Too Much Coffee

hey guys, im currently lacking in usable coffee methods at home, so im using a french press, HELP!!

just made a drink, about 17g of coffee-ish will do me two and a half 8oz ish cups, water at 90c and left it brewing for four minutes, but it doesnt seem to taste right, do these measurements sound useable?

I don't know how much millilitres 8 oz are, but with 14-18g coffee I usually use ca. 250ml of water

I work on 60g per litre, so a bit more than Lukas, very coarsely and very evenly ground coffee. Pour, let it bloom, give it a minute, stir and top up if you are going by sight. I tend to put the whole thing on scales and tare it off so I know exactly how much I am brewing.

Oh - and water in the kettle up to 95C is usually ok.

I also stir the coffee when it's finished brewing and take away the foam like when cupping. Apart from that I'm doing it the same way as James.

Ola

kingseven wrote:I work on 60g per litre, so a bit more than Lukas, very coarsely and very evenly ground coffee. Pour, let it bloom, give it a minute, stir and top up if you are going by sight. I tend to put the whole thing on scales and tare it off so I know exactly how much I am brewing.

Jim, would it be possible (i.e. not too much of a pain) to post a picture of the grind you do for French Press? I'd be really interested to know what it is, as I have a feeling I'm grinding too fine but don't know how far I should go in coarseness! (Of course, I could 'dial' it but am a bit reluctant to potentially waste so much herbazu or gethumbwini or injerto.... )

In any case, if it were at all possible I'd be really very grateful!

A good ruke of thumb to go by is how hard you have to press. For instance, if you are having to climb on the workbench and stamp on it, maybe then you are going too fine :p

http://einphilly.blogspot.com/2007/10/p ... pping.html

This gives a pretty good picture and example of what you need.

Basically it should resemble raw cane sugar.

Matt

Many thanks for the link, that's really useful!

Have been grinding quite a lot finer than that - will try it as shown in the picture this morning

lukas wrote:I don't know how much millilitres 8 oz are, but with 14-18g coffee I usually use ca. 250ml of water

Saved to desk top, I have one of those conversion sites
http://www.onlineconversion.com/volume.htm and found that 8.5oz is indeed 242ml, so you were quite close lukas.

I also had a look under 'Area' (as one does) and found there is a unit of area known as a 'barn'. I thought it was a wind-up and was about to test it, by looking up how many barns there were in a square light year. Then I noticed at the bottom of the page "Supurb barn conversion, near Sheffield", must be a wind-up

QC

A barn is really really small...infact so small it waas almost missed out of the Hitchhikers Guide...stunning.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barn_(unit)

cumberpach wrote:

lukas wrote:I don't know how much millilitres 8 oz are, but with 14-18g coffee I usually use ca. 250ml of water

Saved to desk top, I have one of those conversion sites
http://www.onlineconversion.com/volume.htm and found that 8.5oz is indeed 242ml, so you were quite close lukas.

Thanks for the link!

Chris was alas talking "about 17g of coffee-ish will do me two and a half 8oz ish cups", so I'd suggest again try 14-18g for each of those cups

Chrisweaver wrote:hey guys, im currently lacking in usable coffee
just made a drink, about 17g of coffee-ish will do me two and a half 8oz ish cups,

Shock and horror,

Hi Chris, I'm wondering if this is either a 'mickey take', typing errors or just 'plain-old-fashion' using the wrong figures.

8 ozs (Fluid ozs) of water equals 250 mls of water which happens to be the USA cup measure, yes ?

17 grams of coffee just-so happens to be the weight of coffee you get after grinding an Aeropress scoop-full of beans, yes ?

Just to put my comment into perspective, I'm an 'achieved-learner' compared to most of the guys on this forum, "achieved" because via this forums help I am now drinking coffee that pleases me. Early days I was over extracting, grinding too course, grinding too fine, using too-much water for too-little coffee and because I don't like black coffee I had to find my own path in the end but all guided by what I read and learned from this forum, now, you are using twice as much water as I do in my press and expecting a decent cup of coffee, is it me ?

I grind 17 grams of beans, throw them into a small press (I find it makes a difference) and pour-on 100mls of water. (4 fluid ozs) Because my grind is irregular and leaning towards fine I don't let my coffee brew, I stir-and-press very gently.

The resulting coffee is topped with a little half-and-half then watered down with fresh boiling water so I end-up with about 200mls (almost 8ozs) of lovely-lovely coffee.

Thanks again guys, and a happy-new-year to you all. I'm still managing on my basic kit but drinking coffee that gets me out of bed early just for the pure pleasure.

Those first two cups are the best of the day, yes?

Regards
Richard

Thanks Rich, you reminded me I have to roast some more lovely coffee - probably the Yirgacheffe - so that I can have brewed coffee in the morning again. Currently I 'only' have El Salvador la Fany and I think espresso in the morning is just not my thing atm

I doubt I will ever go to an espresso machine, I took some of my coffee to a pals house, he loved my coffee but it didn't taste as good coming out of the machine as when I make it at home in my french-press.

I have actually gone-back to that whirly blade grinder and even though I accept that a quality grinder helps I don't see a problem, or taste one. I can get a grind that gives me some granular sugar-sized bits together with some towards powder but that's what I get from the hand grinder I have unless I go really course then the coffee doesn't taste as good.

I tried the Aeropress but I'm not keen with the results with paper filters so I'm just ordering my Swiss-Gold filter.

The biggest differences I can make to my French Pressed coffee are in the roast and grind together with amount of water per-cup, I seem to prefer a finer grind with no brew-period at-all.

As regards the roast I'm settling down to quitting at second crack or doing a blend where 50% has gone past and 50% stopped before, my very favourite blend is Old-Brown-Java with the Indian Yelnoorkan at 50/50.

Out of all the coffees I have there is none that I dislike though I have found 50/50 blending an interesting brew with most (not-all) combinations.

Presumably all my comments have to be considered only towards French-press methods because I most certainly did not enjoy that espresso experience. A bit like going back to the dark-ages for me so are you guys just making assumptions that if you buy a superb machine you will get better coffee than out of the humble French Press.

As an after-thought, the filters on French-Press pots, do they differ wildly ? Because of where I live I don't get to see stuff and compare in posh department stores. We have a very cheap 4/6 cup pot where the filter material doesn't touch the sides until near the bottom whereas the filter material on my favoured pots touches all the time.

What do you think ?

Not a lot to add Richard but just wanted to say I enjoyed the enthusiasm for the coffee itself in your post.
I also drink 95% press at home . even though I have a spaz and a lever at home now. this is firstly because i sample ( not drink ) 6-10 espresso a day and when I get home I want honesty for a cup rather than technique, this said I can understand your passion for this medium.