My Coffee Setup

I've gotten into Coffee lately (cliché, I know) and wanted to summarize my coffee setup.

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I’ve really gotten into Coffee lately (cliché, I know) and I wanted to summarize my setup in a post.

If you’re one of the people who asked me about my Coffee setup, this is for you!

Disclaimer: I am not a Coffee expert. The info I’m sharing in this post is based on my own research and experimentation. Taste is subjective!

Coffee Beans 

I have a pretty standard set of practices for buying and preparing my coffee beans. I typically try to buy beans that are from local specialty shops, and that list their farms / origins explicitly. See James Hoffman’s video on how to buy beans for more info here.

Where I Get My Beans

I typically get beans from one of the following roasters:

  1. Smoking Gun Coffee
  2. Monogram Coffee Co

They list where their beans are purchased from (even listing the farms at times), and generally support sustainable coffee growing which is a plus!

How I Grind My Beans

I ended up buying a budget-priced Bodum burr grinder. I chose it because it had metal burrs, and decent reviews.

Based on what I’ve read so far, porcelain burrs tend to get dull and chip; meaning you’ll have to replace them relatively frequently. Metal burrs tend to last a bit longer, and be more maintainable over time.

I have the exact grind settings I use in the Pour Over and AeroPress Sections below.

Brewing Methods

With the gear I have at home right now, I can brew either pour over, or aerorpess coffee. That said, I’ve picked up some things that you’ll need regardless of brewing method.

  1. Digital Scale with timer: any scale with .1g accuracy, and a tare feature should work (a timer is a plus).
  2. POLIVIAR Electric Gooseneck Kettle: if you’re not doing pour over, you can stick with a cheaper standard kettle

Pour Over 

I started out with Pour Over ~2 months ago, and have kept with it since. That said, I’m pretty meticulous in the steps I take, and I’m sure there are much simpler ways to do things.

Equipment

  1. HARIO V60 - 02 Acrylic Dripper
  2. HARIO V60 - 02 Filter Papers
  3. HARIO V60 - 01 Glass Range Server

Brew Instructions

  1. measure out 28g of coffee
  2. measure out 550g of water into your kettle
  3. start boiling water (90 C for light/medium roasts, 95 C for dark roasts)
  4. grind coffee to 1 setting past “pour over” on my grinder
  5. place your V60 dripper onto your server, and place a paper filter inside
  6. with some warm tap water, gently “rinse” the filter in the dripper. when done empty the server
  7. pour your grounds into the setup and level them out, dig a slight hole in the middle with your fingers
  8. place your setup onto the scale and tare it
  9. once your water is to temperature, start the timer and pour in 60g of water; this starts the “resting” phase.
  10. place the kettle down, and “swirl” the setup until you see all of the grounds are wet
  11. let it sit until the timer hits 45 seconds
  12. slowly pour water into the setup in a circular motion until the scale reads ~448g of water
  13. let the dripper work a little bit, and then give the entire setup another swirl to clear some of the grounds of the filter walls
  14. wait until the setup completes draw down (should take around 3, to 3 ½ minutes.
  15. Enjoy your coffee! ☕

AeroPress

I just got my AeroPress last week, and oh boy! I think it might replace my Pour Over setup for a daily brew. In my experience, a Pour Over brew is super easy to mess up (this could just be  a symptom of my inexperience), and I’ve yet to have a bad cup of coffee with my AeroPress.

Equipment

  1. AeroPress GO: all in one kit that includes a drinking cup, stir stick, coffee scoop, 350 filters, and an AeroPress!

Brew Instructions

  1. measure out 11g of coffee
  2. measure out at least 275g of water
  3. start boiling water (90 C for light/medium roasts, 95 C for dark roasts)
  4. grind coffee to 2 settings past pour over on my grinder
  5. place a filter in your AeroPress, pour your coffee in, place your AeroPress on your digital scale, and tare it.
  6. once your water is to temperature, start the timer, and pour in 200g of water in a circular motion.
  7. place the plunger on top of the AeroPress (just enough to get a seal) and take it off the scale
  8. when your timer reaches 1:30, swirl the AeroPress (make sure you’re holding the cup and the AeroPress)
  9. when your timer reaches 2:00 slowly push down on the plunger and extract your coffee
  10. Enjoy your coffee! ☕