What could be more "Cafe Society" than Coffee, right?

Cafe Society
101

When I moved to Seattle in the mid-90s, I chose the occasion to switch to Folgers Crystals. But as I age, and can have only 1 cup per day, I’d like it to taste better, so lately I’ve been experimenting with real coffee at home, I refuse to buy the stuff prepared. I only drink it black, which is useful for taste-testing since there’s no possible disguise.

The current method is Melitta/pour-over, one mug’s worth at a time, using beans I ground moments before in a chop-grinder.* More out of superstition than settled science, I let the gooseneck kettle come off the boil for a few seconds before pouring, then do the moisten/bloom thing for several more seconds, while turning around widdershins in case that helps too. (It’s no trouble and no added cost, so why not, even though I’m not sure it’s doing anything. The bloom thing, I mean, not the spinning around, which I don’t actually do.)

Sticking with those methods as a control, I’m now trying to find the right bean. Best so far is Kirkland House Blend medium roast. Right now I’m working through a bag of Trader Joe’s house blend which is pricier and worse. What I really want, and am not finding yet, is some tang, not the astronaut drink, but that quality of good coffee that’s not too strong, not too dark, but tastes so good black that you’d drink it even if it weren’t the necessary daily medication that it is.

*As with so many things, some changes get you only tiny incremental improvements that might not be worth the trouble or price. I’ll have to be convinced that a burr grinder is really worth it, for example, given that a chop-grinder is vastly superior to pre-ground (we might all agree). The beans selection, I have no clue, but whatever-it-is needs to be pretty affordable, nothing too exotic. I like the Melitta method and don’t see any automatic machine as any more convenient, just more things to wash.

102

Re: the burr grinder thing, I was skeptical as well, until I got one. I used the blade/spice grinder method for years and it was fine for my pour-over cone coffee. I started using my French press more and more, and eventually that became primary. Enter the burr grinder - for French press coffee, you need the grounds to be consistent, otherwise you get too much sludge (too fine), or not enough flavor (too coarse). The burr grinder gives you consistent grounds every time (and is adjustable - some beans are drier than others and grind differently). With the blade grinder it was not as consistent, as the amount of time I was grinding was not set. IMHO the difference was enough to justify switching - great cup every time.

103

WTF, dude?

That sounds like

When I moved to Paris, I chose the occasion to switch to eating only McDonalds.

You move to the USA’s coffee culture mecca and you switch to vile instant??!?

I’m not sure I’d be willing to sully my toilet by pouring Folgers Crystals in there. :wink:

104

Sometimes you need a Le Royal Deluxe with Bacon.

105

Our methods are very similar. I, too, used a blade grinder for decades and wasn’t persuaded a burr grinder would make that much difference. Most recently, I had a particular blade grinder that I really liked, first made by Melitta. It was wonderful. Sadly, it has a design flaw that causes a plastic bit on the lid to break, rendering the entire unit useless.

The first one was best made and lasted the longest. By the time I got around to buying the second one, the technology had been sold on to Hamilton Beach. I’ll let you draw your own conclusions about where the quality went.

After my third one broke, I looked at burr grinders again. Prices had come down a lot and it wasn’t that much more for a burr unit. If I were carefree in the cash department, I would have looked at better units. As things are, I dropped roughly $50 for a Cuisinart burr grinder. When I run it, the thing sounds like an F-series fighter jet taking off and creates static electricity in the coffee grounds like a dry Arizona wind. Very tempting to have a set of ear protectors handy adjacent the coffee area. Instead, my approach is to hit the start button and immediately take the dog out for his morning pee. But aside from these defects, it does a nice, even grind and I’m happy with the resultant pour-over coffee I make with it. The grind is noticeably more even over the blade grinders.

In my now 50+ years of experience in employing only the manual pour-over method of brewing, yes, the bloom thing is important. Also important is to pour the water in a steady, thin stream from slightly on high. I recently read in this article that what I long ago learned on my own has some science behind it:

(Gift link)

The Physics of Perfect Pour-Over Coffee

So FWIW, anyway. :slight_smile:

I’ll have to try the widdershins thing.

106

I dunno, it was maybe performative reverse snobbery. I’d been in L.A. and halfway into the relatively nascent Good Coffee Culture there, but growing weary of its shibboleths and miscellaneous tedia. Then I felt like I couldn’t really commit to the thing once among the Big Boys and Girls in the city where it all began. I didn’t want to have to care about coffee anymore.

107

Moderation in all things. Tendentious trendiness is … tedious. Crap coffe is crap. Good coffee is good. Exquisite coffee is good+.

Some days I feel like a +; some days I don’t. Just like Mounds vs. Almond Joy :wink: .

108

Thank you, great article! I’ll try pouring from a bit higher next time. I know from experience that a slow pour is 100% required: one day when my kettle was out of commission, I slopped water inexpertly out of a saucepan, with nearly undrinkable results.

Probably a fluke, but I’ve got a Hamilton Beach stick blender that whupps the pants off both my Cuisinart and my Braun.

109

I have a manual burr grinder. It would take forever to grind a pound of coffee, but it’s somewhat meditative to grind enough for a cup. It’s not noisy, it wasn’t expensive, and it works very well.

110

Try Light Cream - somewhere between half and half and heavy cream. Been using it for a year or two now and definitely better than 1/2 & 1/2

111

Bringing this thread back to ask about this. One of my coworkers has gone all in on it, says he got a small batch unit not much different than a hot air popcorn machine. Raves about it. He’s gotten me interested.

112

The hot air type was my first roaster, but they are so loud that it’s impossible to hear the coffee’s “first crack” and “second crack.”

The Behmor roasters are the most cost effective, though still a bit pricey. I’ve had the Behmor 1600+ for years and have been happy with it. I am lusting after their new 2000AB.

113

According to my coworker, the freshness of the roast is a least as important as the freshness of the grind, if not more, and that beans roasted too long ago really suffer for it. Your thoughts?

114

It’s certainly true that freshly roasted coffee is much better than old stale coffee. :woman_shrugging:

115

This is true IMHO. I have purchased the 2lb bag of beans from Costco since it’s such a great deal. Starts off good, but something goes wrong about 2/3 to 3/4 of the way thru - it must be staleness. I am the only one here drinking fresh ground daily, so it takes a while to get thru that much coffee, so now I only buy 1lb or so at a time - stays good. Also, I store bulk beans not yet in the hopper of my grinder in a sealed glass jar, which also keeps things in good shape until use.

116

pro-tip: spray your beans with a bit of clean water (1-2 pumps) → google RDT spray (but you can purchase any 1-2 dollar small spray bottle)

the water mist will cut down the static extremely

117

I roast my own coffee for about a year now: Main reason: coffee is best between 1-6 weeks after roasting …. beyond that, quality takes a dive. That means I’d have to purchase quite a few smaller units (250gr) - which tend to be expensive and I cant take advantage of “volume purchases”. This however is only true for roasted coffee. Green coffee can be stored w/out quality loss for months and more than a year. So, I now purchase 5kg of premium green coffee directly from a colombian exporter for m/l the same price of 750gr. roasted coffee.

I poked around for a couple of months and settled for a “ghetto” setup, consisting of a heatgun and a (Covid)bread-machine.

the bread machine does all the tumblin, and the $10,- heatgun the - well - heating part. Takes me about 12-13 min for 300gr of coffee and the end result is on par with commercial roasters that might run high $$$ or low $,$$$. Allows for finetuning to your preferred taste-profile as well (mine is a bit less roasted, compared to most). Word of warning - roasting - it’s best done outside, as there is a surprising amount of chaff flying around, so don’t even think about doing it in the kitchen.

118

yep, in descending relevancy order:

  1. quality and roast of coffee
  2. grind of coffee (a good coffee grinder is more important than a good coffee-maker, just like in audio, its the speakers that are most important)
  3. coffee maker / espresso machine (basically just pushes hot water at 9 bar through the coffee-puck

unfortunately there are lots and lots of people who spend 4 digits in fancy espresso machines and then purchase their espresso beans (Illy, Lavazza, Hausbrandt,…) in the supermarket, which wont even have a “roasted on xxx date” so they are stale even before they hit the SM-shelves. → facepalm

119

My understanding is that that’s one of the things you pay for with a dedicated coffee roaster. I was told you could do it with a hot air popcorn machine, but it makes a mess.

120

Why didn’t I think of that? Pure genius! I keep a spray bottle in the kitchen for lots of misting tasks. Now I’ll use it daily. Thanks for the suggestion!