1. Gather your gear

You’ll need:

• Coffee

• Aeopress - Brewing chamber, plunger, filter paper, filter cap, stirrer

• 250ml cup

• Scales or a scoop

• Kettle and water

• Timer

• Milk (if you like it!)

2. Heat water

Heat your water until it reaches between 91-96C. You can use a swan neck kettle on the hob like this one or use a normal kettle, just flick it off before it reaches the boil and let it settle.

You can get swan neck kettles with thermometers integrated to be more precise, they also help better control the flow of water when pouring.

 

3. Rinse filter and warm cup

Insert the filter paper into the cap and wet with hot water, this rinses any papery taste from the filter and helps it stick to the cap. Be careful here, it can be easy to spill and scald your fingers. Hold the ‘wings of the cap’ and gently pour water over. Add some water to the cup as well to warm it up. Discard all the water.

 

4. Assemble Aeropress and measure coffee

Insert the plunger into the Aeropress so the rubber end of the plunger is level with the ‘4’ mark on the brewing chamber. Stand this unit on the scales plunger down with the flared end of the brewing chamber up. Remember we are going to use the ‘inverted method here’.

Zero the scales. You can use kitchen scales or coffee orientated ones which has a timer too like this one does, whatever it is, digital is best.

Measure out 15g of coffee and add this to the brewing chamber. If you don’t have scales you can use your Aeropress scoop, that measures 15g so it’s perfect. When buying coffee choose it ground for V60 or Aeropress, if you are grinding coffee at home then we recommend a medium to fine grind that looks a little finer than sea salt.

If your grounds are too coarse you will under extract your coffee, you will not extract enough flavour out of your ground coffee. You’ll know if your grind is too coarse as the plunger will be really easy to press down and the water will run through quickly.

If your grounds are too fine you will over extract, this is when you have extracted too much flavour from your coffee, it will become overpowering and unpleasant. Opposite to above, if you grind is too fine then your plunger will be harder to press and it will be tough to get the water through the coffee.

 

5. Bloom

Shake the coffee flat in the brew chamber and tare your scales again if you have used them and start your timer. Immediately pour hot water from the kettle into the middle of the coffee in the brewing chamber circling slowly outwards until the scales read 40g. Leave the coffee for about 30 seconds to ‘bloom’. This is where carbon dioxide quickly bubbles up and leaves the coffee. It’s important to do this to prevent a sour taste that comes with CO2 content. CO2 also repels water which interrupts the brewing process, so its best gone!

6. Add more water

After that 30 seconds is up, add more water. working on a ratio of 1:15 where 1 is a part of coffee to 15 parts water, we need to now pour over another 185ml of water onto our coffee. Again start in the middle and pour slowly, circling the kettle until the scales reach 225ml and the water is near the top of the brewing chamber.

7. Wait
Now you just have to wait. Put filter and cap on the Aeropress and secure into place then leave the coffee to steep or brew until the time reaches 1 min 30 seconds. Holding the cup over the filter on the flared end of the Aeropress flip it over and begin to plunge. This should take about 20 seconds, stop just as you hear the coffee begin to ‘hiss’.

8. Enjoy
Coffee’s up! Aeropress, like any coffee brewing process, is all about experimentation, this recipe can be tweaked and adjusted until your taste buds are content. Try slightly different ratio’s of coffee to water, try different grinds and different coffee’s and let your tastebuds be your guide using this article as a good beginning reference.

Happy brewing!

 

brew guides kindly created by Boost Coffee Company