how to make French Press coffee the right way?

Question

I'll start by saying I'm pretty much a newbie to making coffee, and in the French press brewing which is why I joined this forum to learn. After reading a number of posts/info and watching videos on Youtube, I've tried a few techniques but I still think I haven't quite grasped it. My main issue is once I have let my French press settle for 4 mins, the ground coffee on the bottom looks exactly the same as when I first put it in about 2 heaped tablespoons. I know it isn't instant coffee but I also read in a post at limiting the amount left at the bottom. This is where I'm getting confused. How much ground coffee should be left after letting it sit? My french press is a Bodum 12 oz.

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

Is it possible that you read a few posts on the Internet the wrong way?

• The grounds will not disappear, if anything they will appear "more", volume-wise because they swell in the hot water.
• There are two points about "grounds on the bottom":
  • In the bottom of your cup, indicating a too fine grind of the beans or a hole in the filter mesh. Some very fine "dust" is ok, though. This is french press, not filtered coffee.
  • Coffee sitting on the grounds after pushing the plunger for too long can negatively influence the taste of the last cup, making it excessively bitter, for example. So drink / pour the coffee shortly after you finished brewing. The time threshold depends on your beans and personal taste.

Answer 2

How's the mastering coming?

Thought I would weigh in to provide a little extra help. I'm a barista and head of customer education at Handground. We are working on a French Press brew guide right now but since it's not done, I'll share a quick tutorial.

The goal with brewing coffee on any device is to maximize the extraction of good-tasting flavors and minimize the bitter ones. I suggest starting with the following recipe and then adjusting it to find the right balance of flavor.

1. Heat water to 205F

Depending on your kettle, this might mean taking your water off the heat for about one minute after boil. Use a thermometer if possible!

2. Weigh out coffee to 57g

There's an easy ratio to follow when deciding how much coffee to use. It's called the water-to-coffee ratio, and it will help you methodically experiment with different brew recipes. To find the water-to-coffee ratio, take the total mL of water (around 800-850mL for a normal-sized French Press) and then divide by the number of grams of coffee (mL and grams are conveniently equal in weight). In this case, 800/57 is about 14. That means our ratio is 14:1. From now on you can use the inverse of this ratio to adjust your recipe. For example, if you want to try a 15:1 ratio (a weaker coffee), take 800ml and divide by 15 to find the amount of coffee to use.

If you don't have a scale, 57g is roughly a half cup of coffee, but remember that lighter roasts are more dense than dark roasts, so it will require less volume of coffee to reach your desired weight.

3. Grind your coffee course

Here's an example of what your grind should look like:

It's really important to have a consistent grind. If you don't the different-sized grounds will extract at different rates, meaning some of them will turn bitter and others will stay weak. This is a bad mix of flavors. For the most consistent grind, use a burr coffee grinder

4. Pour water over coffee and let bloom

Dump the grounds into the French Press and then pour just enough water over the grounds so they are all saturated. If you have a scale, shoot for about as much water as you have grounds, so 57mL. The coffee will begin to bubble up and "bloom" if it is fresh. Let this happen for about 30 seconds

5. Pour 800mL water total, set for 4 minutes

Pour 800mL of hot water into the French Press to achieve our desired water-to-coffee ratio. For most a normal 32-ounce French Press, this is about an 1 1/2 inches from the top. Start timer for 4 minutes and let the coffee steep. Place the lid on top of the grounds to capture the heat but DO NOT PLUNGE YET!

6. Plunge after 4 minutes

Press the plunger down through the coffee. This action will tell you something important about your coffee. If pressing the plunger is really difficult, the grind might have been too fine. There should be slight resistance but nothing that makes you struggle. This is one indication that you might need to adjust the grind, but tasting the coffee will be the ultimate test.

7. Remove all coffee from French Press

Leaving the coffee (the drink, not the grounds) in the French Press will allow for the coffee to continue extracting, turning it bitter. If you don't drink it all at once, remove it and place in a thermos or carafe.

Adjusting your brew recipe

This recipe is just a starting point. Now you should adjust your recipe to improve the coffee. The best cups of coffee have extracted all the sweet, desirable flavors from the cup and none of the bitter, negative flavors. Naturally then, the best cup of coffee sits right at the tipping point of sweet and bitter.

You should adjust your recipe by changing just one thing at a time. Here's a simple formula to follow:

1. Assess your latest cup of coffee

Was your coffee strong and sweet? Weak and bitter? Somewhere in the middle? Understanding this will be the starting point for adjusting your recipe.

2. Adjust for coffee strength

You adjust the strength of your coffee by changing the amount of coffee you use. We can use the water-to-coffee ratio that we talked about to do this. If your coffee is weak, or watery and tea-like, use a lower water-to-coffee ratio like 13:1 or 12:1. If your coffee is overwhelmingly strong, raise the ratio to 15:1 or 16:1. Divide the amount of water used (800ml) by desired ratio number (14, 15, 16, etc.) to find the number of grams of coffee to use.

Brew another batch of coffee with the adjusted water-to-coffee ratio and repeat until you're happy with the strength.

3. Adjust for sweetness/extraction

Strength and extraction are not the same thing. Strength is the amount of coffee dissolved in the coffee solution while extraction is the percentage of ground coffee that was dissolved. Extraction controls how sweet or bitter a coffee is, but not its strength.

If you notice your coffee is bitter, you should reduce the extraction rate. You can do this in two ways: Make the grind more course or shorten the brew time. Both will allow for less extraction, meaning less negative flavors.

If your coffee is sweet, I suggest finding its peak sweetness before being satisfied. Increase the extraction rate by using a finer grind or extending the brew time. Do this until you brew a batch of coffee that comes out bitter, and then dial your extraction rate back to the last degree where it was sweet. This is as delicious as you will be able to brew your coffee.

Recap

To summarize what I just wrote, here are a few key things to remember about brewing with the French Press and dialing in the optimal recipe:

1. Consistent grind is key
2. If your coffee is weak, increase the strength by adding more coffee. If it is too strong, use less coffee.
3. If your coffee is still sweet and not bitter, increase the extraction by using a finer grind or longer brew time. Do this until you find the tipping point between bitter and sweet.
4. If your coffee is bitter, dial back the extraction. Again, try to find the tipping point.

Manipulating the different variables that change your coffee will become second nature the more you do it. Start sharpening your coffee skills by being methodical with the way you experiment. Adjust only one variable at a time so you can see a clear cause and effect. Most importantly, don't let the pursuit of the perfect cup spoil the fun. Any cup of coffee is better than no cup at all, so enjoy the journey.

Answer 3

I use the french press a lot because of its vibrancy.

With your coffee grounds all set in the beaker, pour in the hot water. Use a 1:15 ratio of coffee weight to water weight (g or mL). The coffees will then rise to the surface. You have an option to pat the risen coffee with a spoon, or just don't touch it. After 4 minutes, pat the surface with a spoon to sink the fully-soaked grinds. If you want real perfection, then slough-off the yellow crema. Plunge and pour at a maximum of 90 degrees from vertical, to avoid the fines getting into your mug.

Answer 4

Maybe you may take a look at this question and the other links pointed in that question. There are quick recipes and a detailed how-to for brewing in a French press. The discussion may help you to master the French press, I hope.

The size of the French press does not fit, but you may scale, I assume.

Answer 5

Personally - one of the most incredible experiences i've had with a French Press is going via the Serious Eats 8 MINUTE version

The post goes through WHY their "low and slow" approach to diffusion with a really coarse grind (really) and a longer 6-8min soak at a 1:14 - 1:16 ratio - but the effect - as they put it - is well worth trying.

It may all be me, but the only method i've found that i can get to work reliable from a single serving to multiple serving french press is this one.

Rather exciting to challenge the dominant 4min paradigm, don't you think?

Personally i do not grind at the coarsest setting: one and a bit up from that, but that's from playing around - really like the 8min / coarse soak.

m.c.