Brewing the Perfect Cup (Part 1.)

how do we get coffee shop results at home?

1. it all starts with great coffee

it seems obvious right? but taking a good hard look (or in this case, taste) of your coffee can make or break your experience. a lot of folks like strong coffee and equate that with darker roasts. from my experience, this can lead to disappointment. as one goes further into the dark side (yes a star wars reference), you tend to lose the origin characteristics of the bean(s). by the way strong coffee does not need to be bitter coffee (we’ll discuss in part 2.)

you might be surprised that a medium or even medium light roasted coffee will yield great results as you play with your water to coffee ratios (which we will cover later on).

Getting coffee that has a roasted on date, versus a best by date will also yield better results. don’t always go for the best looking bag, find coffee that has been roasted within the last 1-4 days to ensure MAXIMUM freshness and longevity.

2. coffee to water ratios

if you don’t weigh your coffee and water, this might be your sign. too often we rely on tablespoons and a vague amount of water to get us where we want to go.

this can lead to highly variable results, and ultimately not getting the best out of that coffee you spent your hard earned money to purchase.

grams are the best unit of measurement in this case for coffee.

coffee cupping and most cafes will brew around a 1:18 ratio. What this means for you is for every 1 gram of coffee you use 18 grams of water.

What i personally like at home is a 1:15-16 ratio. it makes for easy math and strong coffee.

a quick example is 30G of coffee for 450g or 450ml of water. This is a go to at home for me and typically yields roughly 12oz of coffee.

3. brewing method

Finding a method that produces great results can be more simple than you realize, but take a little extra work in the morning.

3 of my most frequent methods are:

French Press

aeropress

pour over

the ratios listed above work well with all 3 methods, and each yield different results in terms of body, mouthfeel, and “cleaness”.

i prefer these because you can really dial in the variables of ratios, water temperature and grind size.

If you have ground coffee and want to use a keurig (no shame in your game!), use the smallest 6 oz cup setting, to get as close to the 1:18 ratio as possible. Some Keurigs even have a “strong” or “Bold” setting. All this does is increase the contact time or extraction time. This could turn out to make the coffee more bitter when used with darker roasts so use with caution.

next time…

we’ll dive deeper into grind size, EXTRACTION time, and water temperatures!