Baratza Encore ESP PRO Grinder

The Upshot

When we say a grinder is "dual-purpose," what we mean is that works equally well grinding for espresso as it does grinding a range of filter coffee (pour over, Chemex, Mr. Coffee, batch brewer, etc). For people who like to dabble in a variety of brewing methods like us, having a single grinder the can competently do it all is a great asset. Not only is it a space — and not to mention money — saver, but having a dual purpose grinder means that when you add a new brewing method to your lineup, you already have your grinding needs covered. 

With that preamble out of the way, we find the Baratza Encore ESP PRO to be a great dual-purpose grinder. Featuring a wide adjustment range, 40 mm conical burrs, intuitive digital display, auto-stop, grind timer and a variety of accessories that let you set up the grinder "your way," flexibility is the name of the game. Whether you use this grinder exclusviely for espresso, exclusively for filter or for all the brewing methods in your repertoire, we think this is one of the easier to recommend options at the approachable end of the price scale.

For Espresso

We spent several weeks testing its espresso capabilities specifically on our Lelit Mara X, and we were really impressed with how the ESP PRO handled and how the coffee tasted. Although the grinder is technically stepless, the display shows a range from 0 (fine) to 60 (coarse) in increments of 0.5 which made it really easy to adjust and to go from one setting to another and back again. Adjustments are in the traditional Baratza fashion, via an adjustment collar just below the hopper.

Our initial concern with any dual-purpose grinder is that there won't be enough adjustability on the espresso end of the spectrum, but that proved to be a non-issue. We were typically grinding our 20 g espresso shots between settings 25 and 35, coarser on fresher coffee and finer on older roasts. That still left a lot of room to go finer if necessary, and even within the range we were typically grinding the adjustments felt tight, precise and meaningful. 

And the coffee? It tasted great. Our shots had a good amount of body and clarity that we were totally satisfied with. Somebody coming from a more expensive system might have a bone to pick, but for an entry-level espresso grinder we think it's pretty hard to ask for more. I mean, we could, but we won't; we are happy with it.

For Filter

If you have used any version of an Encore or Virtuoso, then you already have a pretty good idea of how the ESP PRO handles grinding for filter coffee. Much like its siblings, the functional range of settings for filter brewing is around 10, from about 45 to 55 in our testing. The display shows increments of 0.5, so in a way you can think of it as having 20 settings within that range compared to the ... well ... 10 of comparable models. Functionally what this means is that each adjustment is a bit narrower than in comparable models, allowing you to dial in a little more precisely.

We found it very easy to adjust between grind settings for a Chemex and V60, and we got good results from both. We think that people who wanted to use this primarily — or even exclusively — for filter coffee would be happy with their results.

LED Screen and Control Knob

The ESP PRO iterates on a screen and control knob design that we first saw on the Virtuoso+. Pressing the control knob turns the grinder on and off, and holding down the control knob switches between auto-off and timer mode for grinding. In timer mode, you can twist the knob to adjust time, which is reflected on the screen in increments of 1/10th of a second. When you're in auto-off mode — or when your adjust the grind collar — the screen displays the grind setting. The screen is a nice touch and makes it really easy to understand the current settings of the grinder. It also just ... looks nice!

Accessories

The ESP PRO comes with a standard hopper which can be swapped out for a single dose lid depending on your preferred use case. It also includes a large square grinds bin as well as a dosing cup for espresso that is basic, but works surprisingly well! Swapping between accessories is easy and well thought out, though we think in practice most people will find the combination that works best for them and put the other pieces in a drawer to collect dust.

Caveats

Despite everything we loved, there are still a few things we'd want anybody purchasing this grinder to consider. The first is that sometimes larger beans had a hard time feeding into the grinder. They seemed to get stuck around the "flow control disk" which is a new part that we think is meant to help consistency and feed the beans into the burrs in a more regulated way. And in that sense, it's successful — perhaps too successful! We'd have to pull the grinding collar off to clear them out which wasn't a big deal, but it was still disruptive.

We'd also caution anybody who is grinding very dark roasted, oily coffee that this grinder may be more prone to clogging. We've expereinced this a bit on the regular Encore and Virtuoso+, and given that this offers even finer grinding we imagine it will be even more of an issue. The grinder can certainly handle these coffees, but it will require more regular cleaning and maintenance to manage the oils.

Lastly, there are two LED lights that shine down into the grinds bin that are very blue — maybe over 5000 Kelvin. They're really, really blue! Many people won't know or care, and in truth the lights DO provide good visbility of the grinds. The color will just drive some people who are sensitive to blue light crazy.