Just be very thankful that you don’t have to wake up to coffee experiments at your house on the weekend…
Experiment: Variable grind size (brewing with the AeroPress)
Coffee: Kickapoo Coffee Organic Colombia – Fondo Paez (From Kickapoo -> Syrupy sweet and incredibly aromatic with an effervescent intensity and a sweet core of candied red fruits. Notes of Tart Cherry, Hibiscus & Dark Plum). The coffee had been stored in the freezer for 2 months (about 5 days post roast) in a sealed Mason jar and brought up to room temperature without opening.
Brew Method: Inverted AeroPress (back and forth stir at 1 min), cap, then flip and complete at 1:35.
Coffee weight to water: 10.0 grams of coffee and 157-158 grams of water
Water temperature: 202F
Grinder: EK43 (grind varied from 7.0 -> 1.0)
The cup levels reflect both the need for coffee first thing in the morning balanced with the taste of the finished cup. Clearly, the cups in the middle to higher extraction range taste better.
This worked out as expected or even better then expected — as the grind size got smaller the extraction yield and the strength increased.
Final notes from our coffee brewing experiments
Varying the ground coffee size had a large effect on the strength of the coffee and how much coffee was extracted. Coffee in the 19-21% extraction range tasted great. Overall this was a very linear step through the desired range of extraction yields. I think it is amazing how close the brewing stayed within 0.5 of 18-22% extraction when the grind size was varied from 1 (finest) to 7 (Chemex/drip/cupping) grind. In hindsight, the inherent tart cherry flavors did not make this the easiest coffee to taste in terms of the transition into the sour range.
