Why Your Espresso Looks Great But Tastes Awful — and How to Fix It

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I made some mistakes in the water section. Sorry about that.

WATER CLARIFICATIONS: 10:43 - Mental error on my part. Baking soda is a carbonate, not a calcium. It contributes a lot to overall alkalinity, but not to general hardness. It does contribute to TDS, though. To be reductionistic, alkalinity helps to buffer out sharp acidity and add to balance. Clearly I got my wires crossed with equating it to calcium. 11:24 - I said it was a ratio of 2:1 calcium to magnesium, but meant for it to be 2:1 General Hardness (which is roughly the sum of Calcium & Magnesium) to Alkaline Hardness (which is your carbonates). The actual LM spec is a bit tighter of a ratio than that.

Calcium and magnesium affect general hardness, influencing body and brightness. In excess, calcium can feel chalky, magnesium can accentuate acidity. Carbonate alkalinity, aka alkalinity, aka KH, is generally thought to "buffer" perceived acidity and add balance and roundness to the flavor profile. Too much alkalinity also makes the cup taste flat or chalky, somewhat similarly to calcium, but doesn't usually seem to give an "over extracted" feel. Too much alkalinity can make your shots taste dull or hollow, but might not add a bunch of bitterness. Too much magnesium can make things astringent.

My DIY recipe only contributed magnesium, and not Calcium. Calcium is not always desired very much, as it contributes somewhat comparable characteristics as alkalinity but also will begin to scale your machine if your calcium carbonate content goes above 20-30ppm, depending on a number of factors. The Baking Soda mostly just contributed to alkalinity to act as that buffering agent. So, you're getting magnesium, baking soda, and whatever was left over from the R.O. process contributing to a TDS (ideally in the ballpark of 80-150), magnesium contributing to GH, and baking soda contributing to alkalinity. Full transparency, I did not test my alkalinity levels back when I was using this recipe, but recall on the forums hearing that alkalinity with these levels was likely in the 75ppm range. Also, with this recipe, your General Hardness is going to be WAY low. I personally have not found this to be an issue, and recognize that while this low GH might lead to slightly muted flavors, the results with the recipe are still quite good and very safe for your machine.

I apologize for the errors.
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You hit the right ratio. You nailed the shot time. The crema is beautiful.
So why does it still taste like regret?

In this video, I walk through one of the most frustrating parts of espresso: when everything looks great, but the flavor is... bad.
Whether you're new to home espresso or deep into the rabbit hole, this one's for you.

We’ll cover:

The false comfort of metrics (why 1:2 in 30s isn’t the whole story)

A quick checklist to rule out water, beans, and gear problems

My step-by-step framework for taste-based dialing in

The hard truth: some coffees just don’t click, and that’s okay

I also share two personal stories—one where I completely reinvented how I pulled shots just to enjoy my own espresso again, and another where a bag of amazing café coffee fell flat at home.