How does espresso become golden brown, not black ?!

I found the answer

Scott Danzig, Learned all about the specialty coffee industry when considering opening a coffee house.

When espresso “settles down”, it should be fairly black. When properly brewed, you’d have the oils from the beans forming little bubbles that are generously mixed into your espresso shot.

If you go for a double or triple shot, you’d likely have more black, settled liquid at the bottom, but you probably should have more golden-brown, bubbly liquid than what you’re describing. This is likely because your coffee is not offering enough resistance to the water that flows through it. Possible causes:

You didn’t “tamp” your coffee properly

You need to use a coffee tamper and apply 30 pounds of pressure.

I’d call it a firm but not strenuous shove onto the grounds. Generally, you twist the tamper a bit before removing it to smooth out the surface. The tamper should be pushed down a level, not to one side or the other, so water is resisted equally throughout. Some tamper actually clicks when you apply the right pressure, so there’s no guesswork.

You didn’t use enough grinds

See the indented line in the metal basket, not far from the top edge?

You fill up the basket with grinds up to that line, whether it’s a basket for a single or double shot (or triple). Any more and the water will have too hard a time flowing through your grinds, and less will cause the problem you’re talking about, with black, watery, untextured coffee.

Your grinds are too coarse

You need to use grinds of the right fineness for water to flow through at the right speed. Any finer and water will flow through too slowly or not at all. Any coarser and water will flow through too quickly and not have as much chance to be infused with your wonderful coffee. If you’re buying your grinds, you need to get a bag ground for espresso, and not drip coffee, french press, or something else. If you’re grinding them yourself, you need to grind them a notch or two finer. Keep adjusting until it looks right. If you start to notice water dripping from above the basket, you’ve ground them too fine, and water finds it easier to leak out some other way.

You’re using stale coffee

It doesn’t sound like this is your problem, since you say you bought fresh grounds, but, I’ll cover it anyway because what they call fresh might be different from reality. Once a bean is roasted, you want to use it within a week or two. Once a bean is a ground, ideally you want to use it within the hour, but at least within a day or two. Eventually, your coffee will become stale, and less absorbent. If grinds are rigid, they won’t form as solid a wall with each other, and water will find gaps to flow through more easily.

Something is wrong with your espresso machine

You may be doing everything right, but there’s a leak somewhere that’s causing water to leak along some other path directly into your coffee. This could dilute your espresso enough to remove its texture. While that may make it a bit like an “Americano”, which is just an espresso shot in hot water, your espresso quality would likely be compromised as well. Hopefully, you’d just need a new gasket and don’t have to replace the boiler for $200.

Additionally, there’s a great point brought up by Carolina Garofani, who I’ve followed on Quora since she first made an account. Professional espresso machines generally can reach higher pressures than home machines can manage, so they will reliably extract more oils from the beans, with automated regulation, to ensure too much isn’t extracted. I can assert that I’ve gotten fairly high-quality shots at home with the Rancilio Silvia I once owned, which isn’t cheap but still non-commercial, so if you buy the right brand, you should be able to get good results.