The Craft of the Café
Like Duolingo, but for The Craft of the Café. Tomo turns the whole topic into a game you play five minutes a day, until it actually sticks.
For the part of you with thirty open tabs that never became anything.
A short one: 9 levels across 2 sections, about 18 minutes end to end, roughly 4 days at five minutes a day. It moves through Precision and Texture and The Culture of the Counter. It assumes you already know the basics.
Free forever · No credit card · iPhone & Android
Key ideas in The Craft of the Café
- Light roasts are less porous and require more water to dissolve solids
- Finer grinds increase surface area and slow down water flow
- Dense high-altitude beans need higher ratios to avoid under-extraction
- Coarser grinds create larger gaps, acting like an open valve for water
- Increasing the water-to-coffee ratio provides more solvent for stubborn flavors
- Slower flow through a fine grind increases the time water spends pulling flavor
- Adjusting the brew ratio based on roast and bean density
- Grind size as a control for extraction speed
- Acids are the most soluble and dissolve almost instantly
- Sugars require more heat and time to balance the initial acidity
- Bitter plant fibers and tannins dissolve last, especially with high heat
- Extended contact time in immersion pulls out heavier oils and textures
- Short, high-pressure contact creates a viscous, syrupy concentrate
- Paper filters in medium-time brews remove the sediment that adds body
- The sequence of flavor extraction based on water temperature
- The relationship between contact time and mouthfeel
You've tried the other tabs
Thirty open tabs. Four facts you actually kept.
You watched. You nodded. By Sunday it was gone.
One answer, then back to scrolling.
Eight weeks. You meant to finish. You didn't.
Tomo gives The Craft of the Café the Duolingo treatment: levels, streaks, and quick quizzes that test what you just learned. That game loop is what the tabs above never had, so it's the one you actually finish.
Here's what playing it feels like
A real question from this course. Take your best guess.
Picture a stream of water hitting coffee; which grind setting increases surface area to slow that water down?
Get it right to open this lesson and 8 more in the app.
Where The Craft of the Café takes you
Move beyond the basic menu to master the variables of extraction, the physics of microfoam, and the philosophy of the 'third space.'
- 1
Precision and Texture
- Dialing in the Perfect Extraction
- The Physics of Microfoam
- 2
The Culture of the Counter
- Curating the Third Space
2 sections · 3 units · 9 levels. Built to play, not to enroll.
You pick the voice
The Craft of the Café is taught in the The Storyteller style: every lesson is a story. Want a different feel? In the app you can spin up the same topic in any of Tomo's teaching styles. Same facts, totally different vibe.
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Start The Craft of the Café today.
Download Tomo, search The Craft of the Café, and play your first lesson in under a minute.