How To Make Good Coffee At Home! Pour-Over, French Press, And Aeropress Coffee Explained
No $5000 Italian machine or rolled-up beanie hat needed.
Coffee is tough to do right, brah.
Ask any barista, or anyone who’s even worked in a place that serves coffee for a couple months as a side gig. The expensive Italian machines are finicky, and respond to even minor changes to things like temperature or ingredients in wild ways. Making coffee drinks is an art, and if done well it can be a lovely experience. But fancy coffee-shop coffee is expensive. It also requires walking out the door, or sometimes even driving a car or taking a train.
This article is about the caffeine you will want to ingest before doing all that.
Of course, we speak of the stuff you make at home. Don’t buy a drip coffee maker; they’re crap. And of course, you can buy equipment for your home that will allow you to make a reasonable facsimile of coffee-shop coffee. You could do that, but to make decent espresso and fancy drinks, you’ll probably need to spend a lot of cash (and do a fair amount of work.) Don’t do that. (Well, unless you’re into that. If that’s true, well, there’s a whole industry there to serve you. Good luck, Jedi.)
If you just want good coffee, at home, with minimal fuss; buy a French press. Or an Aeropress. Or a pour-over setup. Then just get some decent beans and hot water. Job done. And to be honest, the coffee from those things (and maybe a moka pot for something resembling espresso) can be pretty damned good. Drink that, then head out to meet a friend for the fancy stuff.
(Or just read the news for an hour and go back to bed. We’re in the middle of a pandemic; who cares.)
Anyways, here’s a quick rundown of a few easy and quick at-home coffee options. We’re not gonna pick a favorite here; that’s up to you! We will guarantee that all these ways make it possible to make good (even gourmet-level) coffee at home. Pretty easily. And for cheap.
French Press
It’s a coarser grind compared to most of the other methods, so it needs the most amount of time to get right. Four minutes or eight minutes? Super-hot water or not so hot? Again, there’s a lot of answers here depending on what beans you use, who you voted for in the last election, or what you think about the concepts of minimalism or perfection.
With the gear, the over/under is basically a $30 Bodum french press pot. You can go way higher here and get a Rolls-Royce of french presses, or use the plastic one your uncle keeps in his kitchen next to the Cheetos. The beans won’t really care.
Aeropress
The CEO of Aerobie (yeah, the Frisbee that looks like a ring) was said to invent this method years back. It’s great for impatient people, as the coffee steeping time only lasts a little less than a minute. Coffee made this way can also be quite ‘espresso-like’ as you’re forcing the steeping to take place using pressure with the plunger.
Only real catch with the Aeropress method is it really helps to have a good, fine grinder handy. The coffee’s not in there too long, so you want max absorption. (You can of course sorta’ hack this method by brewing a coursely-ground Aeropress batch in an inverted manner, but that’s another article!) Either way, you can order an Aeropress kit with filters for around $30.
Pour Over
Pour overs are in one way extremely easy and in other ways very complicated. Basically your hand takes the place of a drip machine, and you slowly pour hot water thru a funnel shaped filter and coffee grounds. That’s really it. But like anything weirdo obsessive people get into, you can take this whole ritual to a super strong extreme if you feel like it. Either way, the pour over method plus decent beans always yields good coffee.
We picked two different pour-over setups here. The one pictured above is a Chemex; it can come in a bunch of different sizes, and has a pretty thick filter. This means it helps to pre-soak the filters in water for a sec before you get brewing, and even then some baristas say Chemexes make light coffee. The good thing about a Chemex is you can buy it in big sizes. Regular size runs about $40, a little more or less depending on whether you upsize or downsize from there.
The pour-over setup pictured at the beginning of the article is called the Hario, and it’s one of basically two brands that are used in some of the fanciest cafes in the world. It’s imported from Japan and the ceramic one is the one most of the pros go with as it stays pretty hot. Cost is also only about 25 or 30 bucks! Amazing.
One Last Thing
If you end up going with any of these methods, you’ll need a couple other pieces of gear; you’ll want a hot water heater/kettle, and you’ll want a grinder to chop up your beans right before you brew for maximum flavor. If you go with the pour-over setup, it helps to get a ‘drip kettle’ with a thin spout so you can control the flow. In a pinch, you can use a teapot. If you go Aeropress, it doesn’t really matter what kind of hot water heater you have, but as mentioned above it helps to have a legit grinder.
Just like the other stuff, the over/under on these items runs around $30.
Have a good one, and stay caffeinated.
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