Making Really Great Coffee

Calling All Coffee Lovers

I love coffee. I make good coffee at home using a French press and organic grounds, which are pretty expensive. Yet, the coffee is never as good as the best coffee you can get at a coffee shop. What are the tricks to make the very best coffee at home? What do they do at the coffee shops that make it so good? I wonder if I'm doing something wrong.
M.S.

The Water Makes for Great Coffee

The water you use makes a difference in the quality of the coffee. If you are using tap water to make your coffee, consider running it through a filter first (pitcher or faucet-mounted). The temperature also matters. Ideally, it should be never be boiling when it touches the grounds. So after you boil the water, you could let it cool for about 30 seconds before adding it to the press. Also, make sure that you're using the right grind for your coffeemaker. For a French press, you want a fairly coarse grind. And lastly, clean the coffemaker well after every pot. Residue stuck to the pot will certainly affect the flavor.
Amy

Did You Say Salt?

Here's a little trick I learned from my Daddy a long time ago. To take the bitterness out of coffee, before you brew it, add a little "sprinkle" of salt (yes, salt) to the grounds! I've been doing it for years and can really taste the difference when someone else makes it and forgets!
Bee in Virginia

How a Coffee Snob Makes Great Coffee

I make the best coffee in town at my house and the "coffee shops" don't come close to the taste I can brew at home, especially when you factor in the cost! Here are my tips for the best coffee:

1. The coffee maker must be clean. Clean it after you use it, especially the holder for the grounds!
   
2. Use good quality water. I like filtered water but bottled works well too. And use room temperature water.
   
3. Invest in a coffee grinder. The coffee taste best when the beans are fresh ground. Grinding them at the store makes them lose their flavor and freshness.
   
4. Keep most of the coffee in the freezer, but keep some out at room temperature. I used to keep it all in the freezer, but the coffee taste better when it is ground up from room temperature beans, so now I keep a week's worth or so at room temperature and the rest in the freezer.
   
5. Also, I like darker roast beans (French or Italian rather than Columbian) and grind them up good. They'll go further the finer you grind them.
   

One more thing, I tried one of those French presses and didn't like it. The coffee always tasted bitter. I did have some luck using one of those if I then filtered the brewed coffee through a coffee filter, but that was too much work, so I just have a regular drip brewer and that works great using the above tips. Good luck and good coffee!
CJ, Certified Coffee Snob

A Barista's Advice

I work in a coffee shop and this is a frequent complaint from our customers. They buy a bag of a coffee that was tasted in the store and loved, only to find that it doesn't taste the same at home. There are several possible reasons for this. First, we only use filtered water when making coffee at the shop. Tap water can ruin the flavor of good coffee. Second, we grind the coffee right before we brew it, so that it maintains as much flavor as possible. The longer the time between grinding and brewing, the less flavor in the coffee. We also store our beans in opaque, tightly sealed bags with all the air forced out, and in a dark, cool place. Light and air exposure can alter the taste of the beans (and you should never store coffee in the freezer). Also, if you buy your coffee from a coffee shop, I would suggest asking the baristas for any tips they might have. We're very friendly and we usually know quite a bit.
Elise

Roast Your Own Coffee at Home

I roast my own coffee at home. It tastes better than the stuff you can get at the shops because it's fresh, and the variety of raw coffee beans is large, as opposed to the standard French Roasts at coffee shops. The best coffee I've had is Mexican Oaxaca, Nicaraguan Blend, and Panama Boquete. There are many fair trade and organic varieties available online.
RC

Roasting your own coffee is relatively easy. Place 2/3 of a cup of raw beans in the popcorn popper, and place a bowl underneath the machine to catch the chaff. After about three or four minutes, the chaff (it looks like papery brown peanut-skin) will separate from the beans. This is what is called the "first crack," as you'll hear the beans cracking. After another two to four minutes, you will hear the "second crack" in which the beans turn a dark, shiny brown, and bits of coffee bean will show up in the bowl. If you would like a savory, dark roast, unplug the roaster, take the beans out and put them on a plate to cool shortly after the "second crack." If you like a lighter roast, take them out after the "first crack" when they reach the color of your liking. Make sure to wear a pair of oven mitts when transferring beans to the plate. Don't burn yourself.

After the beans have cooled, put them in a jar with a tight lid, but loosely close the lid for five or six hours, as the beans are still releasing carbon dioxide. The coffee will be ready to grind five hours after roasting, and they'll keep for about two to three weeks before losing their optimum freshness.

It's always best to grind your coffee at home, because most ground coffee I've tried are stale. It's worth the cost of the grinder, as the whole bean preserves the coffee's freshness. Think of it this way. Would you want to eat an unpeeled orange, or a sliced apple that's already browned? Didn't think so.

Green coffee never really goes stale, so you can buy in bulk and in a multitude of varieties, and keep lots of bags on reserve.

The payoff is huge. You'll have fresh, superb-tasting coffee that's roasted to your liking. And I find a personal sense of pride in being able to do it myself without having to go to the shop and dropping $1.50 for every cup. Your friends will love coming over for coffee!
Joan

Spice It Up!

I used to know a gentleman who was a professional cook who always made the best coffee. He told me the secret was to put a little cinnamon in with the grounds. Works like a charm!
KJ

Brew the Best Cup of Coffee

Like the questioner, I love coffee, and here are a few suggestions to brew the best cup. I suggest using filtered water; I keep a pitcher of it in my refrigerator.

Through the Internet, I found some coffee bean suppliers at www.sweetmarias.com or www.u-roast-em.com. From these suppliers, I order green beans from growers all around the world and roast them myself every few days. I use a West Bend hot-air corn popper in my garage (coffee roasting makes a pungent odor), and it takes about 7 minutes to roast 1/2 cup of raw beans, so I do three or four batches at a time. There are other successful methods for home roasting. Then, I use a burr grinder for the coarse grind that is best for the French press method.

There is a learning/experiment curve to making the best cup of coffee, but it comes quickly enough, and now my friends are eager to try the different types that I brew.
Kay in Virginia

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