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I’ve gone through several coffee phases, some bordering on extreme — extremely sensitive weighing, timing, $2,000 grinders, $10k espresso machine, etc. My happ

I’ve gone through several coffee phases, some bordering on extreme — extremely sensitive weighing, timing, $2,000 grinders, $10k espresso machine, etc. My happy medium is just doing basic pour overs, but with really good locally roasted coffee. To me, this is the cheapest and best approach. In fact, even if pour overs require too much work (weighing, timing), then just do drip. But do it with quality coffee. Quality is really about roasting time and date. You don’t want old coffee (anything older than a few weeks isn’t good), and low temp. Dark roast is burnt. It’s not a flavor. It’s used to remove the taste from shitty beans. If you use quality beans you want light to medium. This usually isn’t an option with quality beans anyway. They typically only sell the coffee roasted one way. So in most cases, you won’t even have to worry about. Anyway, I guess my point is the opposite of the article. You don’t have to drink shit coffee to save money.

fredley 4y ago
I second this approach. I buy locally roasted beans, and have a reasonably nice grinder and an aeropress. For my palette, the coffee's as good as I can get anywhere.
- reddog 4y ago
  Your comment makes me smile. I've been experimenting with my morning coffee since the percolator was considered state of the art. I've probably got enough different coffee making paraphanalia in the attic to start my own museum. And what I've finally settled on are locally roasted beans (generic Columbian), a good grinder and an aeropress.
- BrissyCoder 4y ago
  Is there an appreciable difference in quality between a french press and an aeropress?
  - AriedK 4y ago
    The difference I appreciate the most is the filter of the aeropress that filters all the fine particles that easily make their way through/past a frech press filter.
- stephen_g 4y ago
  Aeropress is a cool product, but the couple of times I tried it (I borrowed a friend's) I just found it too messy and quite fiddly. So I prefer pour-over now with a V60 now when I'm not making espresso because you can pick the whole filter up by the top (touching only paper) and drop it in the bin. Then the V60 usually only needs a rinse with boiling water if you do it immediately (and don't let it dry).
  - fredley 4y ago
    There's a knack but one of the things I love about the Aeropress is it's completely mess free: unscrew, plunge out into compost bin and tap, rinse under tap, done!
rubicon33 4y ago
You clearly did not read the article lol. His point was really not about money at all. It was a piece about slowing down, fussing less, and just appreciating moments with people over things like roasting dates and quality of beans. That said, have any good coffee recommendations?
- ryanSrich 4y ago
  My point still stands. Doing a pour over or drip is low fuss. You could argue grinding your own beans isn’t low fuss, but most grinders have a preset with a hopper, so it’s still pretty quick and easy to grind your own beans. As for recommendations, I always say go local, and make sure it’s been roasted recently. As for what’s near me (Portland OR) I have quiet a few — Case Study, Coava, Heart, and Never are my current favorites.
  - LesZedCB 4y ago
    Heart is great!
    - kaiuhl 4y ago
      Agreed. I buy 5lbs from them at a time and keep it in the freezer. It’s usually frozen two days after they roasted it. I then refill the hopper on my grinder as necessary and use a pour over (chemex with a metal filter). It’s fast and easy and tasty. But I will also drink any coffee and enjoy it.
      - LesZedCB 4y ago
        that's exactly what i recommended elsewhere in this post!
  - Scarbutt 4y ago
    Getting "roasted recently coffee" sounds like a problem, how do you make sure of it? Also, have you try nespresso(machines and coffee)? I find their coffee really good and can't stand anything else, easy to make and not expensive.
mihaic 4y ago
Completely agree. You can very quickly reach diminishing returns, and now I get great coffee for about 70 cents per cup when I make it at home (including milk). I can't help not notice bad beans, and most places serve almost undrinkable coffee by what I think are minimal standards. If I were to drop bellow this level of quality, I'd rather give up on coffee entirely.
- hammyhavoc 4y ago
  I think a lot of people say they don't like coffee because all they've ever had in terms of coffee has been filth.
bobthepanda 4y ago
I enjoy cold brew for the reason that it is extremely little work. Really, it’s all about timing, but if you prepare it at the end of the workday you’ll have concentrate ready in the morning, and it generates so much concentrate. The “work” is just grinding the coffee, letting it soak, and then filtering.
- b3morales 4y ago
  You can heat up cold brew, too, if you want something hot. As long as you don't boil it, it makes an excellent cup. I do this sometimes on short camping trips for the simplicity. And at home, if I have some in the fridge but the weather's cold in the morning.
- askvictor 4y ago
  Yeah, that's become my go-to for summer. I make one batch for the week - it doesn't seem to drop in quality over that time. Only equipment needed is a grinder (optional, really), a jar and a filter.
staticautomatic 4y ago
This isn’t directed at you/OP, but the anti dark roast thing seems to me to be a distinctively American coffee snob hipster thing. Many places in the world have wonderful dark roast coffee. Honestly, are these people just wandering around Austria, Italy, Vietnam, Cuba, or Turkey complaining about bad the coffee is? Give me a break.
- mrguyorama 4y ago
  It's literally just the typical "If you don't share my tastes then you are wrong" that you get in lots of dumb snobbery circles.
- ryanSrich 4y ago
  I mean people can drink coffee however they want, but dark roasting beans absolutely destroys the majority of flavors within the bean. There’s no denying that. It’s similar to eating a steak well done. People do it, and it’s even very common in certain countries. But it’s removing the majority of flavor. I don’t see how anyone could deny that.
  - crowbahr 4y ago
    I mean a really light roast ends up having little flavor besides sour, if you're talking espresso.
    - LesZedCB 4y ago
      no way! i drink exclusively light roast espresso. yes, the sourness is pretty much always there. but there's blueberry (my personal favorite), red berries, tea, lemon, cinnamon. getting a balanced light roast espresso requires going much higher ratio to get a high enough extraction. try upping the temp to 95*C and go for 1:3 or higher.
      - decafninja 4y ago
        I've tried and tried to experience the flavor notes you mention across many different coffees from many different roasters, all sorts of brewing methods and settings, but cannot. I can taste sour, burnt, and something in the middle that I really like, and that's about it. Not a scientific experiment by any means, but there seems to be more people like me who cannot taste these flavors in coffee than you.
smeyer 4y ago
How much do you spend per cup for your "happy medium"? I ask as a happy non-coffee drinker.
- ryanSrich 4y ago
  About $0.42 per “true” cup. That’s around 40 cups per week. If you’re talking 12oz coffee cups it’s closer to $1
- tashoecraft 4y ago
  I'm very similar to OP. I typically have one, 18g of bean coffee a day. Beans range from about 15-20/lb, so that's ~25 days of coffee, so between .60 - <1.00 a day. My gear is a ~$250 hand grinder, an aeropress $40, and a flair manual espresso maker $250. Along with a kettle, $80, I'm able to make coffee and espresso that'll taste nearly as good as some of the best in the world. It's part hobby, part practical. I also love dinner coffee and understand cheap coffee has its time and place. For the majority of people it's good enough.
- jcpst 4y ago
  About $0.90 per 250mL cup. I have multiple coffee subscriptions- I get a pretty good deal on on a monthly order that ends up costing $13 per 12oz bag. Then I regularly buy one-offs that average around $20 per 12oz bag.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
LesZedCB 4y ago
currently my local roaster is in my kitchen! i use a hottop 2k roaster, got it for $600 on craigslist, and get green coffee from sweet marias. so far it's the best cost/return i've gotten yet!
- ryanSrich 4y ago
  How’s the smell? I’ve considered doing this, but have a house full with a wife and 2 kids. I don’t hate the smell, but it’s not exactly enjoyable for all.
  - yumraj 4y ago
    I use a popcorn maker (air popper) to roast coffee and do it in our yard. No one complains about smoke or the chaff.
  - lukevp 4y ago
    Roasting generates a lot of smoke, but if you have a top mounted range vent that exhausts outside, you could probably get away with doing it inside. We have a pop up range hood in an island range and ended up just roasting outside. If you use a cheap air popper, it also blows chaff all over the place, and if a bean falls out onto the floor or something they’re very hot, so you would need to keep kids/pets away.
  - LesZedCB 4y ago
    i've been doing it without ventilation and i'm really surprised how mild it is. it definitely smells for a few hours, but not bad at all. if it's too bad, i open the door for a few minutes or a window while i'm roasting. i can't recommend it enough! it's super fun, and a whole new domain to learn about :)
- lukevp 4y ago
  Have you been to Mr. Green Beans in Portland? I’ve gotten beans there before, but just in early stages of roasting my own beans with a repurposed air popper. It’s definitely a hassle to use, have been looking into a standalone roaster.
slothtrop 4y ago
Clever Dripper is idiot-proof and brews a full body. But it can be a tad oily. Sometimes I prefer drip tbh, but from a decent machine. Disagree on roast, I've had great dark roasts. Even for espresso, I'd say full-city / medium-dark is preferable. However, I've had more bad dark roasts than bad mediums.
- valarauko 4y ago
  Wait, how are you getting oily coffee from a Clever dripper? If anything the paper filter should be largely eliminating oils.
  - slothtrop 4y ago
    It does a good deal, but still has more than drip. Personally I don't mind but I know my wife describes the brew as "oily".
    - valarauko 4y ago
      Huh - I brew with Clever Dripper most days and wouldn't characterize it as 'oily' - its definitely got more body than a V60 (my other go-to). I suppose all immersion techniques will give you similar results in that case, with something like a French Press giving you much more oils.
jimmaswell 4y ago
Apparently coffee enthusiasts hate me for this - I enjoy using a little single serving percolator on the stovetop. It's the kind that only sends the water through the grounds once, from the bottom up through the grounds then into the top. If you leave it on too long it'll "burn" but if you pour it out as soon as it's done it's fine. I tried a recirculating one a while ago and I actually liked it a lot, I just broke it and haven't replaced it. It didn't seem to make a "burned" taste either. Maybe the finer points of coffee are beyond the granularity of my relevant tastebuds or something, because from what coffee people say I'm allegedly drinking toxic sludge.
- dsr_ 4y ago
  That's not a percolator, that's a moka pot. There are many people who will rave about that.
  - stephen_g 4y ago
    Yeah, definitely sounds like a Moka pot. They're really popular and could even be said to be making a 'speciality resurgence'. Percolators on the other hand are pretty bad. The Moka pot can overheat things if not used well, but a percolator basically always overheats the coffee as part of the way it works!
  - nibbleshifter 4y ago
    My first encounter with one of those was years ago, the person who had it referred to it as a "geyser". I should pick one up sometime.
Eddy_Viscosity2 4y ago
I like dark roast coffee, ice cubes in my scotch, and my steak well done and I'm tried of people telling me I'm wrong. Let me like the things I like.
- hammyhavoc 4y ago
  When I still drank alcohol and ate meat, this was me in a sentence. I wonder if liking these specific flavour profiles is common? In the same way that some people like chocolate, others prefer gummies, some don't enjoy candy, period.
  - appleiigs 4y ago
    Is it a familiarity thing? Did your families/parents like dark roast, ice in scotch and well done?
    - Eddy_Viscosity2 4y ago
      Not in mine as far as I can tell.
acchow 4y ago
> You don’t want old coffee (anything older than a few weeks isn’t good) I find pourovers extremely sensitive to timing. For an espresso, 1-2 weeks old is totally fine (even preferred?), but for pourovers the flavor is totally different even just 8-9 days after roasting. Is there any way around this?
- valarauko 4y ago
  > For an espresso, 1-2 weeks old is totally fine (even preferred?), but for pourovers the flavor is totally different even just 8-9 days after roasting. Most sources suggest that the optimum flavor profile develops about a week after roasting, and drinking coffee brewed from freshly roasted beans to be comparatively flat tasting. Blind taste tests have also suggested that contrary to the popular belief, beans don't go stale after two weeks, but retain the same taste profile almost out to 6 months (assuming proper storage). The key difference is that older beans are completely degassed, and pourover techniques and drawdown times as well as grind size should be adjusted accordingly, something hard to do in most espresso machines but easy with pourover. An immersion brewing method is also less sensitive to degassing.
- deepsquirrelnet 4y ago
  Not in my experience. I find some dippers to be more consistent process-wise than others, but to my palate, age of the roast is still the most important variable.
- mrexroad 4y ago
  Yup. Even after adjusting grind to account for age, i found 2 weeks to be cutoff for espresso out of my Silvia. I do pretty much only pour overs these days though, and find I need to adjust brew temp after around 8-9 day range. However, after 2-3 weeks I find the effort<>flavor trade off isn’t worth it, and toss the beans in a canister I keep for brewing with a Moccamaster. Fwiw, I keep my beans in Fellow Atmos (vacuum) canisters. Picked up a 3 pack on sale at Costco, and I’ve been presently surprised by beans keeping a few days longer.
scoot 4y ago
"Bordering on the extreme"?! You are the marketer's ideal mark. $2K for a $20 grinder? $10K for a $100 coffee machine? And that's before rip-off beans...
- LesZedCB 4y ago
  a programmer would be offended by "$100/hr for a 2.99 smart phone app?!" those expensive grinders are usually machined in house by small teams. though, i do absolutely agree that there are many coffee things that are way overpriced because of the rest of the market.
- readbeard 4y ago
  I assure you that the difference between a $2k and $20 grinder is vast. Reasonably competent, usable espresso grinders generally start at hundreds of dollars and go up from there. If you can figure out how to make a good one for $20, you’ll make a fortune. Same goes for the machine.
- Tarq0n 4y ago
  Particle size matters for coffee, and at $20 you couldn't even get a hand grinder that produces good results.
anothernewdude 4y ago
I've simplified too. I have a $50 Cezve bought from a local store, and a $100 porlex grinder that actually does a grind fine enough. With a $10 bag of beans, I'm good for a fortnight.
clairity 4y ago
only 2 things really matter, when the coffee was roasted and when it was ground. everything else has some leeway: the roast, 18g vs 25g of coffee, 300mL or 400mL of water, 195 vs 208 degrees, pour over vs drip. sure, you can micro-tune those things but that’s a different category of coffee drinker. you’ll get good and consistent results if you get coffee roasted within a day or three, and grind the coffee fresh (even a blade grinder is ok, though i do use a burr grinder now). in LA, stumptown, intelligentsia, and lightwave are good general options. i get mine from trystero, because reading pynchon felt like a rite of passage in college, and it’s excellent. a 14-oz cup costs me $0.90-1.00 per cup, all in.
strken 4y ago
I use an espresso machine that cost me $0 (because my housemate bought it). Prior to that I used a $0 rescued moka pot with the handle melted off, or an aeropress + porlex grinder. I bought the latter two because someone at work had both and recommended them, and I thought they would be good for camping. I have no idea if these things are "good" or not, but I enjoy the process of using them and like the way the coffee tastes. Anything older that a week or two tastes a little weaker and is missing some (usually nice) flavours, but it's still damp and caffeinated and tasty. It's not bad in the sense that a stubbed toe is bad, only in the sense that a car snob might call your Toyota Camry bad ("common, suboptimal, plebian, old model, everyone has one"). Darker roasts are missing some flavours too, but they're often the exact ones I don't want. I trust coffee roasters to work out what suits a particular bean and know which flavours they want to keep. I think coffee is one of those things like wine or whiskey or steak where the best way to enjoy it is to keep your mind open. That lets you work out what you, personally, enjoy. Try over- or under-extracting an espresso shot, and see how it tastes sour or bitter. Try packing the basket differently. Experiment with letting ground coffee sit for a few hours, or with freezing, or with similar beans at different ages. It's fun! You don't have to just believe someone on the internet when they tell you a dark roast is missing flavours, you can go roast your own coffee and see, or ask a roaster to do it. If you work out what you enjoy, it lets you do enjoyment arbitrage, where you can buy a less popular bean/wine/whiskey/cut for less money and get more enjoyment out of it. If you listen to other people, you're just getting told what the fair market value of the thing is, which means you'll miss any opportunity to get a good (personal) deal.
r3trohack3r 4y ago
I’ve gone on a similar journey (though lower price tags - I couldn’t justify the $10k espresso machine and its maintenance but used the ones at Netflix daily) and ended up in a similar place. Now, for my cup of choice, I’m picky about my beans and use a Bunn to do the pour over. Consumer Bunn machines are pretty solid, my grandma’s lasted for over 20 years. Looking inside mine, I suspect mine will do the same. This is the one on my counter: https://retail.bunn.com/38300.0066 https://retail.bunn.com/38300.0066
usrn 4y ago
I can taste the different kinds but I honestly don't mind the Folgers bagged coffee. It's nice because I can just use my normal electric kettle and there's hardly any mess.
- LesZedCB 4y ago
  if you can find a roaster locally, they will often grind it for you! or if you order via mail, sometimes they'll offer a grind size option
chewz 4y ago
I think that you are missing the point... You should be enjoying coffee - pure and simple joy of the moment - instead of focusing on the technicalities of making your brew ... The marginal gain of weighting, expensive grinders etc. is not worth it.
rowanG077 4y ago
Forgive my ignorance but why does local roast matter?
- LesZedCB 4y ago
  i don't think it matters much beyond getting coffee soon after roast, plus maybe the aesthetic purpose of supporting your local businesses.
Semaphor 4y ago
> You don’t have to drink shit coffee to save money. But then your choice of coffee would cost me an extra 100€ every month. For me, preparation is more important than the coffee and even roasting date. I prefer cheap-ish (supermarket or slightly above) coffee (usually 6 months+ since roasting) with a French Press over fancy freshly roasted drip/filter coffee.
baxuz 4y ago
I'm of the same opinion. I can't stand any dark roasts, as they actually upset my stomach. But ho boy have I tried cheap American coffee. That filter coffee you get in NYC. In 3 separate places including in a 5 star hotel. I've never tasted any coffee that was so horrible. And I'm brewing with an Aeropress for over 10 years. It's by far the simplest and most lenient way of brewing coffee, and produces excellent results. I just can't be assed to faff around with brewing methods.
- Akronymus 4y ago
  I routinely finish off the coffee at work thats been cold for 2 hrs, because I forgot to drink it quickly. Never once had trouble because of that. Went to a 3 star hotel once that had coffee for breakfast, only tried that one once.
bradgessler 4y ago
Yeah pour over is great. I never got into home espresso because my understanding is the technique was developed for high volume operations at coffee shops—not for a few shots at home. To use a tortured analogy, espresso is the k8s of coffee. I buy green coffee beans for $8-$6/lb at https://www.sweetmarias.com https://www.sweetmarias.com and roast them with a Behmor drum roaster. Then I dump the roasted coffee into a burr grinder that has preset weights, so I can grind 50g for a pour over or whatever and the grinder stops when it hits that weight. Its def the easiest way to have consistently great coffee. The initial spend is up there, ~$500 for a roaster and ~$400 for a grinder, but if you amortize it over 10 years, as I have, it easily pays for itself. The taste of the coffee is as good as all the fancy single origin stuff and when you get the hang of it, there’s really not much fuss to it.
_the_inflator 4y ago
Water quality is quite important, especially soft water. Also coffee dosage. Lately I find out, that fewer powder can also be very tasty. I prefer a French Press over pour overs, but they are very close.
kqr 4y ago
Amen. Whenever people ask me what coffee to get from the grocery store (I do get that question sometimes because in some circles I'm known as a coffee snob) I usually tell them there's really only one thing you need to look at: roasting date. Pick the freshest one. That's the factor that overpowers all the others. (Then my personal preference, given a tie in roasting date, is also for the more lightly roasted stuff.) My pet peeve is the expensive, fancy-looking stuff that boasts to be "roasted in Italy" or whatever. That's basically bragging that "this coffee went stale before it even entered your country".
monkeydust 4y ago
100% my V60 pour over is my daily go to when I am wfh... Massively better than my office coffee.
benj111 4y ago
The pursuit of 'good' coffee is just getting stuck on the hedonistic treadmill though. I chose to get off at the French press for weekends etc, and just have bog standard instant during the day. I still get to enjoy better coffee, without spending ungodly amounts of money to get it.

fredley 4y ago

I second this approach. I buy locally roasted beans, and have a reasonably nice grinder and an aeropress. For my palette, the coffee's as good as I can get anywhere.

reddog 4y ago
Your comment makes me smile. I've been experimenting with my morning coffee since the percolator was considered state of the art. I've probably got enough different coffee making paraphanalia in the attic to start my own museum. And what I've finally settled on are locally roasted beans (generic Columbian), a good grinder and an aeropress.
BrissyCoder 4y ago
Is there an appreciable difference in quality between a french press and an aeropress?
- AriedK 4y ago
  The difference I appreciate the most is the filter of the aeropress that filters all the fine particles that easily make their way through/past a frech press filter.
stephen_g 4y ago
Aeropress is a cool product, but the couple of times I tried it (I borrowed a friend's) I just found it too messy and quite fiddly. So I prefer pour-over now with a V60 now when I'm not making espresso because you can pick the whole filter up by the top (touching only paper) and drop it in the bin. Then the V60 usually only needs a rinse with boiling water if you do it immediately (and don't let it dry).
- fredley 4y ago
  There's a knack but one of the things I love about the Aeropress is it's completely mess free: unscrew, plunge out into compost bin and tap, rinse under tap, done!

rubicon33 4y ago

You clearly did not read the article lol. His point was really not about money at all. It was a piece about slowing down, fussing less, and just appreciating moments with people over things like roasting dates and quality of beans. That said, have any good coffee recommendations?

ryanSrich 4y ago
My point still stands. Doing a pour over or drip is low fuss. You could argue grinding your own beans isn’t low fuss, but most grinders have a preset with a hopper, so it’s still pretty quick and easy to grind your own beans. As for recommendations, I always say go local, and make sure it’s been roasted recently. As for what’s near me (Portland OR) I have quiet a few — Case Study, Coava, Heart, and Never are my current favorites.
- LesZedCB 4y ago
  Heart is great!
  - kaiuhl 4y ago
    Agreed. I buy 5lbs from them at a time and keep it in the freezer. It’s usually frozen two days after they roasted it. I then refill the hopper on my grinder as necessary and use a pour over (chemex with a metal filter). It’s fast and easy and tasty. But I will also drink any coffee and enjoy it.
    - LesZedCB 4y ago
      that's exactly what i recommended elsewhere in this post!
- Scarbutt 4y ago
  Getting "roasted recently coffee" sounds like a problem, how do you make sure of it? Also, have you try nespresso(machines and coffee)? I find their coffee really good and can't stand anything else, easy to make and not expensive.

mihaic 4y ago

Completely agree. You can very quickly reach diminishing returns, and now I get great coffee for about 70 cents per cup when I make it at home (including milk). I can't help not notice bad beans, and most places serve almost undrinkable coffee by what I think are minimal standards. If I were to drop bellow this level of quality, I'd rather give up on coffee entirely.

hammyhavoc 4y ago
I think a lot of people say they don't like coffee because all they've ever had in terms of coffee has been filth.

bobthepanda 4y ago

I enjoy cold brew for the reason that it is extremely little work. Really, it’s all about timing, but if you prepare it at the end of the workday you’ll have concentrate ready in the morning, and it generates so much concentrate. The “work” is just grinding the coffee, letting it soak, and then filtering.

b3morales 4y ago
You can heat up cold brew, too, if you want something hot. As long as you don't boil it, it makes an excellent cup. I do this sometimes on short camping trips for the simplicity. And at home, if I have some in the fridge but the weather's cold in the morning.
askvictor 4y ago
Yeah, that's become my go-to for summer. I make one batch for the week - it doesn't seem to drop in quality over that time. Only equipment needed is a grinder (optional, really), a jar and a filter.

staticautomatic 4y ago

This isn’t directed at you/OP, but the anti dark roast thing seems to me to be a distinctively American coffee snob hipster thing. Many places in the world have wonderful dark roast coffee. Honestly, are these people just wandering around Austria, Italy, Vietnam, Cuba, or Turkey complaining about bad the coffee is? Give me a break.

mrguyorama 4y ago
It's literally just the typical "If you don't share my tastes then you are wrong" that you get in lots of dumb snobbery circles.
ryanSrich 4y ago
I mean people can drink coffee however they want, but dark roasting beans absolutely destroys the majority of flavors within the bean. There’s no denying that. It’s similar to eating a steak well done. People do it, and it’s even very common in certain countries. But it’s removing the majority of flavor. I don’t see how anyone could deny that.
- crowbahr 4y ago
  I mean a really light roast ends up having little flavor besides sour, if you're talking espresso.
  - LesZedCB 4y ago
    no way! i drink exclusively light roast espresso. yes, the sourness is pretty much always there. but there's blueberry (my personal favorite), red berries, tea, lemon, cinnamon. getting a balanced light roast espresso requires going much higher ratio to get a high enough extraction. try upping the temp to 95*C and go for 1:3 or higher.
    - decafninja 4y ago
      I've tried and tried to experience the flavor notes you mention across many different coffees from many different roasters, all sorts of brewing methods and settings, but cannot. I can taste sour, burnt, and something in the middle that I really like, and that's about it. Not a scientific experiment by any means, but there seems to be more people like me who cannot taste these flavors in coffee than you.

smeyer 4y ago

How much do you spend per cup for your "happy medium"? I ask as a happy non-coffee drinker.

ryanSrich 4y ago
About $0.42 per “true” cup. That’s around 40 cups per week. If you’re talking 12oz coffee cups it’s closer to $1
tashoecraft 4y ago
I'm very similar to OP. I typically have one, 18g of bean coffee a day. Beans range from about 15-20/lb, so that's ~25 days of coffee, so between .60 - <1.00 a day. My gear is a ~$250 hand grinder, an aeropress $40, and a flair manual espresso maker $250. Along with a kettle, $80, I'm able to make coffee and espresso that'll taste nearly as good as some of the best in the world. It's part hobby, part practical. I also love dinner coffee and understand cheap coffee has its time and place. For the majority of people it's good enough.
jcpst 4y ago
About $0.90 per 250mL cup. I have multiple coffee subscriptions- I get a pretty good deal on on a monthly order that ends up costing $13 per 12oz bag. Then I regularly buy one-offs that average around $20 per 12oz bag.
deleted 4y ago
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LesZedCB 4y ago

currently my local roaster is in my kitchen! i use a hottop 2k roaster, got it for $600 on craigslist, and get green coffee from sweet marias. so far it's the best cost/return i've gotten yet!

ryanSrich 4y ago
How’s the smell? I’ve considered doing this, but have a house full with a wife and 2 kids. I don’t hate the smell, but it’s not exactly enjoyable for all.
- yumraj 4y ago
  I use a popcorn maker (air popper) to roast coffee and do it in our yard. No one complains about smoke or the chaff.
- lukevp 4y ago
  Roasting generates a lot of smoke, but if you have a top mounted range vent that exhausts outside, you could probably get away with doing it inside. We have a pop up range hood in an island range and ended up just roasting outside. If you use a cheap air popper, it also blows chaff all over the place, and if a bean falls out onto the floor or something they’re very hot, so you would need to keep kids/pets away.
- LesZedCB 4y ago
  i've been doing it without ventilation and i'm really surprised how mild it is. it definitely smells for a few hours, but not bad at all. if it's too bad, i open the door for a few minutes or a window while i'm roasting. i can't recommend it enough! it's super fun, and a whole new domain to learn about :)
lukevp 4y ago
Have you been to Mr. Green Beans in Portland? I’ve gotten beans there before, but just in early stages of roasting my own beans with a repurposed air popper. It’s definitely a hassle to use, have been looking into a standalone roaster.

slothtrop 4y ago

Clever Dripper is idiot-proof and brews a full body. But it can be a tad oily. Sometimes I prefer drip tbh, but from a decent machine. Disagree on roast, I've had great dark roasts. Even for espresso, I'd say full-city / medium-dark is preferable. However, I've had more bad dark roasts than bad mediums.

valarauko 4y ago
Wait, how are you getting oily coffee from a Clever dripper? If anything the paper filter should be largely eliminating oils.
- slothtrop 4y ago
  It does a good deal, but still has more than drip. Personally I don't mind but I know my wife describes the brew as "oily".
  - valarauko 4y ago
    Huh - I brew with Clever Dripper most days and wouldn't characterize it as 'oily' - its definitely got more body than a V60 (my other go-to). I suppose all immersion techniques will give you similar results in that case, with something like a French Press giving you much more oils.

jimmaswell 4y ago

Apparently coffee enthusiasts hate me for this - I enjoy using a little single serving percolator on the stovetop. It's the kind that only sends the water through the grounds once, from the bottom up through the grounds then into the top. If you leave it on too long it'll "burn" but if you pour it out as soon as it's done it's fine. I tried a recirculating one a while ago and I actually liked it a lot, I just broke it and haven't replaced it. It didn't seem to make a "burned" taste either. Maybe the finer points of coffee are beyond the granularity of my relevant tastebuds or something, because from what coffee people say I'm allegedly drinking toxic sludge.

dsr_ 4y ago
That's not a percolator, that's a moka pot. There are many people who will rave about that.
- stephen_g 4y ago
  Yeah, definitely sounds like a Moka pot. They're really popular and could even be said to be making a 'speciality resurgence'. Percolators on the other hand are pretty bad. The Moka pot can overheat things if not used well, but a percolator basically always overheats the coffee as part of the way it works!
- nibbleshifter 4y ago
  My first encounter with one of those was years ago, the person who had it referred to it as a "geyser". I should pick one up sometime.

Eddy_Viscosity2 4y ago

I like dark roast coffee, ice cubes in my scotch, and my steak well done and I'm tried of people telling me I'm wrong. Let me like the things I like.

hammyhavoc 4y ago
When I still drank alcohol and ate meat, this was me in a sentence. I wonder if liking these specific flavour profiles is common? In the same way that some people like chocolate, others prefer gummies, some don't enjoy candy, period.
- appleiigs 4y ago
  Is it a familiarity thing? Did your families/parents like dark roast, ice in scotch and well done?
  - Eddy_Viscosity2 4y ago
    Not in mine as far as I can tell.

acchow 4y ago

> You don’t want old coffee (anything older than a few weeks isn’t good) I find pourovers extremely sensitive to timing. For an espresso, 1-2 weeks old is totally fine (even preferred?), but for pourovers the flavor is totally different even just 8-9 days after roasting. Is there any way around this?

valarauko 4y ago
> For an espresso, 1-2 weeks old is totally fine (even preferred?), but for pourovers the flavor is totally different even just 8-9 days after roasting. Most sources suggest that the optimum flavor profile develops about a week after roasting, and drinking coffee brewed from freshly roasted beans to be comparatively flat tasting. Blind taste tests have also suggested that contrary to the popular belief, beans don't go stale after two weeks, but retain the same taste profile almost out to 6 months (assuming proper storage). The key difference is that older beans are completely degassed, and pourover techniques and drawdown times as well as grind size should be adjusted accordingly, something hard to do in most espresso machines but easy with pourover. An immersion brewing method is also less sensitive to degassing.
deepsquirrelnet 4y ago
Not in my experience. I find some dippers to be more consistent process-wise than others, but to my palate, age of the roast is still the most important variable.
mrexroad 4y ago
Yup. Even after adjusting grind to account for age, i found 2 weeks to be cutoff for espresso out of my Silvia. I do pretty much only pour overs these days though, and find I need to adjust brew temp after around 8-9 day range. However, after 2-3 weeks I find the effort<>flavor trade off isn’t worth it, and toss the beans in a canister I keep for brewing with a Moccamaster. Fwiw, I keep my beans in Fellow Atmos (vacuum) canisters. Picked up a 3 pack on sale at Costco, and I’ve been presently surprised by beans keeping a few days longer.

scoot 4y ago

"Bordering on the extreme"?! You are the marketer's ideal mark. $2K for a $20 grinder? $10K for a $100 coffee machine? And that's before rip-off beans...

LesZedCB 4y ago
a programmer would be offended by "$100/hr for a 2.99 smart phone app?!" those expensive grinders are usually machined in house by small teams. though, i do absolutely agree that there are many coffee things that are way overpriced because of the rest of the market.
readbeard 4y ago
I assure you that the difference between a $2k and $20 grinder is vast. Reasonably competent, usable espresso grinders generally start at hundreds of dollars and go up from there. If you can figure out how to make a good one for $20, you’ll make a fortune. Same goes for the machine.
Tarq0n 4y ago
Particle size matters for coffee, and at $20 you couldn't even get a hand grinder that produces good results.

anothernewdude 4y ago

I've simplified too. I have a $50 Cezve bought from a local store, and a $100 porlex grinder that actually does a grind fine enough. With a $10 bag of beans, I'm good for a fortnight.

clairity 4y ago

only 2 things really matter, when the coffee was roasted and when it was ground. everything else has some leeway: the roast, 18g vs 25g of coffee, 300mL or 400mL of water, 195 vs 208 degrees, pour over vs drip. sure, you can micro-tune those things but that’s a different category of coffee drinker. you’ll get good and consistent results if you get coffee roasted within a day or three, and grind the coffee fresh (even a blade grinder is ok, though i do use a burr grinder now). in LA, stumptown, intelligentsia, and lightwave are good general options. i get mine from trystero, because reading pynchon felt like a rite of passage in college, and it’s excellent. a 14-oz cup costs me $0.90-1.00 per cup, all in.

strken 4y ago

I use an espresso machine that cost me $0 (because my housemate bought it). Prior to that I used a $0 rescued moka pot with the handle melted off, or an aeropress + porlex grinder. I bought the latter two because someone at work had both and recommended them, and I thought they would be good for camping. I have no idea if these things are "good" or not, but I enjoy the process of using them and like the way the coffee tastes. Anything older that a week or two tastes a little weaker and is missing some (usually nice) flavours, but it's still damp and caffeinated and tasty. It's not bad in the sense that a stubbed toe is bad, only in the sense that a car snob might call your Toyota Camry bad ("common, suboptimal, plebian, old model, everyone has one"). Darker roasts are missing some flavours too, but they're often the exact ones I don't want. I trust coffee roasters to work out what suits a particular bean and know which flavours they want to keep. I think coffee is one of those things like wine or whiskey or steak where the best way to enjoy it is to keep your mind open. That lets you work out what you, personally, enjoy. Try over- or under-extracting an espresso shot, and see how it tastes sour or bitter. Try packing the basket differently. Experiment with letting ground coffee sit for a few hours, or with freezing, or with similar beans at different ages. It's fun! You don't have to just believe someone on the internet when they tell you a dark roast is missing flavours, you can go roast your own coffee and see, or ask a roaster to do it. If you work out what you enjoy, it lets you do enjoyment arbitrage, where you can buy a less popular bean/wine/whiskey/cut for less money and get more enjoyment out of it. If you listen to other people, you're just getting told what the fair market value of the thing is, which means you'll miss any opportunity to get a good (personal) deal.

r3trohack3r 4y ago

I’ve gone on a similar journey (though lower price tags - I couldn’t justify the $10k espresso machine and its maintenance but used the ones at Netflix daily) and ended up in a similar place. Now, for my cup of choice, I’m picky about my beans and use a Bunn to do the pour over. Consumer Bunn machines are pretty solid, my grandma’s lasted for over 20 years. Looking inside mine, I suspect mine will do the same. This is the one on my counter: https://retail.bunn.com/38300.0066 https://retail.bunn.com/38300.0066

usrn 4y ago

I can taste the different kinds but I honestly don't mind the Folgers bagged coffee. It's nice because I can just use my normal electric kettle and there's hardly any mess.

LesZedCB 4y ago
if you can find a roaster locally, they will often grind it for you! or if you order via mail, sometimes they'll offer a grind size option

chewz 4y ago

I think that you are missing the point... You should be enjoying coffee - pure and simple joy of the moment - instead of focusing on the technicalities of making your brew ... The marginal gain of weighting, expensive grinders etc. is not worth it.

rowanG077 4y ago

Forgive my ignorance but why does local roast matter?

LesZedCB 4y ago
i don't think it matters much beyond getting coffee soon after roast, plus maybe the aesthetic purpose of supporting your local businesses.

Semaphor 4y ago

> You don’t have to drink shit coffee to save money. But then your choice of coffee would cost me an extra 100€ every month. For me, preparation is more important than the coffee and even roasting date. I prefer cheap-ish (supermarket or slightly above) coffee (usually 6 months+ since roasting) with a French Press over fancy freshly roasted drip/filter coffee.

baxuz 4y ago

I'm of the same opinion. I can't stand any dark roasts, as they actually upset my stomach. But ho boy have I tried cheap American coffee. That filter coffee you get in NYC. In 3 separate places including in a 5 star hotel. I've never tasted any coffee that was so horrible. And I'm brewing with an Aeropress for over 10 years. It's by far the simplest and most lenient way of brewing coffee, and produces excellent results. I just can't be assed to faff around with brewing methods.

Akronymus 4y ago
I routinely finish off the coffee at work thats been cold for 2 hrs, because I forgot to drink it quickly. Never once had trouble because of that. Went to a 3 star hotel once that had coffee for breakfast, only tried that one once.

bradgessler 4y ago

Yeah pour over is great. I never got into home espresso because my understanding is the technique was developed for high volume operations at coffee shops—not for a few shots at home. To use a tortured analogy, espresso is the k8s of coffee. I buy green coffee beans for $8-$6/lb at https://www.sweetmarias.com https://www.sweetmarias.com and roast them with a Behmor drum roaster. Then I dump the roasted coffee into a burr grinder that has preset weights, so I can grind 50g for a pour over or whatever and the grinder stops when it hits that weight. Its def the easiest way to have consistently great coffee. The initial spend is up there, ~$500 for a roaster and ~$400 for a grinder, but if you amortize it over 10 years, as I have, it easily pays for itself. The taste of the coffee is as good as all the fancy single origin stuff and when you get the hang of it, there’s really not much fuss to it.

_the_inflator 4y ago

Water quality is quite important, especially soft water. Also coffee dosage. Lately I find out, that fewer powder can also be very tasty. I prefer a French Press over pour overs, but they are very close.

kqr 4y ago

Amen. Whenever people ask me what coffee to get from the grocery store (I do get that question sometimes because in some circles I'm known as a coffee snob) I usually tell them there's really only one thing you need to look at: roasting date. Pick the freshest one. That's the factor that overpowers all the others. (Then my personal preference, given a tie in roasting date, is also for the more lightly roasted stuff.) My pet peeve is the expensive, fancy-looking stuff that boasts to be "roasted in Italy" or whatever. That's basically bragging that "this coffee went stale before it even entered your country".

monkeydust 4y ago

100% my V60 pour over is my daily go to when I am wfh... Massively better than my office coffee.

benj111 4y ago

The pursuit of 'good' coffee is just getting stuck on the hedonistic treadmill though. I chose to get off at the French press for weekends etc, and just have bog standard instant during the day. I still get to enjoy better coffee, without spending ungodly amounts of money to get it.