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Starbucks Baristas: The daily grind

Full History - 2022 - 03 - 23 - ID#tlwnb8
8
Bad Reaction to Mastrena Expresso (self.starbucksbaristas)
submitted by TabithaJasper
Helloo
During my shift today I heard several complaints of our regular expresso tasting unusually burnt. I finally took it upon myself to try a shot and was met with a terribly foul flavor. Not only did it smell and taste extremely burnt, it also had what I can only describe as a soapy--almost sanitizer taste to it. Almost 10 hours later, my tongue still feels a slight burning sensation and I am very nauseous.

Our Mastrena regularly breaks down. We have people come to fix it seemingly every other week.

Did I just have a bad reaction to burnt expresso? I drink our expresso everyday-- some days it tastes more burnt than others but have never tasted anything like this before with such a lasting effect.

Any insight appreciated.

Thanks :)
Blonde-RU2-Mastrena 8 points 1y ago
When was the last time someone cleaned the hoppers? Did they clean it correctly? Did someone run tabs improperly?
TabithaJasper [OP] 3 points 1y ago
The hoppers had been cleaned probably an hour prior to my taste test but there had been complaints both before and after the change. A shift cleaned them so I doubt they were cleaned incorrectly.

I didn't work yesterday so I'm not sure about the tabs. If the tabs were ran incorrectly, what would it be that I'm tasting?

Thanks
alexadegrange 5 points 1y ago
The remnants of the tabs still in the machine might be what tasted like sanitizer. Sometimes our mastrenas stop halfway through the cleaning process and we have to take out the tabs & redo it or else it’ll just sit like that.
Detantevandaisy 2 points 1y ago
Whenever someone in my store says ‘expresso’ we have a barista go: aw, was it a bad break up?

So seeing you use expresso made me giggle
ihateyousoymatcha 2 points 1y ago
Also check the calibration. If they're tasting burnt it might need tweaking. For Mastrena 1 I think it was manual knobs, have someone whose done it before show you.

For Mastrena 2 it's an automatic program under settings but it takes like 15 minutes so we usually do it first thing in the morning.

And like someone else said, it could be cleaning tabs that didn't dissolve all the way
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