Coffee Brew Guides
AeroPress Inverted
The AeroPress is an immersion brewer that we love for naturals and big bodied Kenyans. This is our inverted AeroPress recipe.
- Ratio: 1:14.67
- Coffee Grind: Medium/Medium-coarse (For the grind size, we use a grind slightly coarser than our pour over coffees (around 12.5 on our EK43s or 22 clicks on the Comandante)
- Quantity: 15g of coffee for 220g of water
- Total Time: 2 minutes 15 seconds
- Water Temperature: 94°C
Advice: We use a slightly coarser grind size for our inverted method when compared to our standard method, we do this to compensate for a slightly longer extraction time of around 2mins 15sec.
Brew Method
- Pre heat your brewer and rinse your paper filter.
- Dose the coffee into the chamber and level the bed by lightly tapping the side of the brewer with your palm.
- We add all of our water within the first 10-15s, starting your timer as soon as the water hits the coffee.
- Stir back and forth for 10s after finishing your pour.
- At 1min 30 sec stir again for 5s, cap the Aeropress, flip it onto your vessel, swirl once to ensure all the coffee is in the water and press for 30s.
Final brew time between 2min 10 sec and 2min 20sec
AeroPress Standard
For our standard method we do a simple and quick recipe that produces a bright and sweet cup.
- Coffee Grind: Slightly finer (10.5 on our EK43s or 18 clicks on the Comandante)
- Quantity: 15g of coffee for 220g of water
- Total Time: 1 minute 40 seconds
- Water Temperature: 94°C
Advice: To get the most out of your freshly roasted coffee, you should have a good burr grinder, a scale, a timer and clean, filtered water.
Brew Method
- Pre heat your brewer and rinse your paper filter.
- Add your coffee to the aeropress and level the bed by tapping the brewer against your palm.
- Add your water in about 10s, then stir the brew 3 times back and forth.
- Cap the aeropress until 1 minute has passed, then stir back and forth 3 more times, then cap and plunge for 30s.
Pour Over (One Cup)
This is for a single cup of Pour Over.
- Coffee Grind: Medium (12 on our EK43s or 22 clicks on the Comandante)
- Quantity: 18g of coffee for 300g of water
- Total Time: 3 minutes 15 seconds
- Water Temperature: 94°C
Advice: Always pre-rinse your filter paper and pre-heat your brewer and vessel to minimise thermal shock.
Agitating the brew too much can significantly slow your draw down due to the filter clogging. This remains true whether you swirl, stir or tap the brewer.
When pouring we recommend a steady, but gentle pour speed, not causing too much bed disturbance.
The further from the surface of the coffee you are pouring from, the more bed disturbance the pour will cause , therefore we recommend pouring fairly close to the surface of your coffee.
A high quality grinder will go a long way to improving your pour overs. Higher quality grind translates to less fines in your brew (a more consistent grind size), meaning that you’ll have a more even extraction and a lower probability of your filter clogging.
Brew Method:
- For our single serve recipe we use 18g of coffee (ground at 12 on our EK43s) to 300ml of 94 degrees Celsius water.
- This recipe requires 5 equal pours of 60g each, every 30s.
- Your final pour will therefore be at 2mins, after which we swirl slightly to ensure a flat bed.
- The extraction time you’re aiming for is between 3mins and 3mins 30sec.
Pour Over (Two Cups)
This is for two cups of Pour Over.
- Coffee Grind: Medium (12 on our EK43s or 22 clicks on the Comandante)
- Quantity: 25g of coffee for 400g of water
- Total Time: 3 minutes 30 seconds
- Water Temperature: 94°C
Advice: Always pre-rinse your filter paper and pre-heat your brewer and vessel to minimise thermal shock.
Agitating the brew too much can significantly slow your draw down due to the filter clogging. This remains true whether you swirl, stir or tap the brewer.
When pouring we recommend a steady, but gentle pour speed, not causing too much bed disturbance.
The further from the surface of the coffee you are pouring from, the more bed disturbance the pour will cause , therefore we recommend pouring fairly close to the surface of your coffee.
A high quality grinder will go a long way to improving your pour overs. Higher quality grind translates to less fines in your brew (a more consistent grind size), meaning that you’ll have a more even extraction and a lower probability of your filter clogging.
Brew Method for Two Cups:
- For our multi person recipe we use 25g of coffee (ground at 12.5 on our EK43s) to 400g of 94 degrees Celsius water.
- For this recipe we take slightly longer pauses of 40s between our pours and also do only 3 pours.
- First pour of 75g, second pour at 40s of 125g, bringing your total weight to 200g, final pour at 1min 20sec of 200g, bringing your final brew weight to 400g, after which a gentle swirl ensures a flat bed and even extraction.
- Your extraction time for this recipe should be between 3min 15 sec and 3min 45sec.
Wrapping It Up: As for different brew methods, we developed these recipes on the V60.
We find that the Kalita Wave brewer (we use the 185), prefers a slightly coarser grind than your V60, similar to the Chemex, which also prefers a coarser grind due to the thicker filter paper.
French Press
For the plunger, the recipe is scalable, therefore you can use essentially the same method brewing any volume of coffee.
- Ratio: 1:14.0
- Coffee Grind: Coarse (13 on our EK43s or 26 clicks on the Comandante)
- Quantity: 25g of coffee for 350g of water
- Total Time: 3 minutes 50 seconds
- Water Temperature: 94°C
Advice: We don’t plunge all the way to the bed to avoid fines making their way through the metal mesh.
Brew Method
- Preheat your brewer.
- Add your coffee and pour all your water in about 10s.
- Let the brew steep for 3mins 30sec.
- Stir for 10s.
- Clean the brew by scooping off all the floating granules of coffee and foam.
- Place your plunger at the top of the brew water (Not pressing all the way down) and decant the coffee into your cups.
Espresso
For espresso we recommend basing dose off of basket size. If your machine has 18g baskets, work with an 18g dose to start.
- Ratio: 1:2
- Coffee Grind: Fine
- Quantity: 18g of coffee for 32g of water
- Infusion Time: 28s-32s
- Water Temperature: 94°C
Advice: Always ensure proper puck prep by distributing evenly (a simple tap or two of the porterfilter against your palm will do the trick, nothing too aggressive) and make sure you are gentle with the porterfilter after tamping to ensure channelling doesn’t occur.
(Don’t tap the tamper against the side of the porterfilter after tamping)
Brew Method
Oftentimes an espresso brewed at a simple 1:2 ratio is perfectly suited for milk based beverages, but if you want a little bit more flavour to punch through your milk, try brewing at a 1:1.8 ratio.
For an 18g basket that translates to an 18:32g espresso.
The higher concentration and slightly shorter extraction results in a thicker espresso with a slight increase in acidity, which balances out well with well textured milk, giving you a sweeter and more pleasing milk beverage.
