Stovetop clarity

A while ago I posted a video of making stovetop espresso. With all my earlier stovetops the end product had been muddy and burnt but with the little Bialetti that Kam from Fiori gave me I have had much more success.

I have been in the habit of lifting the Bialetti from the flame almost as soon as the coffee starts to flow up the spout - I know that the result of this is a little less coffee, but I find that first fraction of the brew to be sweeter and substantially more mellow than if I maintain the heat and allow all of the water to boil through.

There is also substantially less sediment - to the point where the coffee is almost completely clear. I don't know just why this is - if I leave it a litle longer it certainly has a lot more sediment and I wonder if that last rush of water and steam is at a higher pressure and thus carries a little more sediment through with it.

I know that from a flavour persective some people prefer the full measure and body of the more muddy brew, but I have come to prefer the early lift and the clean taste - here below is my video again so that you can see the result of the method I am using. I'd love to hear any views on why it is that the first fraction has almost no sediment.

The Hario Siphon

The team at Coffee Shrine supply a range of coffee making equipment for the home and office, and recently started stocking Hario siphons. I have never had the opportunity to play with a siphon and so I jumped at the chance to borrow one when they offered. I read up on technique in a number of places, including the recent instructable at Five Senses Coffee. Feeling well armed with knowledge and blissful lack of experience I put together the siphon and the Hario hand grinder and started to make coffee.

Actually, it took a few more tries before I got something that approximated what was described to me as a good quality cup of siphon coffee.

The final attempt though was something awesome. I was using an Ethiopian Limu that I had lightly roasted two days before and it was full of stone fruit and had an almost tea-like tannic quality. It was very refreshing and quite different even to the pour-over I had made with the same beans.

The Hario kit is a beautiful set of equipment. I love glasswear, and particularly laboratory glasswear. At teacher's college we had to learn to make our own pipets and other basic glass tools, but always I luster after the rows of beakers, conical flasks, retort stands and bulb flasks that stood in rows in the lab prep room.

The Hario gear took me right back into that world and I spent a blissful weekend trying slight alterations to the various recipes I had.

I was also very surprised by the hand grinder. My experience with manual grinders has not been good but I found that the ceramic burr Hario had grinder was effective and consistent and that the process of grinding enough coffee did not take too long. It actually added to the experience overall.

A big thanks to the guys at Coffee Shrine for letting me borrow their kit, it was great fun to play with.

The pictures below will hopefully tell the story better than my words can!

Stovetop Espresso

I have never had much success with stovetop espresso although I own about 4 variations of the caffetiera - all of them in stainless steel.

A friend gave me a Bialetti for my birthday and I read up on the process of making stovetop at a number of different web sites. The advice had some common points, and and some conflicting ideas so I combined these and with a little trial and error got a great tasting espresso from my new allow friend.

I'm not saying that this is THE way to make a good stovetop - it is more a video about how I used it to make mine. All I can recommend is that if you own one and have been frustrated by it - persist, read and experiment.

Also buy a Bialetti 'cause they are cool!

Pour Over II

Still loving it - and have actual decent photos now!

Pour Over

I’ve never been a huge fan of pour-over coffee, but then my sole experience to date has been the standard fare of ‘dripolater’ machines that slowly torture already stale ground coffee with a slow trickle of over or under-heated water to deliver a brackish, muddy, acidic brew.

I do have a small manual gold foil filter that came free with a pack of Harris coffee – but results from this have been mediocre at best.

I am today however a big, big fan of pour-over coffee.

At work we have a grinder and several plungers that are used throughout the day – our team is only five people, and yet we are nudging 750 grams a week of coffee consumption.

Last weekend, Crema roastery up in the hills was clearing stock and had on sale some Bodum pour-overs – the ‘Bodum Dripper’ . Kamran (who was up there for the day) rang me and asked if I would like one, and I’ve never been a hard sale on gadgets for coffee.

We’ve been using it all week and I have to say that these are a real gem. I was wary about the single origin Bunum Wo that I bought – in the plunger it is great but has a powerful kick, and I thought the pour-over might just boost the kick.

I should not have been concerned – Magic, pure bloody magic, a nice clean cup, with good body for the style and really allows the qualities of the bean to shine through.

I’ll post up some pictures of the whole kit - (the only ones available online have that aweful 'fake' opaque coffee they seem to love for photographing), but pour-overs these can be bought for a good price – and with a nice even medium coarse grind they provide a wonderful alternative for making office coffee – or for making coffee when you have guests who like something other than espresso.