slow coffee

Over the past couple of years I’ve seen myself turn into a true coffee afficionado. I can’t remember when I had my first cup of coffee though, I just know that it was early on. While I stuck to the traditional coffee maker for years, I found myself drawn to barista-made coffee in the recent years. Until recently, the barista-made coffee was sipped in the coffee bars I frequented in different locations. However, earlier this year, Steven and I took a slow coffee class, where we learned all the different techniques to provide us with a cup of barista-made coffee at home. Discover a couple of tips and tricks after the jump.









We took a class of two hours at a Ghent based coffee bar that introduced us to the art of slow coffee. I prefer to call it that as I truly think of it as a form of art. Hell, even championships are held to brew the most perfect cup of coffee.

Here are a couple tips and tricks I remember from that class (thank God for notebooks!):
Beans
I guess this one is rather obvious. Invest in beans, although they don’t necessarily have to come expensive. Just find out what you like. Tastes differ, so I’m not one here to recommend this or that. I’d suggest you try them and if you don’t feel it, move on to the next. I’m sure that one day, you’ll find ‘the one’.

Time management
Time management is key when brewing your own coffee and is what I still find the hardest thing to accomplish when brewing my cup of coffee. Either way, just try to brew a cup too short or too long and you’ll taste the difference. We invested in quite a couple of things to have our barista-made coffee at home, but one thing still missing is a drip scale (is it Christmas already?!), though practice could be a factor as well.

Water
The water used to brew your coffee does make a difference. I guess you should have seen this one coming as we all have to agree: water tastes differently, so when being used to brew coffee, that difference will show in your cup of coffee as well.

Grinding matters
Grinding can go from coarse to fine and does have an impact on the end result, so decide this carefully before you start grinding your coffee beans.

Balance
Brewing your own cup of coffee is all about the balance between coffee, water, temperature and time. If you’ll google around, I’m sure you’ll find a start towards measurements, but then again, it’s all about the feeling.

Now that we’ve got this covered, let me provide you with a list of steps I’m taking when brewing my cup of coffee. You can use this as a check list if you’d like.

1. Fill the water kettle and heat to about 93°C (no full boil).
2. Measure out about 15g of whole bean coffee and put in grinder (I grind them by hand).
3. Place a paper filter into the dripper and add some water to moisten the filter.
4. Get rid of the water in step 3 and add the ground coffee to the dripper. Place over the carafe and put on a kitchen scale.
5. Turn on the scale and add about 25g of water, wait for about 30 seconds.
6. Continue adding water at a slow/medium pace until you reach about 225g.
7. Remove the dripper after 3 to 5 minutes and enjoy your barista-made coffee.

All my equipment is by Hario except for the scale (it’s just an ordinary kitchen scale), the beans are from Vandekerckhove in Ghent (where I got all the equipment as well).

Now, for a while we had been sipping our coffee from our good old coffee mugs, but I wanted something stylish (I’m a sucker for good design, I admit it).
The people at Fun must have read my mind as they sent me this beautiful set of Bodum Pavina glasses to pour my coffee in.
These glasses are so beautiful and perfect for a cup of coffee. They appear like two glasses fit into each other which allows you to drink hot beverages from them without burning any fingers.
They absolutely are my new favorites to sip my coffee from. Want these yourself? Then have a look at the Fun webshop, they have quite a few other Bodum tools to get you started on that barista-made coffee.

Next week I’ll be introducing you to another brewing method, but let’s take things slow and first enjoy that cup of filter coffee, shall we?

 

 

coffee grinder by hario | coffee drip kettle by hario | coffee dripper (v60) by hario | server by hario | pavina glasses by bodum (c/o fun) | tea towel by mae engelgeer

the fine print: this post is a collab with fun, but as you know all opinions are entirely my own

all photos by kelly steenlandt