Unpopular opinion: pre-ground beans are fine for most people, hear me out

I spent 6 months chasing the perfect pour-over with a $230 grinder, watching YouTube dial-in videos, weighing every dose to 0.1g. Then my buddy from Denver came over, saw my setup, and said 'you're overthinking this, I use store-ground stuff and my coffee tastes the same to me.' I laughed it off, but last week my grinder broke and I had to use pre-ground from the local shop for 5 days straight. Honestly, I couldn't tell the difference in my daily cup, maybe I'm just not that sensitive, or maybe all that ritual was just me pretending to be a connoisseur. On one side, freshness matters if you're drinking straight espresso, but for milk drinks or cold brew, does anyone actually blind-test and pass? So who here has done a real side-by-side, not just assuming the expensive route is always better? What's your line between 'enthusiast' and 'obsessive waste of time'?

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samjohnson2mo ago

Man, this whole thing is just another version of how we all get tricked into turning simple stuff into a hobby with a price tag. Same thing happens with knives, watches, even hiking gear. We buy the expensive stuff because we think the ritual makes us better at it, but half the time we're just entertaining ourselves. The real test is whether you can tell the difference when you're not staring at the gear and pretending to be an expert. And honestly, most people can't, myself included. The line is probably when the hobby starts causing more stress than joy, or when you're spending money just to feel like you're doing it right. If the pre-ground cup makes you happy, then that's the win. Everything else is just noise.

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