The Coffee Compass

Your Guide for Craft Coffee

Brewology

Science Says Brew Temperature Doesn’t Matter — Sort Of

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Time to re-write that Brewers Cup competition routine. According to a new study, coffees brewed at different water temperatures are indistinguishable at the same extraction percentage and concentration. The paper, a collaboration between the Coffee Science Foundation and the UC Davis Coffee Center, was published in the academic journal Scientific Reports under the rather catchy title “Brew temperature, at fixed brew strength and extraction, has little impact on the sensory profile of drip brew coffee.”

Researchers at UC Davis used a Curtis C4 batch brewer to brew a washed Honduras at 87°, 90°, and 93° celsius. Other brewing parameters such as grind size and total contact time were adjusted to achieve the same extraction and strength with each brew. A trained panel of professional tasters were unable to significantly distinguish between the different brews….

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This One Weird Trick Increases Coffee Extraction

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This week I was perusing Instagram and came upon a surprising coffee recommendation from author and consultant Scott Rao. According to Rao, when making coffee with manual-fill batch brewers, such as our favorite, the Bonavita 1901, filling the tank with cold water can help slow the brew cycles, increasing extraction (i.e. more delicious coffee flavor).

This tip is surprising because water temperature is one of the key variables that affects coffee extraction. Overwhelmingly, most manual-fill batch brewers struggle to get the water hot enough. (And don’t get us started with baristas brewing your $5 pour-over with too cool water.) In fact, we’ve long heard coffee experts recommend the opposite: preheat your brew water to help the machine get it to temperature. 

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Five Amazing Must-Try Aeropress Recipes

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Home coffee enthusiast Chris Heiniger lifted the Gold Aeropress at the 2015 Eastern Aeropress Championship, but the competition featured too many creative Aeropress recipes not to share a few of our favorites. Warning: you probably won’t be able to get through this post without grabbing your brewing kit and giving a few of these killer Aeropress recipes a try.

Erika Moore, Bonlife Coffee

aeropress recipes

  • 15 g. Ringer Blend from Bonlife Coffee: 50% Ethiopia natural process Tswana, 50% Granja La Esperanza Geisha Peaberry
  • 240 ml. of water poured over 25 seconds
  • Steep for 20 seconds
  • Stir back and forth
  • 1:20 plunge
  • Aerate and pour awesomeness

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Coil: A Misc. Goods Co. Coffee Brew Method

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Coil Cold Brew Coffee

Any entrepreneur will agree that steady growth in innovating new products is hard to maintain. Tyler Deeb could have easily walked away from one of the most successful playing cards Kickstarters of all time to return to a safe desk job. But he decided he was all in, and has returned to Kickstarter with an innovative coffee brew method. SAY WHAT?!? That’s right. Misc Goods Co. has partnered with Quills Coffee consultant, home roaster extraordinaire, and Coffee Compass guest blogger Chris Heiniger to bring you Coil, a cold brew coffee maker.

Misc. Goods Co. Coil Cold Brew

Coil is the first brew method of its kind, and can cool freshly brewed coffee from essentially boiling temperatures to near 48° in under 4 minutes without ever touching ice. Deeb explains…

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You Won’t Believe What This Guy Did With a Moka Pot

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Moka PotIf you asked us a couple months ago, we would have told you that it’s impossible to make a good cup of coffee with a moka pot. Although this stovetop espresso maker is seemingly ubiquitous across the European continent, our only experience with moka pots have been bitter, acrid, and unenjoyable. But then we stumbled upon this video from Kávékalmár on James Hoffmann’s blog. To summarize, we haven’t questioned our coffee presuppositions so much since we watched Matt Perger’s 2013 WBC routine. After watching this video we feel like we need to add a moka pot to our brew arsenal, not to mention some thermocouples!


Photo from Creative Commons.

Learn How to Brew a Chemex with Cartel Coffee

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A CHEMEX BREW GUIDE from Cartel Coffee Lab on Vimeo.

The Chemex

German-born chemist Peter Schlumbohm had a simple goal: invent the best coffee maker ever. After several years of testing and prototypes, the Chemex was patented in 1939. Over the ensuing decades the Chemex became an icon of design and pop culture. The Chemex is James Bond’s brew method of choice in From Russia With Love and is also featured in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art in New York, who says it “epitomizes the kitchen–as–laboratory concept—a hallmark of the interwar New Kitchen.” (They stole the words right out of our mouth.)  In more recent years it has experienced a revival amongst the craft coffee movement, valued for its ergonomic elegance and the clean, balanced cup it produces.

Cartel Coffee

Out of a plethora of instructional videos on the interwebs, Cartel Coffee Lab in Tempe, Arizona has one of our favorites. This shop is always one of my first destinations whenever I fly back to the Grand Canyon State to visit my family (full review here) and this is the only coffee video I have seen with a No Country For Old Men allusion. So strap on your boots, grab a kettle, and start brewing!

Matt Perger of St. Ali Geeks out in “Man vs. Volumetric”

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Man vs Volumetric – by Matt Perger for St Ali from St Ali on Vimeo.

Matt Perger, 2012 World Brewer’s Cup (WBC) champion, St. Ali barista in Melbourne, Australia, and internet video sensation brings us this video on what an elementary analysis in coffee extraction can yield (pun intended). The video commentary on his vimeo page is worth the read, mentioning control variables and experimental bias.

His conclusion: “I think it’s safe to say: if you’re not using volumetrics or weighing every single shot’s dose and yield, your espresso bar will be grossly inconsistent. There’s really no excuse, it’s 2012.”

The video shakes them haters off, geeks out on ‘spro stats, and features delightful music. Enjoy.

[HT: Sprudge]