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My First Experience with the Bunn Trifecta

My family has this nasty habit of going to Disneyland once a year. I've tried to kick it, but my wife's a junkie and now my daughter's hooked, so I don't see a light at the end of that tunnel. In a compromise, we go to Old Town Orange the night we get in. There is a BBQ shop that is really good and Portola Coffee. My first experience was reviewed here, but my barista used my favorite v60. This last time I went the barista brewed on the Bunn Trifecta.

We stopped in and spoke with the Barista. She was a lovely young lady who didn't make me feel bad for being a coffee nerd. I ordered two cups of coffee and let her do her thing.

My first look at the Trifecta, I thought it was an automated aeropress. After watching it brew, I realized that it was not. I actually didn't know what it was doing, so I had to come home and research it a bit.

The Trifecta is an immersion brewer, so the grounds are steeped in the water. You can control the volume of water, the temperature and how long the grounds are immersed. I was on board with that, pretty straight forward. As I watched the brew cycle (which you can also control the length of), the coffee started bubbling. I was like, "uhhh...what's happening?" Unfortunately, my barista was still very new and though she was able to follow the recipe, she didn't quite have all the technical info down yet. One of the things that makes the Trifecta unique is that it uses air to agitate the grounds. I tend to not favor aggressive agitation because I think it makes for a muddy cup. When the cycle finished, the coffee was pressed through a metal filter (also not my favorite, but very necessary for the purpose of this machine). This looked like pure magic. I assume it used air pressure, but I'm not 100% sure.

The cup was great, as I have come to expect from Portola (and for $5 per cup, it darn sure better be). It had a nice tangy acidity, but main aspect was the body. It had a super heavy body. I mean this was coffee you could stand a spoon in. When I finished the cup there was some super fine grounds at the bottom which I assume come from agitating and then pressing through a metal filter.

I like the idea of this brewer. A single cup brewer that automates and simulates a lot of what a manual brewer does. It is a little faster and requires a bit less attention than manual brewing though. Prima Coffee did a great job demonstrating the machine here: https://prima-coffee.com/equipment/bunn/trifecta.

I'm sorry for not having any pictures, its because I'm actually putting a video together. I will be posting that shortly.
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