Hustling With A Clever Coffee Dripper
Jun 07, 2017
THE SIMPLE QUESTION : What if you wet the coffee before brewing? If so how wet? for how long, at what temperature?
THE GEEKY QUESTION : The question that we asked ourselves, was essentially, if *blooming coffee grinds makes coffee taste better, what is the optimum bloom (or is this really pre-infusion)?
Quickly this became an exercise in cold water pre-infusion.
*It is to wet coffee grinds in order to dissolve and release trapped CO².
The idea was to wet coffee grinds with various water qualities for various times.
Pre-infusion before brewing with mildly warmed water for a few minutes improves the extraction quality.
TAKE NOTE
Too much heat causes weird extraction. Too cool, does not fully utilise the benefits of pre-infusion, and short-ish (5 minute) pre-brews work best.
|
Coffee |
Vengeance Blend |
|
Dose |
12g |
|
Total water (g) |
200g |
|
Pre-infusion water (g) |
30g - *Mud 50g - *Wet 80g - *Visible |
|
Rest of the water (g) |
170g - *Mud 150g - *Wet 120g - *Visible |
|
Temperature of pre-infusion water |
14 Degrees Celcius |
|
Temperature of the rest of water |
100 Degrees Celcius |
|
Pre-infusion time (min) |
Varies/group |
|
Aggetation |
2 Strokes |
|
Full infusion time (min) |
3 Minutes |
* Mud : liquid emulsion, mud-like consistency 30g cool water
* Wet : wet coffee, visible liquid 50g cool water
* Visible : watery, looks like small brew 80g cool water
we made the final “brew” topping up to 200g water total
THE PRE INFUSION TEST 1:
_______________________________________________________
|
16 Hours |
||
|
Wet |
Mud |
Visible |
|
Great Body Great Flavour |
Moderate Body Some Flavour |
Low in Body Low in flavour |
|
1 Hour |
||
|
Wet |
Mud |
Visible |
|
Flavour Some Body |
Body Some Flavour |
Lacking Body Some Flavour |
|
5 Minutes |
||
|
Wet |
Mud |
Visible |
|
No Body Flavour Sweet |
Body Fruity Flavour Some Sweetness |
No Body Dry, Ashy |
|
GO! |
||
|
Wet |
Mud |
Visible |
|
Sweetness No Body Lacking Flavour |
Body Flavour |
No Body Just Flavour |
THE OUTCOME :
Outcomes in order of ranking best cups overall and by method:
- WINNER : 16 hour wet was the sensory preference unanimously.
- SECOND PLACE : 5 minutes it was mud
- THIRD PLACE : Immediate was mud
- FOURTH PLACE : 1 hour was the visible
So, all over the place really!
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THE PRE INFUSION TEST 2:
_______________________________________________________
Then we decided to compare 18 hour pre-infusion and 16 hour. While adding the *1 hour and 5 minute for reference.
*(We added the one hour as we had an anomaly. When hot it tasted crap, but tasted great when cool.)
|
18 Hours |
16 Hours |
1 Hour |
5 Minutes |
|
Wet |
Wet |
Visible |
Mud |
|
Sweet Lacking Body Wine Gum Flavours |
Lacking Sweetness Moderate Body |
Super Sweet Lacking Body |
Sweet Moderate Body Good Flavour |
THE OUTCOME :
Outcomes in order of ranking best cups overall and by method:
- WINNER :5 minute. With great sweetness and good body.
- SECOND PLACE : 18 hour. Lacked body.
- THIRD PLACE : 1 hour. Good sweetness but very little body.
- FOURTH PLACE : 16 hour? Hmmmm, I call bullshit… (See round four)
So, our curiosity about the 1 hour visible was a little of a bust unfortunately. It seems that we can only expect it to be a great cup only after 5 hours of making it. Though the 5 minutes mud doing well so far!
Let’s move on.
_______________________________________________________
THE PRE INFUSION TEST 3:
_______________________________________________________
We needed to focus on a range around the 5 minute pre-infusion with mud next and this led to the following.
|
10 Min |
5 Min |
3 Min |
1 Min |
|
Mud |
Mud |
Mud |
Mud |
|
Sweet Good Body |
Sweetish More Body |
Watery Least Flavour Lack Of Body Some Acidity |
Watery No Flavour Low Body |
THE OUTCOME :
Outcomes in order of ranking best cups overall and by method:
- WINNER :5 minute. With great sweetness and good body.
- SECOND PLACE : 10 minute. With HUGE sweetness though lacked a little body.
- THIRD & FOURTH PLACE : 3 minute & 1 minute were very similar. In comparison, like sex in a canoe (fucking close to water)
_______________________________________________________
THE PRE INFUSION TEST 4:
_______________________________________________________
Re-test 18,16 and a new 12 hour all one “wet” (50g) we also did the 5 minute mud (30g) as reference
|
18 Hours |
16 Hours |
12 Hours |
5 Minutes |
|
Wet |
Wet |
Wet |
Mud |
|
Quite Sweet Moderate Body |
Lower in Sweetness than 18 hour But Still Good Sweetness With a Good Body |
Over-extracted with a weird finish Good Body Sweet |
Best of the four Good Body Good Flavour Moderate Sweetness |
WINNER : 5 minute
SECOND PLACE : 16 hour second best. (HAPPY DANCE) I knew something was wrong.
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CURIOSITY CREPT IN
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Salami slices of a 5 minute mud. Enough said!
|
Coffee Below the Filter |
Main Brew Pt. 1 |
Main Brew Pt. 2 |
Dregs! |
|
Mud |
Mud |
Mud |
Mud |
|
Almost no Flavour or Body |
Balanced Good Body Good Sweetness Overall best |
Surprisingly similar to part 1, maybe slightly worse. |
Sweet Heavy Body |
Continuing our curiosity we decided to take the TDS reading for each stage
- Coffee below the filter = 1.18%
- Main brew (PT1&2 mixed)= 1.77%
- Dregs = 1.53%
SO WHAT DID WE LEARN?
Long (multi-hour) pre infusions produce sweetness, but are probably not worth the effort. Timing matters, more study required.
For a great filter, 5 minutes of pre-infusion is supremely worth it. We wonder if drip machines should be tested for this? easily done.
_______________________________________________________
Q&A FROM BARISTA HUSTLE:
Q: Why is the bloom with cold water?
A: We needed a protocol that was maintainable. Further testing would seem worthwhile.
Q: How much water?
A: See test one
Q: Are you stirring?
A: yes, aeropress paddle used, one swipe forward through initial “mud” one swipe back, we have not tested for other methods yet. Next test @alyssa?
Q : The water, thank you (Thomas) that we pre infused with was 14ºC and room temperature was Cape Town
winter, probably 18ºC (get a life)
A : Water added after was 100ºC before it left the kettle.
PS Alyssa @ Truth Coffee did all of the hard work!
_______________________________________________________
FURTHER TESTING UPDATES:
For this next test, We tried pre-infusing with 4 different temperatures of water.
|
Variables |
14 |
50 |
100 |
50 + 100 |
|
|
Coffee |
Vengeance |
Vengeance |
Vengeance |
Vengeance |
|
|
Dose |
12g |
12g |
12g |
12g |
|
|
Total water (g) |
200g |
200g |
200g |
200g |
|
|
Pre-infusion water (g) |
30g (Mud) |
30g (Mud) |
30g (Mud) |
30g (Mud) |
|
|
Rest of the water (g) |
170g |
170g |
170g |
170g |
|
|
Temperature of pre-infusion water |
Room Temperature (18) |
50 |
100 |
50 + 100 |
|
|
Temperature of the rest of water |
100 |
100 |
100 |
100 |
|
|
Pre-infusion time (min) |
5 Min |
5 Min |
5 Min |
5 Min |
|
|
Aggetation |
2 Strokes |
2 Strokes |
2 Strokes |
2 Strokes |
|
|
Full infusion time (min) |
3 min |
3 min |
3 min |
3 min |
|
- WINNER : 50ºC water, clear winner. Really good body, great sweetness. Most complexity, really let the flavours shine through
- SECOND PLACE : Pre-infusion with a 50/50 blend of 50ºC water and 100ºC water approximating 75ºC a lot more body, our second favourite. Sweetness was good, overall flavour complex and interesting
- THIRD PLACE : Room temperature - Lacked body and mildly sweet.
- FOURTH PLACE : Pre-infusion at 100ºC left weird flavours, lacked sweetness body is ok-ish
THE OUTCOME :
Pre-infusion before brewing with mildly warmed water improves extraction quality.
Too much heat causes weird extraction while too cool does not fully utilise the benefits of pre-infusion.
