At most I drink one cup a day, at dinner. I’m not especially picky, so at home I just use instant coffee and add boiling water.
Instant coffee is not coffee. It is like decaf a foul chemical concoction that should be illegal.
I read this a while back when I was still in lurk mode (before recent free posting), and I have to say, this is the best coffee I’ve ever had. Better than Starbucks, even. There’s no bitterness at all. I prefer my coffee iced, so I keep my pitcher in the fridge.
I’m on Weight Watchers, so I make each drink with two tablespoons fat-free half and half, one tablespoon of dark chocolate Hershey syrup and two packets of Nutrasweet. I shake it up over ice in a cocktail shaker and then pour it over ice in a tall glass. It is so good and only one Weight Watchers point.
Another vote for a French Press. Two heaping scoops of grounds, and fill it to the metal rim with water. I think it’s supposed to make two cups’ worth, but it makes enough to fill my big travel mug.
I have a One Mug TM drip coffee maker that I just fill the basket up for a 16(?) oz. mug. I’ve never actually measured the coffee, though.
For my mini-French press (makes one cup), I use two Tbsp. coffee, for the 6 cup stove top percolator, about a half cup, and my 8 oz. stove top expresso pot, about 4 Tbsp. expresso roast.
I always grind the coffee just prior to brewing. I’m convinced that totally makes the difference. YMMV.
Of course it is. The quality just isn’t as good. But I don’t think it’s sufficiently worse to justify all the palaver that’s required for the more complicated methods.
I use a pod coffeemaker because I could never get the amount of coffee right for my coffee maker. I also do the cold brewed method 4:1 water to coffee ratio and try to keep some in my fridge for when I’m in a hurry or want an iced coffee.
Wow, seriously? Because really good coffee is delicious to me. As in I don’t care about the caffeine or anything, I just LOVE the flavor. Instant coffee is not even drinkable unless I’m out on the highway and there is a 90% chance that I will die from falling asleep at the wheel if I don’t swallow this hideous swill. The degree worse that instant is, for me, is enormous beyond words.
But then, I’m a huge coffee snob, too. Good quality coffee, brewed minutes after it’s ground, etc.
I find most restaurants’ coffee to be undrinkable as well.
I’ve yet to try cold-brewed, but I seem to remember hearing that it’s also much less acidic than normal coffee. Do you find this to be true?
Put whole beans in mouth.
Chew 20 seconds.
One sip of hot water.
Swish.
Swallow.
It’s the rule of thumb when making a pot of tea - one teaspoon per cup, plus one for the pot. I’ve heard it all my life.
I searched on the phrase and most of the relevant Google results referred to making tea, though some were in relation to coffee.
I have a 12-cup drip coffee maker. We can get about 6 mugs of coffee from that, maybe 7. I put just shy of 6 2-tbs scoops to the 12-cup measure on the water dealie. So 2 tbs per mug of coffee.
I do, IMO, it has a much smoother taste.
I also read something about filtering coffee. If you use paper filters it will absorb some of the oils that make the coffee more bitter and acidic*. Paper filters also result in healthier coffee since those substances (cafestrol and kahweol) increase cholesterol levels. Paper filters reduce these substances to negligible amounts. Cite about cafestrol.
*Some would argue that these oils are what give coffee it’s flavor but I think the paper filtered coffee tastes just as good and I prefer less bitter coffee and lower cholesterol.
Well, that would require some sort of chemical analysis, so I can’t really answer. But there is definitely a lack of bitterness, and cold-brewed coffee that is two days old is just as good as when it was made.
I agree – my husband and I drink cold-brewed coffee pretty exclusively these days (well, he works at Starbucks, so he’ll have espresso drinks when he’s working). We each have different recipes for it – he likes his stronger than I like mine. Mine is 6 cups of water and 1-1/3 cups of ground coffee. I mix them together in the morning, leave it out on the counter all day, and strain it very well at night (using first a fine-mesh sieve, then a paper filter). It lives in the fridge because we started doing this in summer, when we wanted iced coffee.
It’s so, so good – creamy and not bitter at all.
Hey, I make coffee this way in my garbage disposal when I’m cleaning the pot. 
It sounds intriguing as an experiment, but I like my coffee hot when I first get up, and it seems to me that nuking it would destroy any flavor advantages of this method. Isn’t it also weaker than conventionally brewed coffee?
This I’m prepared to believe (but perhaps for different reasons). 
My version is 1/3 cup coffee grounds to 12 oz of water (from the NY Times). I use my french press, put in double of everything (2/3 c coffee, 24 oz of water). Stir. In the morning I press, then pour the coffee through a strainer lined with a coffee filter and then add an equal amount of water, because I’ve made coffee concentrate.
As Chefguy says, it’s never bitter and tastes very smooth. You can drink it as is, iced, or heated in the microwave.
What if I don’t have a microwave?
And why would this be?
Any sort of reheating changes the taste of coffee for me. It leaves it tasting, well, reheated. Maybe my palate is too sensitive? 