Video Overview | Vario Plus

Transcript

Hey there, it's Ragan from Prima Coffee, and today, we are checking out the Baratza Vario+. So this grinder's taken everything you love about the classic Vario and just improved upon it. It still has the same great grind range from espresso to cold brew. It has a macro and micro stepped adjustment, providing 220 grind settings, and it has weight-based timing. Additionally, there's a bunch great new features. There's 54-millimeter flat ceramic burrs. There's a high visibility backlit LCD. There's a durable all-metal grind chamber and burr carrier that add both additional stability and longevity. There's metal adjustment knobs which are an upgrade from the plastic ones. You don't have to worry about them popping off. And there's an LED barista downlight that increases your visibility when you're grinding into your portafilter or grind's catch. All right, so let's go ahead and grind with it. Right now, I have the grind's catch in, but it's easy to remove to replace it with the portafilter for it. So what do we do, pull it out, and you can pop this in. Because it is grind by time, we're going to go ahead and weigh our portafilter. We put this in and we don't have any of the settings set yet, but we're going to set the grind adjustment to Baratza suggestion of Q2, and we're going to go a little bit coarser than that. We're going to press the button to manual mode, and we're going to just start grinding. Okay, let's see. And that gets us to 18 grams. Because that worked, we're going to set the preset. You can pick either one, two, or three. And we're going to choose one. We're going to hold it down. You'll see it blink and it's set. You can adjust the time through the up and down arrows as well. Like any piece of coffee equipment, the Vario+ has its limitations. In this case, it is the ceramic burrs. Ceramic burrs tend to produce more fines, which is ideal for things like espresso, not so much for pour-over, but it doesn't have such a large impact that it's going to make your brew any less enjoyable. Additionally, the Vario+ is grind by time and not grind by weight, so it takes more maneuvering and adjustments to get to the right setting. But other than that, the Vario+ is a great option. So, if you're on the market for a new automatic grinder that gives you a grind range from espresso to French press or cold brew, the Baratza Vario+ is a great option.