Trouble shooting pour over 101

Hi friends of ickle. It's Rowena here, roaster, green bean buyer and QC of ickle.

I have collected a fair bit of questions and often get asked for trouble shooting tips from our dear home brewers and the baristas from all over Australia.

As we all love trying new recipes, new merchandise and new coffee roasters. But how do we get the best out of those coffees without wasting the whole bag trying to get the most balanced cup possible? These problems are common especially for those who buy coffee from different states or even from international coffee roasters. Not only the roast developments are quite various but also the roasted coffee gets QC and tested with different water quality or even have different preferences of what is "ideal" in their perfect cup of filter coffee. Chasing the best result could be challenging when it comes to unfamiliar roasters.

Firstly we make sure we have all the tools!

Essential equipments for pour over :

-drip cone

-paper filter

-coffee grinder

-weighing scale

-pouring kettle

-thermometer to measure water temperature or digital temperature control kettle

-timer

Then we need a "starting point" recipe!

I recommend 1:16 coffee to water ratio. 2:30-3:00 minute total brew time (bloom included) and 95-98 degree celsius. This recipe is very approachable to most coffee roasting styles and suitable with most dripper available in today's market.

Now in your cup!

What we usually look for in our coffee here at ickle coffee are the tasting notes, the smooth body, sweetness, acidity and pleasant after taste. Of course these qualities you'll find in the cup when you do everything right and most of time could be achieved after multiple tweaks of recipe.

When the coffee is tasting weak/watery, usually comes together with unpleasant sourness.

Try these variables, do one adjustment at the time to see what actually will improve the brew

-grind finer

-use higher water temperature

-increase contact time by adding pour pulses

-decrease water ratio, try adding 1g at a time, smallest adjustment of ratio could make a big difference

-try thiner paper filter

If the coffee is tasting medicinal, dry, bitter and astringent sour:

-grind courser

-use lower temperature water

-remove agitation

-increase water to coffee ratio

-decrease contact time, finish the total amount of water faster to fasten the brew time

Good quality water is also very important to achieve tasty cup of coffee.

Here are recommended range of ideal coffee brewing water:

These range of measurements are recommended for brewing. For balanced and flavourful coffee. If brewing water chemistry are far too different to these standards coffee quality could be compromised.

Enjoy brewing and let's keep improving our perfect cup :)

Rowena

Colombia Camilo Merizalde

• Cali, Cauca

• Finca Santuario

• Yellow Bourbon

• 1,850-2,0250 MASL

• Gold Washed

Tasting Note: Cherry, amaretto liqueur and herbal tea

This week we have added a new Colombia to our April offer. Colombia Camilo Merizalde, Yellow Bourbon Gold Washed process. Extended fermentation then dried for a period of 18 days in a controlled environment on raised beds under UV light and fans from Finca Santuario. This coffee has really unique tastes, very sweet and vibrant with tasting notes of cherry, amaretto and herbal tea (hints of ginger and lemongrass).

This coffee is a beautiful yellow bourbon variety, that has undergone a unique double fermentation process to extract maximum flavour. Fermentation in coffee processing is an increasingly utilised procedure to enhance flavour development and create a softer body and complex acidity. Taking the flavour profile even further is this particular bean's drying process. Dried for a period of 18 days in a controlled environment on raised beds under UV light and fans, these beans produce an intensity and consistency that is unparalleled amongst most Colombian coffees. Finca Santuario began 22 years ago, when Camilo Merizalde had the desire of creating a very unique farm capable of producing the best specialty coffees in Colombia. Rather than focus on quantity, Camilo decided to focus on quality as a driver of profitability. He quickly realised that biological diversity was paramount in creating an environment capable of producing excellent cup quality with long term sustainability. As such Finca Santuario is set out in such a way as to encourage a vast swathe of plant and animal diversity working symbiotically with the coffee plants. Recommended Recipes Espresso : 20g : 60g 21-23 seconds, 94°C (1:3 ratio) V60 : 15g : 250g 3 pulses, 2:30-2:45 minutes, 96°C (1:16.5 ratio) Batch Brew : 1:16 ratio, 94-96°C

Last week on the list for Burundi Kazoza N'ikawa. We are loving this coffee for both espresso and filter brew. Very clean natural process with notes of strawberry, English toffee, watermelon and orange blossom :)

Bolivia Java

Bolivia Java 200g

• Bolinda, Caramavi

• Las Alasitas

• Java

• 1,600 - 1,650 MASL

• Coco Natural

Tasting Note: Grapes, white chocolate, strawberries and cream At Las Alasitas, Pedro hires pickers from the Villa Rosario community to carefully handpick the coffee during the harvest. These pickers are trained to select only the very ripest cherries, and multiple passes are made through the farm throughout the harvest to ensure the coffee is picked at its prime. Selective picking is always very important and is particularly important for naturally processed lots like this one, to ensure a very sweet and clean cup. The Rodriguez family has found that the very ripest (almost purple) cherries provide the best cup. After being picked and weighed, this coffee was carefully washed and laid out to dry on raised African beds and turned every hour. After about one week on the raised beds, the coffee was then placed in a coco dryer. Pedro is always innovating and trialing different processing techniques. He has found that these driers help to dry the coffee slowly and consistently. The coffee sits in the large steel vats for around 35 hours at temperatures no higher than 40 ̊C, and turned every 30 minutes. Once the coffee was dry, it was transported to La Paz where it was rested, and then milled at Agricafe’s dry mill, La Luna. At this state-of-the-art mill, coffee is meticulously hulled and sorted using machinery, and is also sorted carefully by hand under UV and natural light.