My Endgame Grinder: Fuji Royal - Mirukko DX R-220 Review

shout out to thoughtful and sey.

Hey New York.

This is my endgame grinder for filter coffee. I use it every day as a single doser for pour overs, both at home and in the café setting.

In the coffee gear world, grinders with novel designs, fancy burrs, and insane particle distribution graphs go in and out of vogue every week. But the Fuji Royal is forever. It’s in the same league as the Herman Miller Aeron, the Volvo 240, a Staub Cocotte, or Christian Dior. Timeless and enduring. After finally purchasing my own R-220 a few years ago, I have felt zero desire to replace it. I will probably be using it as my primary coffee mill until it falls apart; which considering it’s dead simplicity and bulletproof build quality, will probably be never.

Japan is littered with low volume (both in noise and foot traffic) coffee shops that feel like they’re operating out of someone’s house, and they all seem to use an R-220. It’s the gold standard for unfussy pour-overs in Japan, and it’s easy to see why. It just works, and it works well.

How does the coffee taste?

I loved the coffee these shops produced. They always felt soft, round, and comforting, like a loved one making you coffee at home. They tasted…cozy. That is the primary flavor note I would ascribe to the R-220. Cozy. The SCA should make a brother to their flavor wheel…the feelings wheel.

nice.

While the R-220 is not the last word in clarity or uniformity in particle distribution, it makes up for those shortcomings in that uniquely cozy flavor profile. That’s not to say it has bad clarity or uniformity, just that it’s not going to be as good as an aligned EK with SSP burrs or something of that nature. For filter coffee, grind uniformity is excellent. Like all grinders, there are some fines present but they’re more than manageable. Coffees extracted from the Fuji always have great sweetness, taste multidimensional, and have a thick, round body, and I really enjoy that. It’s easy drinking, while still providing enough clarity to taste the intent of the farmer and roaster.

This profile is most likely a result of the ghost burrs that come in the “DX” model, which I have. (There is an alternate flat burr model as well.) Ghost burrs are a burr style you don’t really see in modern coffee grinders, and I couldn’t tell you why. (Notably, a new Timemore grinder seems to be employing the ghost burr.)

At some point in the mid 2010s, Fuji changed the material and production method for these burrs (cast iron to stainless), but I personally have not noticed much of a difference between old and new models. My model is stainless and they still look new after many years of daily use.

Other good things:

My favorite thing about the Fuji is that by purchasing it, you are mostly immune to gear acquisition syndrome (GAS). Fuji Royal has been producing variants of this grinder nearly unchanged since 1955, and they don’t show any signs of making anything new any time soon. They haven’t even changed the colors. So long as you avoid a wandering eye at other manufacturers which seem to put something new out every year, you’re never going to feel like you need something new. You’ve already purchased the best ghost burr grinder.

The motor in this thing is beastly. You can feel the torque of it when it turns on. It twists the chassis slightly when you flip the switch. It also makes a pleasant noise while grinding, at least compared to other small grinders which I feel always have a hollow, plasticky, tumbling pebbles sound. The Fuji in comparison sounds closer to a very expensive drill press or lathe. The motor has one speed setting which is quite fast (~3500 rpm or so.), and this is not ideal as far as fines production goes. But, the trade off for fines is pure speed. This thing rips through coffee doses incredibly fast. If the fines really bother you, grind into a dosing cup with a built in sifter and shake a little bit. Alternatively, you can use any old AC speed controller to chill it out. Some people even mod their R-220s with built in dimmers to control RPMs.

Zeroing the grind size dial is incredibly simple, and Fuji Royal even provides their own instructions on how to do it. You can also easily convert the stepped dial to stepless by removing the detent disc, which is a nice option to have but unnecessary for my purposes.

This grinder is also by far the easiest to clean and maintain that I’ve ever had, and is completely tool-less in disassembly and reassembly. You can remove the burrs and access the internal chamber (which is mostly just the auger) by simply undoing the thumb screws in the front with your fingers and pulling out the rotating burr from the driveshaft. There is also nowhere for stray coffee grounds to get stuck in the body, so a quick vacuum and hit with a brush is all you need.

Thumb screws undo easily.

The face comes right off to reveal the rear of the rotating burr.

The auger and rotating burr slide right off the driveshaft, revealing the stationary burr and chamber, and that’s it!

Build quality is stellar, and is almost entirely of heavy metals. The stand, grind size dial, and on/off switch are the only plastic parts, and are of very high quality. They also feel tactile and nice to use, with satisfying clicks and reassuring detents.

Retention is excellent, with usually less than .10 grams of coffee left in the chamber. Totally negligible.

Oh, and it’s cute. At the café I work at where we also use an R-220, people often mention how cute our grinder is. If you have issues with a significant other not wanting ugly coffee gear on the counter…here you go. It comes in red, yellow, and black.

Not so good things:

No grinder is perfect. R-220 is no different. The original grounds bin it comes with is absolute trash. Seriously, what were they thinking? It gets grounds everywhere, it’s way too big, and it’s awkward to use. I appreciate that its meant to magnetically couple with the the chute, but it just doesn't work well. Just throw it out and get one of these.

It also generates a lot of static. Like a lot. Most of it is mitigated with a little RDT (spray of water) on the beans before grinding, but not all. There will always be a little dusting of fines around the chute because of the static. Nothing a quick brush can't fix though.

static-y fines. it only gets worse with every dose.

Lastly, the hopper feels like a bit of an afterthought. Its only means of staying put is that it fits snugly into the top of the grinder, but other than that there's nothing securing it. I would have liked at least a keeper screw or something. Not a huge deal, but annoying sometimes. There are some aftermarket options which look good, but I don’t care enough to change it.

meh.

Myths I want to dispel:

I see a lot of posts on various forums asking if the R-220 can be used safely on US household outlets. For some reason, the common wisdom is that you need to purchase a step-up transformer (for 100V to 110V) in order to use this thing safely. This leads to a lot of photos online with big goofy black boxes on people’s kitchen counters, and I’m here to tell you…no. You do not need a transformer to make an R-220 work right in America. Just plug it into your outlet and use it.

The second myth that is sort of related is that if you want to use one of these in the US, you need to import it from a specific seller in Taiwan so that you receive a converted 110V model and not the 100V Japanese model. It’s not necessary to jump through this many hoops…just buy one through normal channels.

Your mileage may vary.

Undeniably, part of my love for the Fuji is personal nostalgia. I have a problematic addiction to trying to recapture that high of being young and fit in Tokyo again, with that sense of continuous discovery and an extreme lack of responsibility. A time where all my favorite coffee shops didn’t feel mobbed by travel influencers taking photos with their phones, and the world didn’t feel like it was on fire both environmentally and politically. To me, that cozy flavor profile is so distinct that it feels like a time machine, reminding me of a less anxious moment in history. To put modern, exotic, experimentally processed coffees through it in 2023 tastes and feels like you’re remanufacturing the past, like colorizing vintage film. Or maybe it’s the reverse, like shooting film in modern settings. There’s an interesting dissonance there. The grinder isn’t of the moment, and yet here it is, giving you its own take anyway.

Even if you don’t have that personal connection to its period correct time and place on the counter of an aging coffee shop deep in a Tokyo suburb, I still highly recommend giving Fuji Royal a try at some point in your coffee life. It is my favorite grinder.

Thanks y’all. Have a happy weekend and enjoy Tears of the Kingdom.

- Josh