I‘ve been making coffee with a Chemex every dang day going on six years or so, and I find I enjoy the routine and semblance of control the whole process gives me. I’ve got my favorite whole beans delivered by a local roaster every couple weeks, an ideal grind size, preferred amount of coffee in grams, water temperature, and pouring method. It's a nice thing to do while listening to podcasts or something first thing in the morning.
Also, while this is my preferred method, I have very little interest in poo-pooing regular coffee makers or Starbucks or what have you. Whatever gets you goin.
So, how do you take your coffee? Also lol sorry if this is a dumb forum topic
@shlootermcgavin#18940 its a good topic and you should post in that other thread. Please educate me on pour over technique, I need air traffic controller level assistance
@MichaelDMcGrath#18941 Oops! I was aware of that thread because of the insurrection that kicked off that discussion but was sorta avoiding it because of that. Will have to check it out!
@shlootermcgavin#18943 yeah it quickly became the coffee thread somehow haha. Reading from the most recent should filter out most of the Jan 6th stuff which is near the top.
*edit* i forgot what brought me to this thread to begin with: any coffee snobs roast their own coffee? i've been doing it for a few months and it's really very good, and a fun little ritual on the weekends, (for me at least.) i get my greens from [u-roast-em.](https://u-roast-em.com/)
thought about this thread while making my afternoon coffee: turkish coffee made with tanzanian peaberry i roasted yesterday, with a peppermint tea chaser.
@pasquinelli#19001 ahhh i love it! i gotta get into home roasting. i have a potentially foolish question: do you just use your home oven to roast? what's that setup look like?
@shlootermcgavin#19010 i just roast in a pan on a stove. i‘ve tried an air fryer, but i find being able to see it, and hear it, and smell it more readily is more helpful, at least for a week’s worth of coffee for me, (150g going in, ~120g finished.)
@yeso#19018 actually, it is. when you make turkish coffee you let it sit for a "little bit" in the cup before you drink it. i wait until it's 150°f. and yeah, you need a cezve (the pot) to let the liquid bubble up without boiling, and you need a grinder capable of grinding very fine.
I live across the street from a coffee roaster, so that‘s where I get my beans from. I’ll sometimes get esspresso drinks from them because I can‘t make them on my own.
I’m a big fan of the pour-over method of coffee making and think it‘s really ideal in terms of cost, ease of use, and ease of cleaning up. I grind my own beans, use a gooseneck kettle, measure my beans and water using a scale, and time all my pours.
I’m currently using a Hario V60 but I‘m honestly not convinced that the larger hole leads to better results than using a more standard Melitta. Maybe I need to work on my technique? But I already feel like I’m at “crazy coffee-obsesso level”
I used to have an Aeropress and liked the results that gave me, but I lost it in a move some days ago. Maybe I should get a new one one of these days.
at @yeso#18942's request, read on for my chemex technique. i use a 70:4 water-to-coffee ratio. yields about two 12oz cups of coffee.
_**GEAR**_
- chemex and filters
- electric gooseneck kettle with temperature controls and a timer
- an "it gets the job done just fine" electric burr grinder
- countertop scale that can measure grams
- water
- beans, medium roast
**_INSTRUCTIONS_**
1. fill kettle with water, heat to 203 degrees Fahrenheit
2. grind approximately 40g coffee. i set my grinder to right in the middle between medium and coarse
3. place filter in chemex and pre-soak the filter with a little bit of water, just enough to get most of it wet. pour out the plain water into the sink
4. put your chemex on the scale and zero the scale. pour your ground coffee into the chemex. gently, so as not to move them beans around too much, pour 80-120g of water onto the beans. start your timer and let it bloom for 30-45 seconds
5. zero the scale. over the next 30 seconds, add 400g water. pour slowly and steadily, working in a circular/spiral motion, being careful not to pour directly on the paper
6. let it draw down for 30 seconds or so, then continue pouring water in batches for the next 1-2 minutes until your scale reads 700g
7. let it draw down completely. remove filter and discard. pour a cup and enjoy! the whole process from bloom to cup should take about 4.5 minutes. a little longer is okay too.
I consider myself like a mid tier coffee snob, at least, by coffee snob standards. Well beyond your average coffee drinker but I'm not too wild about most things, although, I suspect with enough money I would get crazier.
I have a Breville Infuser, which is an espresso maker with automatic pressure and dosing controls as well as a steam wand I suspect is just mostly okay. It was supposed to be a Mother's Day present to my mother-in-law but she ferociously refused it, not like in that way where you are just trying to be polite but like she demanded I take it and return it because she wouldn't use it. I was curious and tried it out a few times before packing it up and returning it and then immediately realized after my first successful shot that I wasn't going to return it.
I grind myself with a Breville Smart Grinder Pro which I effectively stole from Amazon (ordered one and told customer service it didn't show up and probably got stolen so they gave me a refund hehe). No complaints or even anything particular to say about it, it's great. I like that you can do a precise grind length and then pause it in the middle to lightly tamp down my shots so that coffee doesn't spill everywhere, then restart it from where you paused it.
Despite having an espresso machine and a steam wand I mostly just put cream and hot water into my coffee. I like it that way. Lots of cream but strong coffee make a fantastic combination. I will make lattes or breves (breves are the best) every once in a while but not all that often, it's kind of a pain to clean the steam wand after.
I would really like to get into roasting my own coffee, one of the best cups of coffee I've ever had was at the home of someone who roasted their own and I can't stop thinking about it. They used I think one of [these](https://www.roastmasters.com/fresh_roast_SR540.html) and it looked really simple, main problem according to them is that it produces a lot of smoke which they had an elaborate set up for which I wouldn't be able to replicate. But you have freshly roasted coffee in less than 10 minutes.
That's a really nice setup. I think I'll try that out soon!
I'm certainly no snob. I love the heck out of coffee but we mostly just get whatever's on sale unless we're feeling really wild and want something a lite different. In those cases we order from [Bones Coffee.](https://www.bonescoffee.com) They have some really good blends!
I also was just given this aeropress which is cool! It makes a difference in quality but I usually go through 10 cups in the morning (jk kinda) and having to brew one cup at a time is excruciating. [URL=https://i.imgur.com/djIa3zc.jpg][IMG]https://i.imgur.com/djIa3zch.jpg[/IMG][/URL]
I‘ve been using Hario v60 for awhile and recently replaced that with Hario Switch. This is really great. It’s sold as immersion brewer but you can also leave the stopper open to just use as regular pour over or you can do hybrid.
This is a no brainer brewer and really simplified by coffee routine. I just do 20g coffee to roughly 270-280g water off boil. The bad thing about it is it's small so I do 50-60g water blooming, drain, then pour in rest of water and steep for 2 mins. You can skip blooming if brewing less amount. I put on a lid to keep temperature better.
Here is a pretty nerdy video about it.
https://youtu.be/QjIvN8mlK9Y
I've tried tons of different pour over techs but I just can't tell that much of a difference to be honest. This pretty much toss all the pour over methods out the window for me. I had a couple of aeropresses before v60 and rubber parts on both disintegrated into super sticky sludge.
@shlootermcgavin#19186 thanks for taking the time to explain this - despite committing to the pourover lifestyle in the other thread, I still haven't tried. Have most of the gear already so I should take the plunge already
