavor, color and aroma and even the most inept coffee maker can create a nice cup of coffee using them.

Although it may seem an easy to grind coffee, after all, we just throw the beans into a coffee grinder and hit the button; there are a few elements to a coffee grinder that can change the end result of your coffee. There are many different types of grinders and today, I would like to talk about one specific type, the burr grinder.

No, I’m not talking about “burr it’s cold in here,” but I am talking about a specific type of grinder that crushes the beans instead of cuts them. There are actually two different types of burr grinders and I will talk about them shortly but first, let’s look at how the burr grinder actually works.

Generally, when you place coffee beans into a coffee grinder, it will either cut or grind the bean down to the texture that you want. Some coffee grinders have settings that allow you to select the size of the ground and others have a standard grind that you cannot adjust.

With burr grinders, your coffee bean is ground down by a moving wheel that is pressing the beans down onto a stationary surface. The friction from the wheel produces the ground coffee and usually produces a lot of mess to go along with the coffee.

Now that I have summarized what a burr grinder does, let’s look at the two different types of burr grinders.

The economical choice:

If you are looking for a more inexpensive model of burr grinder, then you will probably choose a wheel burr. They are generally the less expensive of the two coffee models and they do create a nice even ground that makes excellent coffee.

The only problem with the wheel burr is that they are usually much noisier than other models. The reason for this is because the wheel tends to spin at a faster rate than other grinders and it creates more noise as it works.

The expensive choice:

Now, if you are looking at burr grinders, the conical burr is going to be a bit more expensive, in general, than any other burr grinder. However, you can still find some conical burrs that are not too expensive so they can be a great choice for anyone.

The difference between a conical burr and a wheel burr is the shape of the burr. In the former, the burr is shaped like a cone and because of this; it tends to spin at a much slower rate than the wheel burr. The end result of a slower spin is a quieter machine that tends to have less mess.

Another benefit of the conical burr is the fact that they usually do not clog as easily as the wheeled burr. This means that coffee beans that are generally oily than regular beans can be ground with ease in these machines.

In the end, however, both machines produce a wonderful grind that is very even in size, thus creating a much better coffee for everyone to enjoy.

-Sirena Van Schaik

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