Cafetiere Brew Guide
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Bean Shot Brew Guide: Cafetiere
The humble cafetière (or French press, they are one and the same!) remains one of the most common ways to brew coffee in the home and, for many, represents the first step away from the stale, bitter world of freeze-dried instant granules. In comparison to ‘dialling in’ a complicated and expensive espresso machine, brewing with a cafetiere is inexpensive, simple and the results can be amazing (especially when you’re using our Bloody Good Coffee!).
However, to extract the very best flavours and realise the true potential of the coffee not just once, but time after time, there are some key things to remember and a few easy steps to follow. With just a little bit of care and attention (and just a tiny bit of Key Stage 3 maths), it is possible to enjoy the very best in every brew.
This advice also comes directly from our personal experiences and offers a snapshot of our own daily routines. It may surprise you, dear reader, to discover that we don’t all rely on elaborate home machine set-ups, nor do we have the time to dedicate hours to perfecting our own morning brew before setting out to serve our lovely customers in Sherborne. In fact, the good ol’, ever-reliable cafetiere is so often our go-to device and is still an industry favourite when simplicity and consistency are called for.
We often get asked ‘what’s the best cafetiere recipe?’, so we’ll start with our tried and tested, simple approach with the cafetiere brewing technique we always suggest. Future posts may well delve deeper into the nuances of grind size, the roasting methods used and water type but for now, let's set out a few basic guidelines:
To start you are going to need a few things:
Cafetière - obviously
Kettle and water
Bloody Good Coffee - cafetière grind (very coarsely ground)
Timer – yes, your phone is fine
Notepad and pen - only for the first time
Your favourite coffee cup
The use of digital scales may seem a bit over the top to those more accustomed to the old scoop and hope approach, but trust us, taking control of measurement will make a huge difference to the quality and consistency of your brew and, most importantly, your enjoyment of the finished product. Get used to using them and it really isn’t an extra step at all, it’s just part of the process.
Now for the method:
First, fill the kettle and switch it on.
While it’s coming to boil, put your cafetiere on the digital scales and tare them out so the scales read zero.
Fill the cafetière with cold tap water to where you would normally fill when making coffee. Don't go all the way to the top as you’ll need to add coffee, be able to stir it and insert the plunger. A good guide is 2-3 cm below the spout of the cafetiere.
Place the cafetiere back on the scales, they will now display the weight of only the water.
Make a note of the weight, rounding up or down to nearest 10g here helps.
Discard the water (use on your indoor plants or drinking water, no wasted water please!)
Now for the maths bit.... don’t worry, it’s not too hard!
The recipe (see here for more chat on coffee recipes) we will use as a starting point is 60g of coffee grinds per 1000g water. Or 16.6g of water for every 1g of ground coffee. (this is an industry standard starting point for immersion brewing) :
60g of coffee : 1000ml water
60/1000 = 16.6
So for every 1g of coffee use 16.6g water or, if it’s easier to remember, for every 16.6g of water, add 1g of coffee. (You can round up or down, the coffee police won’t know!)
Back to your set up… whatever the weight of the water you just measured from the water jug, you need to divide this number by 16.6. This will give you the amount of coffee to use.
Eg:
Cafetière water weight: 300g
300/16.6 = 18
Ground coffee to use = 18g (rounding up or down to the nearest gram here is perfectly fine, just do the same with every coffee!)
Here is an outline of the most common sizes of cafetiere:
Water in grams / Coffee in grams
1000 / 60
750 / 45
500 / 30
250 / 15
NOTE: The steps above you’ll only have to do once, unless you change your cafetiere and the size is different.
Write this recipe down, tear out the page and stick it on the fridge for jogging the memory. This is now your recipe for your cafetiere.
Nearly there:
To make your cafetiere:
Place the cafetiere on the scales and tare out.
Fill with the correct weight of cafetiere ground coffee as per your calculations outlined above.
Tare out the scales so they read zero.
Allow the kettle to boil and let it sit for 30s before using it (you will burn the coffee if using straight after boiling, we’re aiming for about 95-98 degrees)
Fill the cafetiere to the correct weight as per your calculations and notes above.
Start the timer.
Stir with a spoon to mix all the coffee and water.
Remove your cafetiere from the scales and place the filter plunger in the cafetiere. Plunge the filter to 1cm below the line of the water. This allows all the coffee to mix with the water, rather than the coffee forming a ‘crust' on the surface.
Leave for 4 minutes
Slowly plunge the cafetiere
Gently pour EVERYTHING out into your favourite cup and enjoy!
THATS IT!
An extra tip:
Whatever you do, do not leave any coffee standing in cafetiere. Coffee at this point will have extracted for long enough; leaving the cafetiere with coffee and grounds together whilst you drink your first cup will end up over extracting (I will post about over extraction in the future), giving you bitter and burnt flavours into your second cup. You have 2 options here.... make less coffee initially or pour the leftover into a pre heated thermal cup or jug.
Making a cafetiere using this method is simple (once you have worked out the amount of water the cafetiere holds), and it guarantees that when trying a new coffee, it’s the flavour of the coffee that changes, not the way you make it. If the recipe isn’t strong enough for you either add more coffee or use less water. If it’s too strong, use less coffee or more water. Whatever you do, once you’ve cracked the recipe, make it the same every time and you’ll continue to enjoy great tasting coffee every time you brew.
So, give it a shot, grab some of our award winning Brue, craft the perfect cafetiere and let us know how you get on in the comments below.