Too Much Coffee

I've just finished the second of my brewing guides and seeing as everyone seemed to like the French Press one I thought I'd link to the Chemex one which can be found here.

Comments very welcome!

I am not sure if there is anything quite as revelatory as the cleaning of the grinds in this one - the biggest eye opener for me was the amount I needed to change the grind between doses. (Which, as a barista, should have been fairly bleedin' obvious to me!)

Very nicely done, James.

Will you ever be making higher resolution versions available?

Thanks James, that is really useful for us. We don't drink pour-over very often and I've never felt that we have quite optimised everything.

There were a number of things in your guide that I was pleased to see that we were doing correctly, such as the slow pour of the water and keeping the introduction of it to the centre to form a cone. However, I do now think that our grind may be too fine as the coffee is less red/clear and we do get a small amount of grind sediment in the brew. I think this is partially because we are using a Bodum Swiss Gold pour-over that seems to require a finer grind than paper to achieve a similar brew-time.

The clarity of the Chemex brew appeals a great deal, I must look at getting one at some point. I may try some paper filters in the Boum in the mean time. Do you have any tips about using Swiss Gold filters in this method that might help us please?

How hi-res would you want? I will have a fiddle with the video settings for export and see what I come up with!

I think the resolution is fine as is - Vimeo can do 720p, but unless your camera is HD there's no point in upscaling.

I really like the look of the videos, great depth of field, very film like. Would be interested to hear what equipment you use. (also the floating text in the press video was really cool).

Love that music. Oh, and the video was nice, too

OK... Ignore me, I just found the "Full Screen" button!

Now I want a Chemex as well.....but at least I can blame you and your coffee porn.

You're are the guru, dude.

I am using the one with cloth filter. I use 15g coffee for 160-180ml so that the brewing time is around 2:40, suggested by some Taiwanese experts. Perhaps the difference is due to different filters?

I am still playing with my cloth filter brewer - is that 2:40 from start of bloom to final drips?

Also that is a much higher dose than I would use - the faster brew time may compensate for that giving a similar strength cup to my slower brew. I would try both - see which you like more. Certainly 60g/l is enough coffee to give a very bodied, quite heavy cup (in my opinion of course!)

syscrusher - I am using a Canon FS100, and my 350D DSLR too, editing in Premier and adding extras in After Effects. I am trying to do a Winter Espresso one at the moment so we shall see how that turns out...

hope this isn't a daft question, but where can you buy chemex brewers in the UK? I've been searching on Google, and all I can find is US or dead HasBean links.

Cheers

I think Steve is still stocking them, and eventually I plan to place a fairly big order. Until then - odd little design shops usually. I think there is a shop up near Brum stocking them too - check the chemex website or maybe email them, but I am convinced there is somewhere...

kingseven wrote:I am still playing with my cloth filter brewer - is that 2:40 from start of bloom to final drips?

Also that is a much higher dose than I would use - the faster brew time may compensate for that giving a similar strength cup to my slower brew. I would try both - see which you like more. Certainly 60g/l is enough coffee to give a very bodied, quite heavy cup (in my opinion of course!)

syscrusher - I am using a Canon FS100, and my 350D DSLR too, editing in Premier and adding extras in After Effects. I am trying to do a Winter Espresso one at the moment so we shall see how that turns out...

From start of bloom till the end, yeah. Of course, 2:40 is only a reference. Personally I find little difference from 2:40 - 3:00.
About a slower brew, would that bring unpleasant flavours out of the coffee grounds, like the ones when you overextract? I find cloth filter is quite delicate. It can give a really nice cup but at the same time you can also mess up quite easily. Of course, you're the master

Nice video's James!

I think the coarser grind would compensate for the slower brew and allow a slightly lower dose of coffee. In my head the extraction maths works!