Perfect pour-over coffee is a 3-part process

Commentary, Fresh Roasted Beans, Technique

Perfect pour-over coffee is a 3-part process:

Getting perfect pour-over coffee is a process that is a combination of several elements all working together. This outline is a quick overview of the key ingredients. If you are new to pour-over coffee brewing at home, it’s easy to start simply, and as you get more experience and your palate matures, you can easily add complexity by adding equipment, brewing light-roasted beans, etc. Starting with good beans, a dripper and hot water are all that is required.

This outline is a quick overview of the key ingredients.

1. Freshly roasted coffee beans (Small batch, freshly roasted, direct trade, beans from an artisan roaster)
2. Equipment (Coffee dripper, gooseneck kettle, paper filters, timer, scale, temperature gauge, coffee grinder)
3. Technique (how to brew it)

Freshly roasted coffee beans

Taste starts with the roast. Artisan coffee roasters like Intelligentsia Coffee, Blue Bottle Coffee, Stumptown Coffee Roasters, Espresso Vivace, Handsome Coffee Roasters, Ritual Coffee Roasters, etc., are the best places for crafted coffee roasting. This is not saying they are the only ones, every city will have it’s own local coffee artisan roasters. Look for one in your area and purchase from them. If there are no local roasters, the aforementioned roasters will ship via their online shopping sites. Do not buy ground beans, only whole beans and only grind as much as needed for brewing at the time. Buy in small quantities, 12-16 oz. at a time. Store whole beans in an air-tight container.

Equipment

• Start with a good quality coffee dripper, Melitta (available in most grocery stores), Hario, Bee House, Cilio, Chemex, etc, are all good, although they vary in method. Hario and Chemex, with a single large hole, tend to extract faster than Melitta and Bee House coffee drippers that have either one, or a couple of small holes.
• A gooseneck kettle is useful and makes pouring hot water over the grounds easier to control.
• A scale with built in timer that measures in grams helps you measure exacts amounts of coffee and water.
• Thermocouple for measuring water temperature.
• High quality conical burr coffee grinder. Small blade grinders work, but the uniformity of the grounds is difficult to control.

Technique

Grind of the bean, weight/amount of beans ground, amount of water, water temperature, pour technique all add up to success or failure when it comes to pour-over coffee method.

Article on technique

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