Bitter Press

Experiments: Hotel pour-over extravaganza

We’ve all been there: a vacation opportunity comes up, and we’re off. And then we wake up the next morning, in the hotel, and lo and behold, horrible coffee. There’s nothing in the near radius, and you know that back in the room, there’s a microwave, one of those mini coffee pots, and that weird packet of pre-ground coffee. Yeesh.

But you’re not going to bring your press pot on vacation, are you? Cleaning that thing out in the hotel room sink?

It’s okay, I’ve got you covered: get a pour-over cone (preferably a ceramic Hario V60 or other perfect conical shaped cone), bring filters, a Pyrex measuring cup, a mug, and a plastic baggy of coffee you’ve ground at home. As long as there’s a microwave, we can do this.

The object of pour-over is to get an even extraction by using a thin stream of water in a circular pour in a cone brewing device that comes down to a single zenith; most drip cones are that weird fake cone shape with the flat ridge that rides along the bottom. If we’re looking for an even extraction, we want the water to be heading into a single point, right? If the cone is two flat planes angled into each other, we have too much room for water to swirl around inside, and if it has multiple holes of exit, like some ceramic beehouse drippers, too many paths to travel.



Hario makes a great one — the V60 — and has almost single-handedly revived the discussion of pour-over coffee in the US. Now, not everyone swears by it, but enough people do, and enough people resist it vehemently, letting their seething hatred bring them to a mad rage to find what they believe is the One True Pour-Over Drip Cone. Personally, I think it makes a delicious cup, and we’re arguing about hypothetical situations and semantics without a lot of hard data to back up accusations. Plus they’re only about $25.


Most coffee type people would recommend a specialized pouring kettle, with a thin, craning spout that produces a very thin stream of water. This is definitely helpful, but the cheapest ones cost about $60, and we’re trying to do this without breaking the bank, right? Plus, we’re not going to pack a whole kettle just for pouring on vacation (I might).

In it’s place, we’ve got the perfect tool that’s oft o’er looked: the one cup Pyrex liquid measuring cup. We’ve got measurement. We’ve got microwaving ability. We’ve got a spout for pouring. We’ve got hotel coffee.

We want to start out by gauging the size of your mug. I prefer brewing 8 ounces, but this is quite possibly a 10 ounce mug. It is also a little kitschy. I chose it on purpose to replicate a mug you might find in your hotel room.


We’ll want to get 8 ounces of water into the Pyrex, and we kick it in the microwave for 2 minutes. we want the water to boil here because we’re accomplishing three things with it: rinsing the filter, pre-heating the ceramic cone, and pre-heating the ceramic mug. We want to rinse the filter to get any possible paper taste out of it.


Preferably, I like to fold a crease down the seam so that the filter sits nicely in the cone, and then it’s time to pour, evenly wetting the whole deal. Fill up the Pyrex one more time (preferably with some sort of filtered water if available), and stick it in the microwave for three minutes this time.

Now let’s measure out the coffee. A few notes on this coffee: it’s from Finca Matalapa in El Salvador, it is a Peaberry lot, is about three weeks off the roast date, and was ground for my normal drip setting a week before the trial. We all know freshly ground coffee is the best option, but what if it’s not an option at all? Also, let’s think about all the people who don’t own a grinder and have their coffee ground for them at the coffee store — how much are they missing out on?

Recommended dose on the Hairo V60 is 10 grams for every 4 ounces. There’s a little up-dosing due to the fact that the hole in the center is a little large, and we’re not going to have a perfectly slow stream either.


There we go. If you remember from the last experiment, a full 2 tablespoon scoop of whole bean coffee weighed out to about 8 grams. But, due to bean density or whatever, it seems that ground coffee comes out closer to 7 grams for a full scoop.

There we have it: three scoops, 21 grams. That’s just about right. Now the water is in a nice rolling boil in the microwave — we want it to stay quite hot, since the open top of the V60 will let a lot of heat rise — and we’re going to hit the bloom on the coffee. But what’s the bloom you ask?

The bloom is what happens when freshly roasted coffee is hit with hot water. Carbon dioxide is a naturally gets trapped in the beans during the roasting process when something happens to the moisture in the beans or something and whatever. What’s important for you to know is that it’s there, and it’s bad for extraction. The little pre-infusion of water that we’re adding to the coffee is going to cause a lot of that CO2 to be released, and it’s going to pre-heat the coffee grounds, and also prep it for infusion. It’s like creating a million different pathways for the water to travel through. Water on a dry bed of ground coffee is going to create paths of least resistance and channel differently, in an uneven extraction. Coffee that’s already wet is going to have a million paths already set up for the water to travel through.


We’re aiming for about 1 ounce of water for the bloom, and then we’re going to let it rest for 30-45 seconds. We want to saturate all of the coffee grounds, but we don’t want any water to start dripping through. When the top of the coffee looks like it’s starting to dry out a bit, and the bubbles rising up are starting to pop, it’s time to pour. The coffee didn’t bloom as much as it would have if it was fresh, because most CO2 had escaped after it was ground and was resting in the plastic bag.

We want the thinnest stream possible, in a concentric circular pour the size of a quarter or so in the middle of the coffee. If the water is too near the side, it’s going to exit through the side instead of traveling to the hole in the bottom.

Since we pre-measured the water, just pour until it’s all in the cone, and then let it drip.

Simple! A good sign of a nice, even drip is a collection of coffee grounds hugging the sides of the cone. It’s hard to see in these pictures, but there is a nice general cone shape of coffee grounds, only it’s a bit lumpy near the bottom. It’s okay, no harm, no foul. It’s not ideal, but it doesn’t mean that the cup is in bad shape at all. Discard the spent coffee grounds, and then rinse your cone, and take a sip of your coffee!

Tasting notes from the Peaberry lot: sweet cherry, graham cracker, slightly tart, a little flat, clean finish, nicely composed. The cup wasn’t too far off from the ones I made with fresh ground coffee, sooner off the roast date, with the specialized pour kettle. It didn’t quite have the same depth, and was a little flat in comparison, but I’d be pleased to drink this coffee any day of the week. Experiment: success!

Although I’m not sure how I feel about it. Should I feel let down that these substandard coffee procedures produced a nice cup, or should I be excited that great coffee is more attainable than previously thought? In either case, comparison testing was required. Time to repeat the experiment with some fresh ground coffee.

Check it out! I got one of those Hario hand-crank grinders I was talking about in the last experiment. Loading up the hopper with three scoops. Like I mentioned before, a scoop of whole bean coffee is closer to 8 grams, so this total will probably be closer to 24 grams than the 21 grams used in the pre-ground run through.

And there you have it: 24 grams of nicely ground coffee. Though it’s one notch finer than it probably should be, but I didn’t realize that until I started pouring. But I’m getting ahead of myself. Set up a dry filter and rinse it through, just like last time. The coffee I used was also from Finca Matalapa, in El Salvador, this time the Cidra lot. It was about nine days off the roast, and stored in an airtight ceramic container.


Capacity of the Pyrex is only 8 ounces, but I went for closer to 10 ounces of water due to the fact that there was closer to 24 grams of coffee, three more than the previous experiment. And into the microwave to boil the dang water.


Dosed, and bloomed. A flat bloom like this one means the coffee might be a little too finely ground. Not sure why, but a coarser grind seems to bloom larger than a finely ground one.


Just like the last time. Only you might be able to see that the coffee grounds hugged the sides of the filter a bit nicer, indicative of a steadier pour. I did have practice for this one.

Tasting notes from the Cidra lot: cola, green pepper, turbinado sugar, rounded body, refreshing, a bit flat, but overall delicious. Borderline over-extracted due to the fineness of the grind.

The fresh ground cup definitely had more depth than the pre-ground cup, and both seemed to lack a little depth and could have had slightly cleaner flavor profile. The results are extremely promising for an upcoming trip to Florida or for folks who aren’t quite ready to invest in an expensive grinder or pour kettle. At the same time, it seems that the pour kettle does help get an even extraction and a cleaner flavor profile, and freshly ground coffee did have a bit more depth.

Exploit my findings in any way that suits your coffee preparation. Good coffee can be had with little investment in equipment and hopefully I showed you that. I’ve also found out that investing in good coffee equipment can take your cup to the next level, so maybe if you need an excuse to blow some dough, I hope I’ve given you enough reason.

Bottom line — you don’t have to suffer on vacation.

1. bitterpress posted this