RRC Archives

So, I have never been much of a coffee drinker, but this week I have gotten hooked on *good* coffee from Kava. So, what do you need to make good coffee at home? I am guessing some good, free-trade beans to start with. But, can you just use a walmart Mr. Coffee brewer thing, or do you need a better machine?

Wes

All the drip makers make good coffee,the cheap ones have carafs that spill. They don't pour right. It's mosly the coffee bean that makes for good coffee.I like ordinary French Roast, myself.

to make really good coffee you need a french press,and good beans.if your out west try Pete's.you can use mr coffee but buy beans whole and ground them yourself

I'm a big fan of french presses for a few reasons. They're the best for camping coffee because you can get lexan versions and they don't need filters - just pour hot water on your (coarse!) grounds, wait, stir and press. Plus, if I understand things right, the amount of caffeine released is a function of how long the grounds sit in the water (thus the reason that espresso has a lower concentration of caffeine than brewed). With a french press, you can let everything steep for longer and get a better dose! If you're using a french press, get coarse ground coffee - regular grind will work, but you'll get lots of sludge. (Unless you like Turkish coffee style sludge, of course!)

But overall, the big tips that I kow are:
Start with good coffee (duh!) If you can find it, try stuff from Intellingensia - they are a roster here in Chicago, and everthing they put out ranges from excellent to mind blowing. (My new favorite restaurant has a coffee list like a wine list with 3-4 exotic coffees from Intelligensia. One of them had a naturally occuring flavor of blueberries in it. Amazing! And if you want decaf, their decaf is the best I've ever had - you can't tell the difference.)

Keep your brewing rig clean. The old gunk will mess up the flavors.

Ideally, brew with clean water at about 190 degrees F. This is where the electric gizmos have an advantage - they don't actually boil the water. If you're using a french press, you can either pour the water just before it begins to simmer, or let it cool for a couple of minutes after it gets to a boil. Also, use cold water because it hasn't been run through the building's water heater. Lastly, don't re-boil water for coffee. Normally, water has a certain level of oxygenation which is important for bringing out the good flavors in coffee. After it has boiled, cooled and been re-boiled, the oxygenation level is a lot lower, so you won't be able to pull as much flavor out of the grounds.

If you can track down the Good Eats episode on coffee, Alton explains all this stuff and more in a more entertaining, less ponderous and coffee-snob way than I can.

dude, you don't need fair-trade coffee. fair trade just means that the suppliers jack up their prices even more so they can give some of the extras to the poor spicks doing all of their work.

French Press and good beans...or get an espresso machine and make americanos all day...now THAT is good drinkin'

oh yeah and the grind matters too...

Roll over to Transy one day and I'll buy you a cup of Joe. Give me some warning and I'll get it to you for $.53. It's pretty darn good.

Great coffee beans are the most important thing. I buy from Peet's Coffee & Tea. Their Major Dickason's Blend is my favorite.

http://www.peets.com/shop/coffee_detail ... id=1000090

You should also get a good burr grinder that lets you adjust the courseness of the grind.

I use a French Press whenever possible. I like to use a good drip machine with a thermal caraf during the week so I can set the machine to start brewing in the morning before I get up.

Well Wes, I too am a big fan of the french press. There is also something called a "french pull" that does the same thing only makes clean up 100 times better. Look for that.

But, when pressed for time, Mr. Coffee works well too.

I got this Malita (sp?) coffee maker that grinds the beans in the brew basket for you on a timer. It's pretty sweet, I get freshly ground coffee when I wake up and it is noticeably better than pre-ground.

I also got a Toddy cold brew coffee maker. You load this thing up with a pound of really high quality coffee (like medium roasted Kona) and leave it in the refrigerator over night and when you pull the plug on the bottom you get this super rich coffee concentrate that has very little acid and is super potent. Mix it with some sugar milk and ice and you've got one magnificent iced coffee. Or just mixed with chocolate milk it's divine, and if you just add boiling water (1 or 2 tablespoons of concentrate in a cup) to the concentrate you've got bad ass hot coffee. It's great stuff for camping. Get your coffee pot up to boiling, take it off the heat, and stir in the appropriate concentrate and BAM! you've got gourmet quality coffee for the whole camp.

Espresso is a whole different experience but once you've had the real thing you'll choke down the crappy approximations most places sell. If you want to do those at home you really need a good machine because it takes a lot of pressure to do it right. Real machines are EXPENSIVE.

So, anyway. Coffee good. Not coffee bad.