The Chemex is both a coffee brewer and an artwork. Few coffee brewers have the ability to show to an audience like this brewer. It’s even earned a place at the Smithsonian. It’s so delightful to look at that it’s easy to overlook that it’s a fine coffee brewer that offers a unique flavor profile.
How It Works
The Chemex uses a thick laboratory-grade paper filter. If you try to use Melitta-style filters in a Chemex, the water will run through too quickly. The paper is part of the method. It asks as a flow regulator. The idea is to fill the Chemex with coarse ground coffee and let it soak as the thick paper slows the water’s movement through the coffee. In this way, it offers and almost-French press-like soaking to the grounds. But, most Chemex aficionados suggest tiny hot water pours, adding just enough to completely cover the grounds.
The thickest filter paper ever... let's you brew stronger, which surprises a lot of people.
Tests
I made coffee using very coarse grounds, identical to what I’d use in a French press or percolator. This is counterintuitive to drip making, but the thick paper demands it. If you grind too finely, the combination of paper density and grind will slow your drip rate so much, you’ll end up with very strong, bitter coffee, although there will be no sediment. I heated the water to boiling and then removed it. In about a minute the water was 200 degrees Fahrenheit. That’s a good temperature to pour into the Chemex. The Chemex inventor, Dr. Peter Schlumbohm, believed that most coffee brewers (especially the vacuum) brewed at too high a temperature. The Chemex is designed to brew at standard or below temperatures. While I got good results at up to 200F, I often preferred the coffee brewed at around 190, which is technically 5 degrees below industry standards. Let’s just say this: don’t pour the water in once it’s boiling; you won’t like the results.
The temperature curve reflects the gaps between pours. As you can see, it’s hard to determine the exact contact time between the water and the grounds. One reason for the distinctive flavor of the Chemex might be the wide temperature variance once the water is poured in, without any more hot water joining it until that amount has gone through the grounds. Another reason may be the coarse grounds. The thick paper filter is almost certainly a factor. While critics may claim the Chemex filter holds back important flavor oils, I would not agree without some evidence. The cup profile does not indicate anything less than a stellar cup of coffee. In fact, I think I can make stronger coffee with the Chemex with no bitterness at least partly due to its filter. If a wine-like viscosity is what you want in your cup, the Chemex is your brewer.
Grind
The Chemex works by trial and error. It is difficult to calculate the contact time, as you really have a number of contact times, due to the practice of pouring small amounts of hot water and allowing it to cycle through the filter bed before pouring in the next one. The best starting point it simply to use a coarse grind and not-too-hot water.
Coarse ground, like Kosher salt, because the filter controls contact time, not the grind.
Measurements
I use forty grams of ground coffee in the so-called six cup Chemex. I own the larger one too, the eight cup. I use seventy-two grams of ground coffee and I grind is slightly coarser. I use less and grind coarser because the ground coffee bed is deeper, meaning the contact time is automatically longer.
Water temperature
An interesting point how hot the succeeding pours are. Most manual drip users boil the water, then let it come off the boil and then pour it in without reheating it. As Oren Bloostein told me, he continuously keeps the water at near boiling. I’ve done it both ways, and am unconvinced that one way is inherently right versus the other. I suggest you try both and decide.
Cleanup is simpler with the Chemex than any other brewer I’ve used. You simply toss the paper away. If you compost, you toss the remove the grounds and toss the filter. The glass maker rinses easily — nothing to scrub.
Conclusion
The Chemex is the most attractive manual drip maker ever made. It is a manual drip maker, which means it’s more work to make the coffee. Even though I do, I can understand others claiming they don’t want to make manual coffee while getting ready in the morning. Its cleanup is so simple, and once you get your measurements and grind down, it’s really quite an easy brewer. The only thing left is how to keep the coffee warm. I suggest the cost is low enough that you buy two sizes and make the right amount for a half hour, and spring for the glass top that keeps the heat in.
After spending years in search of the perfect cup of coffee, I must admit I’ve had quite a few that have come close enough to deserving to be, as the saying goes, “almost too good to be legal”. And upon that flimsy premise I became curious to try the coffee given society’s true illegals… the men and women who populate our flourishing and expanding prison system. How good or bad is it? It would seem that it should, along with hard beds, out-of-date newspapers and small-screen television, be a part of their punishment for disobeying the law in this, the greatest country on earth.
I’ve certainly had coffee that seems more of a punishment than a joy, here on the outside that is. The more I thought about this the more obsessed I became, until I began introducing myself to a few lawyers and judges at parties (I normally would be embarrassed by being seen with these types) with the hidden motive of obtaining passage into the coffee klatches within the prison system.
Finally, Sid Heller, my attorney of many years, who has come dangerously close to being imprisoned himself for so savagely representing me in court (Sid is a lot like a mad dog when he tears into yours opponent) called me late one night.
Sid: “Kevin, I’ve done it.”
Kev: “You’ve been disbarred?”
Sid: “I could be if this ever gets out. I’ve got you a visitors pass to three institutions, a city lockup, a county jail and a State penitentiary. What’s my Christmas present?”
That’s Sid. Effective and right to the point.
So, here I am writing this report on the way back from my tour of coffee al frisko.
Photo by Sid Heller, Esq.
City Jail
My first sip of city jail’s coffee said it all. In fact, this coffee reminded me of the song title, “Yesterday.” The worst thing about it to me is that the guards appear to be drinking it too. Now, I can almost understand some fellow who finds himself here awaiting trial having a few cups just to get through the boring courtroom tactics. After all, his lawyer has to stall the case along until everyone connected with it either dies, or can’t remember. But the guards??? Frankly, I expected better. By the way, I don’t suppose you can guess whose coffee they serve here? I’ll give you a clue. It’s mountain-grown. If I were ever here, I mean really here, I know I would use my one phone call to roaster John Martinez. “Hello, John. Kevin Sinnott here. Hey, do you suppose you could overnight some Jamaican Blue Mountain and maybe a French press? I’ll have to send you a check, John. Trust me.”
Oh yes, and there are insects here. Large ones.
County Jail
I always promised my larger-than-life uncle, one Father John Dufficy, that I would never stoop so low as to cite the sensationalist drivel that is so prevalent in the newspapers. Nevertheless, I couldn’t help but think of Lindsay Lohan while I sat in cellblock 19B at the McHenry County Court lockup.
It was obvious that the experience was destined to be unpleasant. The foul smelling man in the next cell noticed my customary sport coat (I did wear a striped shirt) and insisted on calling me, “English” for the duration of my stay. The rest of his conversation held similar interest. I’ve never met a person who made more references to the sex act and seemed less likely to experience it, given his lack of charm and any form of social skill.
The guard posted for my ward (is it a ward?) asked me if he could get me anything such as cigarettes. I responded that I would like a cup of coffee, fresh if possible.
He gave me an odd look after that last comment, about the freshness. I was quietly glad that he did. It meant that he hadn’t guessed my true identity. My research, after all, was for naught, if the prison administration started slipping me special treatment in the form of better coffee. All I need is some savvy guard sending out to Dunkin’ Donuts in an attempt to fool me.
When my “host” returned he handed me the usual institutional styrofoam cup. Wedged alongside it was a packet of Sweet N’ Low, almost a guarantee of poor ingredients. How is it McDonalds is able to afford Equal and a big customer like the Prison system can’t?
I know you’re getting curious about the cup quality. Surprise. The coffee was… quite good. Aromatic. With a nice acid and medium body. The finish was the only place where the telltale signs of a less than stellar product was being used here.
Oh, I could definitely quibble about the formula. I have no doubt that they were employing the usual “one teaspoon per cup of coffee” for every cup. If I were to stay here for even one day, I would offer my recommendations that they “up” the grounds-to-water ratio.
Perhaps it was the overwhelming stench of the cell block, but even the Styrofoam cup seemed inoffensive. When I was released I noticed the coffee making station was equipped with last month’s top rated Bunn coffee maker and Yuban coffee. Someone around here must have taste buds.
Maybe they are subscribers after all.
State Pen
State penitentiaries are both the best and worst of the penal system. There are the ultra-violet “Natural Born Killer” — types who probably can’t be trusted with any glass equipment for fear they will convert a broken carafe into a dangerous weapon. Then there are the so-called “country club” prisons filled with reckless stock brokers and tax evading Mafiosi, where I would half-expect commercial quality cappuccino makers, maybe even a Starbucks or Gloria Jeans franchise operating within the prison walls to serve these “high-flyers.”
The state penitentiary I visited boasts no such luxury. Even though I was allowed into only the minimum security areas, much of the coffee appeared to be instant. The guards here definitely keep to themselves. They do not share coffee or any other informalities with the prisoners. My rather limited contact with the other prisoners didn’t allow me to become “wise” to any sort of underground “specialty coffee” system such as exist for cigarettes, drugs and sex magazines. I did notice one Gavalia package on the window sill of an inmate. But for all I know, it was a birthday present from his aunt. I was unable to find its owner, who was probably in the gymnasium during my stay.
In case anyone’s interested, I discovered that prison terms — I guess I should say, prison phrases such as calling the guards “screws”, “guns”, “rods” or “heaters” and the other inmates, “buddy” or “pal” are apparently no longer in style. The first time I attempted to use any of these in passing conversation, a hearty round of laughter resulted. I apologized and covered my ignorance by claiming I had been transferred from an older prison community. The prisoners took it in stride, and told me I’d just seen too many Humphrey Bogart films.
Taster’s Choice: Not Much
There are basically three choices of state pen brews. First, there is the institutional coffee served at breakfast and dinner. Frankly, it tasted identical to what I’d been served on Amtrak. It had Nestles written all over it. The harsh assault on the tongue, the weak body and the sour aftertaste. I’m sure the urns they were using (verified by “Mel”, who works kitchen duty or mess, as he calls it). The second choice is to drink coffee from a vending machine. Here the coffee is probably technically worse than the stuff in the hall, but for some reason, it actually offered more in overall perception. I was unable to bring in any laboratory equipment to verify brew strength, but I would say their machine was extracting better than average. The coffee actually had some of the finer notes of a decent high-grown arabica, rather than the robusta in the “mess.”
The third method is to have coffee with “Charlie.” Charlie is an inmate who actually has his own coffee maker. Well, sort of. Charlie uses an electric plug-in heating element known as a “stinger”, which he dips into a water filled styrofoam cup. When the water boils, Charlier spoons some coffee grounds in and stirs. Then he filters the coffee into a second cup. Charlier also uses decent coffee, by prison standards. Charlie uses Yuban, too. (What’s this thing about Yuban and prisons?) And he brews it strong, at least fairly strong. Charlie is allowed to get bottled water, because the guards didn’t want him to carry the glass carafe back and forth to the water fountain. Charlie says it makes better coffee, which I basically agree with.
I think Charlie used to work in a supermarket. I’m not sure whether he said he had a job in a supermarket or he pulled a job in one.
Charlie makes a pretty fair cup, though, under the circumstances. He also told me he is a member of Greenpeace.
Conclusions
First, I would advise no one to go to prison to taste the coffee or otherwise. I certainly don’t miss being there, even if it was just for “the experiment.” If I ever get in trouble I will pay Sid whatever he asks to try to stay out.
But…the coffee in prison, overall, is no worse, and even in some important ways, better generally, than that in many outside venues.
The coffee may be cheap in the mess, but, due to time constrictions on meal service, the coffee never “stayed up past its bedtime” on scalding hot plates or suffered a slow death in an airpot.
The county jail coffee was actually near exceptional for food service, circa 2011. It would put most office coffee service to shame. Many air travelers suffer far more for being coffee drinkers than men and women who have broken the law and are supposed to be punished for it.
Considering that none of these institutions buy premium coffee, or even grind fresh, the passing marks show that emphasis on cleanliness, measurements and fresh serving after brewing really do account for a lot.
As someone who misspent some of his early life viewing movies, I can’t help but recall some of coffee’s more exhibitionist moments before the camera.
Here are but a few moments memorable to me:
The 1952 film noir classic, The Turning Point with Edmond O’Brien as a well-intentioned but naive politician trying to clean the rats out of government featured a scene making coffee using a vacuum maker. The film’s director wisely starts the scene during the vacuum drawing the finished brew back down into the lower carafe. I can’t watch the scene without shoveling some fresh Guatemala Antigua into my own vacuum Silex.
For the best “coffee as sacrament” you can’t do better than Air Mail, my favorite John Ford film. Cheerless airline executive/pilot (from the days when they did both) Ralph Bellamy must pour twenty cups or so of coffee to maintain his seemingly eternal vigil running his airmail operation during an equally endless fog bound night. As atmospheric as these exciting early years of airborne heroics were, I think in balance I prefer the boredom of modern airlines. The safety, but not the coffee, has improved, however.
Another noir classic, The Stranger on the Third Floor, sets much of its dark story line around the confines of a diner called Nick’s. Nick, a Greek restaurateur steals a scene in which he explains why his coffee is so good to two dewy-eyed starlets who ask his secret. “The secret”, Nick says, “is I put a raisin in the every cup”. I’m thinking of remaking the film with this same scene in it. Only in my remake it turns out that I am Nick’s killer, after I discover he’s been flavoring my coffee without my knowledge.
Any film with alcoholics in it is guaranteed to feature early morning “lots of black coffee” scenes and Lost Weekend is no exception. Ray Milland’s portrait of a boozer is liberally peppered with the coffee-making activities of crusading Jane Wyman, whose employment of a percolator almost excuses Milland’s habit, at least in my book.
Preston Sturges, whose work seems to age even better than the best Sumatra green beans, obviously knew how to weave the coffee into a good yarn. His classic, Christmas in July, is about an advertising wannabe, Dick Powell, who tries to seduce gal pal Ellen Drew with his phrase, “If you can’t sleep at night, it’s not the coffee. It’s the bunk.” In fact, he enters the slogan in an advertising contest sponsored by a major coffee company. At one point his mother notices that he has accidentally dropped a penny in his coffee cup. “That’s lucky”, she says with her first generation brogue. Sorry, Mom. Not in my house, where you couldn’t see a penny in the bottom of the cup. It’s never good luck to look into a coffee cup and see anything but coffee. If you can it means the coffee is weak.
Patricia Fitzgibbon, Coffee Companion staffer, forced me to endure one of her favorites films, the ultra-campy Pillow Talk. Other than watching Rock Hudson method-act love interest in Doris Day, this film does have our top-rated Chemex coffee maker as its scene stealer. Once I spotted the Chemex, I re-wound and ran the scene several times.
A somewhat late entry in classic coffee-making in film comes from an early 60’s cold war comedy, One, Two, Three, starring James Cagney as a Coca-Cola executive trying to sell Coke in the Soviet Union. His secretary is shown in a photo accompanying this article making coffee and, yes, that is a vacuum maker. No wonder the Soviets resisted his efforts to introduce Coke when they apparently still had superior coffee-making equipment.
The 70’s and 80’s proved to be dark ages for coffee makers, as for coffee in general. It speaks volumes about our culture’s subconscious shame in using electric percolators and switching to high-content robusta-grade coffees that there is a drought of good coffee-making scenes in films during this period.
Perhaps the 90’s will prove to be a more coffee-focused time period. Already we have Café Romeo (a film so dependent on Joseph Campanella that even after he dies he is brought back via flashback for the film’s duration). Although Groundhog Day has no noteworthy coffee scenes in it, I was impressed by rumors that Bill Murray insisted on specialty coffee from a local roaster during shooting. A recent Christopher Walken film, in the Company of Strangers, has him sipping espresso in Venice while playing intense psychotic games with two impressionable British.
I haven’t yet seen the ultimate coffee cinema scene. When I do, I’ll let you know. Meanwhile, if you do, let me know.
The Audi Roadjet with coffee maker. What's worse: Useless coffee makers or useless coffee maker features?
The review of the Speak and Brew coffeemaker will depend upon the willingness to send one to me because I actually test coffeemakers. This is true for the Audi Roadjet a concept car with built in coffeemaker too. I put measured ground coffee in them, press the button and brew. While it’s brewing, I take the water temperature as it cascades down through the grounds. I time it to make sure it brews for the proper amount of time and, yes, there is an ideal time, or at least a range of times.
My purpose if writing of this is there are so many coffeemakers that try to achieve greatness by doing everything imaginable… but brew good coffee. I’m not against these features. The ability to speak to me might be important. Let’s say I’m married to a very chatty spouse and I never get a word in edgewise (I’m not, but we’re just “let’s say’ing”). Or let’s say I’m single and want a little conversation. Well having a coffeemaker that speaks to me might be pleasant. Of course I start thinking of the machines that speak to me in my life: my GPS speaks to me. But, it rarely says anything except barking orders at me, or correcting me if I make a wrong turn, more often a turn it doesn’t know about that involves a shortcut.
A coffeemaker with a clock in it seems like a good idea, but is it? The coffee isn’t as good if you grind and set it up the night before because flavors are released into the air, but I agree it might still be worth it. Of course I can do all this except press the on button the night before with any regular coffeemaker.
But, there are legitimate conveniences I truly wish would work, such as on-board grinders. These almost never are good grinders, even the burr grinders. And, they are difficult and sometimes impossible to clean. And still, the brewing needs to be right.
I’ve been looking over reviews for the past years. I can’t find a single all-in-one coffeemaker that is in the top rank. If it did, I’d almost guarantee it would be a bestseller. But, there isn’t and that’s the truth. Is it that they don’t know? Has the SCAA and various authors and coffee experts done such a poor job of teaching the brewing basics?
I suspect the answer is the manufacturers of such machines automatically presume the enduser of such gear has no interest in anything but the gimmick or feature. Or they feel that by being the single player that satisfies this particular need they no longer need to try to do it all.
But, I wish otherwise. I genuinely like gimmicks. I like extra features. I simply wish a machine with extra features would also make good coffee.
The Zojurushi 5-cup coffeemaker attracted my attention at a previous International Housewares show. I’d been trying to find a successor to the legendary Kitchen Aid 4-cup. Could this be it? My appetite was whetted when I ran into it again at Oren’s Daily Roast. I practically begged him to let me try it, but I’m already into him for so much coffee, he put me off. Finally I got the courage to scarf one from their sales rep at this year’s Housewares show. I was pretty excited to see it. It has the second most important virtue of any coffee gear, good looks.
The 5-cups are to me really four, but that’s what I’m looking for.
Number one, though, can it brew great coffee?
I finally scarfed one off Zojurushi’s PR people who I met at the International Housewares Show. One showed up on my doorstep a few days later.
It uses a number 2 Melitta filter. It has a removable water chamber and an inline charcoal filter. I was surprised that the filter appears to be located after the water is heated. As I use mostly low-mineral no-chlorine water I hardly need such a filter. No mention is made in the instruction book as to where to buy replacements.
Using the Zojurushi is easy. Fill the water tank up to the line. The instruction book may be light on the water filter replacement but it is excellent about its suggested formula, specifying 35 grams of fine grind coffee for a full pot. That works out to the industry formula. This might not seem astounding but recipes are almost never mentioned in coffeemaker instruction manuals, and when they are, they are usually wrong.
Monitoring the brew temperature showed me what I wanted to see. It really gets hot, not quite as instant on as the Technivorm, but very close, 200 degrees Fahrenheit for most of the brew cycle, even a little above towards the end. Best of all, the water gets all the grounds nicely wet. It’s a little appreciated fact that the biggest advantage manual drip has over auto drip is your hand always knows where to pour hot water. I found the best way to ensure this is to remove the top during brewing; I presume this is because the lid must be located precisely, but it’s easy to try it once and see if you agree. With minimal futzing, this coffeemaker just works almost perfectly.
Result? After years of searching I’m done. The Zojurushi does a stellar job, almost the equal of the Technivorm in temperature and actually, gasp, a little better in its drip performance. You almost can’t do better yourself.
Recommendation? Place 35 grams fine grind coffee for a full pot. Flip it on and in seven minutes, you’re ready to enjoy. Seven minutes may seem overlong to American drip aficionados, but trust me you will like the coffee. I ascribe the slightly longer contact time to Japanese fascination with European standards (I’m half-kidding) and the fact that during the first minute the water is just under ideal brewing temperature.
I brewed several batches of Bridgeport Coffee Company’s El Salvador Finca Las Nubes – Ernesto Lima. They charge for heirloom bourbon coffee grown by the kind of farmer who walks around dusting his plants every afternoon and, using this brewer, I could taste it. I then brewed some very different Oren’s Daily Roast Viennese Blend, which is make up of two stellar Colombian coffees, one light and the other French roast. It’s my favorite summer after-dinner coffee. I get a lot of local produce during the summer months and this coffee is able to add to a meal already chock with rich flavors. This brewer actually made coffee virtually identical to what I could do with a Hario V60, no mean feat.
This review has a simple ending: Zojurushi is top rated, the current five cup champ.
I spoke of my best cup of the Coffee Fest 2011 Show as a Sumatra coffee slow brewed for me at the Counter Culture exhibit. My best coffee from Coffee Fest was the Backpacker’s Blend given me in the hall by a small-batch roaster, Kalamazoo Coffee Company from, where else, Kalamazoo, Michigan. He appeared to have just two packages of it, so it seemed all the more precious when he offered one of them to me. I came home and opened the sack to take a whiff – too dark roast, I thought. I didn’t even brew any that day. The next day lunchtime rolled around. I often brew something slightly darker roasted for my afternoon coffee. I chose to use the Sowden SoftBrew, which steeps the coffee. For reasons thus far unexplained by science, there’s a significant difference between steep method brewers and highly agitated drip or vacuum methods. I’ve heard plenty of conjecture, but no solid facts. Let’s just say they’re different.
To brew using this method, I decided to emulate the formula used by Peet’s Jim Reynolds in his French press tutorial in my Coffee Brewing Secrets DVD. Jim used a rather robust grounds-to-water ratio: 57grams for four six-ounce cups. Of course, I ground coarse, as coarse as my Preciso grinder would allow. I preheated the SoftBrew inside and out so that when the water was poured in to mix with the grounds it would not be suddenly cooled by unheated porcelain or the filter’s cold steel. I heated the water to a full boil, and started a stopwatch. One minute from the boil, I poured enough water over the grounds, just as Jim did. After another minute, I poured the rest of the water into the SoftBrew. I covered it and timed the entire time from the first water was place in contact with the grounds until I poured the coffee, four minutes.
Often I find steeped methods have paradoxically harsh flavor, which I believe comes from people pouring still-boiling water over the grounds. I say paradoxically because the brew often tastes underdone, indicating the water has cooled too rapidly. All steep methods are going to experience heat-loss during brewing, but the act of pre-warming the pot would seem to circumvent at least some of the initial temperature drop.
Just before I poured the coffee brewed in the SoftBrew I gave the whole mixture inside a stir. I did this because the grounds can’t help but move towards the top of the brewer during soaking. This means the coffee towards the top is going to be stronger than that at the bottom. I want everyone to enjoy the same brew strength in their cup. The stirring does increase the likelihood of fine grounds in the coffee, but I think it’s a small price to pay as well as a small increase in fines.
The coffee was perfect. The roast was definitely towards the dark side, but minus any perception of bitterness or burnt caramel that dominates so many darker roast coffees. There was still a healthy brightness of acidity in each taste. This was a coffee that would stand up to cream nicely, but I enjoyed it just as it was.
My thanks and compliments to Kalamazoo Coffee Company. It was indeed my best cup after the show.
Water is the number one subject people ask about. Water is the solvent that brings for the oil from the grounds. Without water, there’s no coffee. Learning about water and how to view it helped me enormously to brew better coffee. As in most things coffee, there are lots myths surrounding water. I want this to be short and sweet. Here’s my quick opinionated practical guide to brew great coffee.
Hard Water
“Hard water won’t extract because it’s already too full of minerals.”I hear it all the time. Don’t think of water as absorbing coffee oils. Think salad dressing. Oil and water don’t mix. Think of heated water being a solvent that removes coffee oil from the grounds and they get mixed into the hot water, making the beverage known as coffee. Also, when water is heated the minerals go into suspension. They are virtually unimportant during brewing. What minerals do is add taste. The reason not to use highly mineralized water is they risk adding a flavor that competes with or clashes with your coffee flavor. If that’s not reason enough, hard water suspended during heating, cools and hardens on the insides of your coffeemaker’s plumbing. It doesn’t take much to clog your coffeemaker’s arteries and interfere with the flow. This causes everything from substandard brewing temperatures, to slowing down brewing to simply halting the process. A coffeemaker manufacturer’s repairman once told me the majority of their service was simply calcium-choked coffeemakers.
If you have highly mineralized water, you should do the following: Drink some. If it tastes good, you can brew coffee with it. If the water doesn’t taste good, you shouldn’t brew with it because it will flavor your coffee, almost always it will taste bad. For bad tasting water use bottled water. For very hard water, you can choose. If you are willing to routinely be running vinegar or Urnex (a good coffeemaker cleaner) through your machine, and use fresh water (better still distilled or low-mineral bottled water) to rinse afterwards, you can continue to use hard water. But consider if your water is hard enough, you won’t save much by just switching to bottled water, compared to buying vinegar, coffeemaker cleaner and bottled water to rinse the machines.
Bottled Water
If you use bottled water, check to see that it is low enough in minerals to make a difference. Usually it is lower simply because most bottled water manufacturers do some filtration to make their products consistent… but not always. Some bottled waters are full of minerals and not even any softer (meaning lower in mineral content) than the hardest tap water. The most reliable waters for brewing coffee are so-called drinking water, which are usually highly filtered municipal waters. Most often, they are treated with reverse osmosis filtration, which all but eliminates minerals. Then, the water bottler adds some particles in controlled amounts, just enough to add ‘normal’ flavor – water with no minerals can taste ‘flat’. There are some excellent good-tasting bottled waters, both low in minerals and with good taste that are not r/o filtered, but they take a little patience to find.
Softened Water
Under no circumstances should you use softened water, meaning water that’s been treated with a home water softener. Actually, there is an exception – espresso machines sometimes benefit from softened water, but these are dedicated machines and it’s a special case. I’m still not certain I fully approve of it, but at least it qualifies as a possibility – with espresso. This is not true using drip, vacuum or press pots. Softened water is especially problematic with automatic drip machines, where softened water and ground coffee can combine to make gelatinous goo that will become stuck in your brew basket.
Softened water is virtually undrinkable anyway due to its elevated sodium content. I anticipate the question of alternate softening methods. To be honest, I don’t know, nor do I know if it’s been researched by anyone. I’m eager to learn if any tests have been done.
So, there are the coffee basics you need to brew great coffee minus the myths.
When Good Eats’ host Alton Brown did a coffee segment some years back I was surprised at how casual the man who claims to be food’s OCD poster child was about preparing a beverage I know to be among the most finicky and demanding of cooking arts. If his general demeanor convinced me that Mr Brown is not a devout coffee enthusiast, his advice that his special sauce for getting the best coffee taste was adding salt to the grounds sealed it. I was genuinely despondent over the segment. For one thing, it showed he either never saw or wasn’t convinced by my own appearances on Food where I attempted to evangelize good brewing techniques and attentiveness to the process. Second, I was horrified to see him suggest adding salt.
To Salt or Not
Salt is, according to food medical sages, a slow poison to health. I’m a philosopher when it comes to such warnings. I think a lot of living is eating and, after my early years as a strict food puritan, I came to take a common sense mix of good living and reasonable caution. I don’t smoke or drink heavily. I preach moderation in all things, including salt. By my reckoning a key to long life is learning not to be a health fanatic as worry appears to kill as quickly as the occasional wrong ingredient. So my objection to salt in coffee is not based upon health issues. I acknowledge that salt is not a killer in the amounts advised by Brown.
I’ve also heard food industry critics challenge Brown using the conflict of interest argument. They claim the Brown is funded by a major salt company and thus his views are tainted by his paycheck. Again, I say nay. I think Brown appears to me to be sincere in his beliefs. If I’ve learned one thing in writing about coffee, you’re going to find funding from those you generally agree with and who recognize that what you’re saying is what they want to help spread around. It isn’t always a conflict. It is more often the other way around. The people who want to fund you like you because you both generally agree. I think Brown likes salt and the salt companies simply know this, like this and make their investments accordingly. So, my objection has nothing to do with an impropriety.
I think Alton Brown is wrong, that’s all. Oh, is he right that adding salt to coffee affects the flavor? Yes, he is. But why? Salt is a taste desensitizer. It is roughly the same thing as advising eyeglass wearers to not clean their glasses before viewing their cable TV because it will help cover the artifacts present in video downloads. It’s actually a pretty fair analogy because salt softens the harshness in coffee – coffee that’s poorly brewed that is. Oh yes, it’s also coffee that’s low quality. This is what irks me. Brown, who counsels people to spend extra money and time seeking high quality seafood, meat and vegetables, suddenly offers coffee shortcuts to help hide the defects in inferior beans, and mistakes inherent in poor brewing practices and faulty equipment. Suddenly, the man who’s taught you to cook dinner as if you’re a chef in the most expensive Paris restaurant, is instructing you to brew coffee in a World War II-era Soviet worker’s kitchen. He’s doing all this during an age of comparative coffee bean greatness. I’m befuddled.
Now if I may move upwards from scolding Rachel Ray’s predecessor for a moment, let’s talk about what exactly salt accomplishes in brewing. Salt is a flavor de-hancer. When you go to the supermarket on a Saturday and the cute person handing out tiny wine samples offers you a cube of cheese to accompany it, it is to help the wine by cutting the harshness of a relatively young, inexpensive wine. No wine expert would consider having cheese before or during a wine tasting. More important no one whose spent a hundred dollars or more on a bottle would want to risk destroying their tongues ability to savor that extra fragrance and taste nuances they’ve paid top dollar for. If they do, I can help them save money.
Cheese is called “the winemaker’s friend” precisely because it deadens your taste buds. It may not hurt your experience, but at least know you are like the wealth rock star who learns from a former starlet’s autobiography that he bedded her down. He has no memory of the experience but it must have been wonderful. To me that’s a waste.
Salt does not heighten the flavor of most foods, but limits your ability to taste them. Once you learn this, you are likely to either save money by buying cheaper foods knowing you can reduce the off tastes, or you can begin to really savor them by reducing the salt and allowing your taste buds to really focus on their various flavor essences and aromas.
Ironically, in an age when coffee snobs smirk at seeing their social inferiors adding a dollop of cream to their cups, cream, especially the richer, fattier varieties, can arguably be called flavor enhancers rather than taste deadeners. The challenge here is that the corporate dairies customarily add sodium to cream, probably due to the assumption that a majority of their customers buy poor coffee and don’t know how to brew it.
I urge you to buy direct trade coffees grown by farmers known to your roaster, and brew those coffees within fourteen days of roasting, using the practices I’ve spent years learning and spreading. If you do all this right, you will end up with some of the most exotic and pleasurable aromas and flavors known to man. If you still want to sweeten or enrich them with sugar or cream, be my guest.
But I urge you with equal passion to spare the salt.
There is hip and there is hip. The Hario V60 is definitely what the doctor ordered for the new slow coffee movement, that is brewed coffee done by hand, one cup at a time. I heard some marketing guru state the other day that the single-cup coffee market was going to be big. Really? That would have been big news a few years ago. Frankly, I’ve been using one-cup brewers for a dozen years, but I’m not claiming to be psychic.
Recession Chic: You already own a cup, half the coffeemaker.
They are just what the doctor ordered for upscale expensive beans, and my desire to drink a brewed cup par excellence. Manual drip brewing is a superb extraction method. Realize that brewing 10 cups at a time is difficult for drip because it takes so long for hot water to get hot, and get through the grounds without over-extracting and becoming bitter. One cup? No problem.
Let’s look at what’s different about the Hario and why it’s getting such a buzz.
Brewer – the power of this brewer is the bottom, where the coffee exits. Usually it’s a tiny hole. This allows the brewer to regulate the water to help control how long the water is in contact with the grounds. If the water goes through too fast, you just get hot water. If it’s too slow, you get bitter coffee. The Hario hole is so big, it hardly controls the flow at all. This allows you to grind super fine and that is mostly a good thing. The Hario presumes you will grind your own coffee. If you use preground drip grind, it the water will likely run through too fast. The key to grinding is to grind fine enough to slow the drip, ending up with between four and six minutes contact between the water and grounds. In this way, it is similar to the Chemex, which also has a large gap at the filter bottom.
Negligee-thin filter
The filter is an extension of the philosophy of the exit hole. The filter appears designed to encourage flow, not hold it back. Again, this will encourage you to grind fine. The filter paper is designed to be practically transparent, quite different from Chemex’s, which seems thicker and slower in comparison.
Grind – so what grind you should use? I said between 4 and 6 minutes is the ideal contact time. But, why such a large spread? Well, this allows for your personal taste, but also when you grind finer for drip, there’s a double effect. The finer grind slows the flow, but it also increases contact area between the water and grounds, so trial and error is necessary. I found when brewing four cups, which this brewer is capable of, I ground slightly coarser, still a fine grind, but just a bit less fine, so that my entire batch was ready in six minutes. When I only needed to brew one cup, I ground superfine, but it still took less time because there was less water to run through the grounds, so I had to grind very fine, almost a powder, and due to the increased ground surface exposed to hot water, I got the same strength in about four minutes. Is that clear? I hope so.
Oversize Hario coffee exit means use fine grind.
The Hario has these swirling fins inside. One colleague of mine was just overwhelmed with this brilliance of this innovation. I must just be different, but I fail to see how important these are. They add a nice visual design touch, but I seriously doubt if they really encourage a specific flow in any significant way.
The Hario V60 is available in plastic, glass and ceramic versions. I tested the least expensive plastic version. I would expect the ceramic version to be allow the water to cool fastest, and glass perhaps slowest, but I’d reckon the water travels through the grounds so quickly that it won’t be an issue.
Nice brewing view of first pour. Note channels peeking through filter.
Here’s my method: Boil some good tasting water. Place one 10gram scoop of coffee per 6 ounce cup. I used Counter Culture’s Peruvian Valle de Santuario for my tests. Grind fine, finer than for auto drip, but definitely not espresso grind. As grind is so important to this brewer’s performance, expect to do some futzing to get the taste you like. Also expect to alter your grind if you change the batch brew volume. For four cups, I weighed 40 grams coffee, and backed off to almost an auto-drip grind. Then the contact time between grounds and water was just shy of 6 minutes. This particular coffee has vanilla, fig and chocolate notes in it and the Hario brought out all the noble acidity and richness I could ask for. I suspect the filter paper webbing has a lot to do with the extraordinary success of the Hario V60. The filter is the closest to a glass or fine mesh filter with all the flavor and oil you could ask for, yet absolutely no sediment.
The Hario rinses clean, but the plastic version I tested is not dishwasher safe!
The Hario V60 is a fine brewer, far from being overpriced and it is not just geek gear. If you want jewelry or high end kitchenware, you can buy a glass or ceramic model. It does not displace either the Melitta cone nor Chemex, but it offers a fun and good tasting option to manual brewing, and places a healthy emphasis on grinding fine, rather than counting on the exit hole or filter to regulate contact time. With its innovative filter paper that offers the best in flavor transparency, the Hario V60 is a winner.
Coffee growing, purchasing, certification practices, roasting, packaging, blends-versus-single-origin and preparation methods (this last one particularly interests me), as well as consumer education played out with big coffee industry players over a three-hour period in New York City this past week. The players included Illy’s Andrea Illy, Intelligentsia’s Doug Zell, Blue Bottle Coffee’s James Freeman, Gillies Coffee’s Donald Schoenholt and Bunn’s Karalynn McDermott, and an assortment of food service industry professionals. (more…)
