More Coffee Information and Resources:
BREWING
There is a myriad of ways to brew your
favorite coffee and for the most part it all begins with a simple
introduction: Know Thyself. Are you after a thick silty morning mug? A
thinner brighter brew? A full bodied but smooth sensation? Once you
have this part down, youre ready for the facts.
AUTO DRIP
About 70% of the coffee made in this country is brewed with paper
filters, a method that produces what some refer to as the classic
American style: light-bodied and clear, free of oil or sediment. Due
to the popularity of the drip method, the brewers out there are
constantly being improved. Gone are the accidents, the errant grinds,
the unpredictable water temperatures.
One improvement is the gold filter which allows more oils and
organic compounds to get into your cup. With a washable filter you
eliminate the slight papery taste due to the disposables, and you get
a fuller-bodied brew.
With an auto drip brewer you can usually get peak performance with
even the most inexpensive of machines. Any more money you spend will
go towards whatever bells and whistles fit your fancy. Of course, we
at GMCR have our preferences:
Capresso Thermal Coffee Maker
Capresso CoffeeTEAM Brewer
Krups
SINGLE CUP BREWERS
Single-cup brewing is the latest step in the quest for great coffee.
GMCR stands behind the line of
Keurig
brewers which offers easy, fast, personalized coffee and
total satisfaction. That is, of course, if you are using the right
coffee. Luckily, we make this part easy; our Green Mountain Coffee
K Cups
live up to our standards of great coffee, and ensure that
your morning mug will live up to yours. For more information on
single-cup technology, go to
and check out the options from
Keurig.
For more information on single-cup
technology, go to the
single cup page and check out the options from Keurig:
Keurig B40
Keurig B50
Keurig B60
COFFEE PRESS
Developed in Italy in the 1930s, the coffee press is most often
associated with France and most commonly known as the French Press.
Its sophisticated design belies the simplicity of the concept - manual
filtration. The coffee press itself looks like an elegant beer mug
wearing a cap. Coffee and water are added to the glass and allowed to
sit for around four minutes depending on taste. Finally a plunger (a
mesh filter on a stick) is pushed from the top of the mixture to the
bottom, pushing the grounds to the base of the contraption and
readying the clarified coffee for pouring. The result: A much heavier,
grittier, richer taste than the above-described creation. This
difference is due to the presence of sediments, oils, and a gelatinous
substance called colloids, most of which are eliminated in the drip
method. Coffee press users: Make sure to
grind your coffee
on a course setting as even the biggest grounds
have been known to find their way through this filter. Coffee press
novices: Here are some suggestions.
Chambord Coffee Press
Eileen Press
Bodium Travel Press
Thermal French Press
MOKA POT
Also known as a stovetop espresso maker, the modest metal moka pot
creates a thick dense brew that rivals the real stuff. The moka pot
consists of two reservoirs and a filter that separates them. Water is
poured into the bottom bucket, coffee grounds are spooned into the
filter basket, and steam-produced air pressure forces the
not-quite-boiling water through the coffee and up into the top
reservoir. Presto, a perfect little cup. Our experts suggest using
finely ground beans for this one.
GMCR offers:
Bodum Mocca Pot
VACUUM POT
No, this is not a nightmare; you are not back in your high school
chemistry lab. This crazy contraption is actually a coffee brewer, and
a good one at that. Similar in concept to the moka pot, the vacuum pot
consists of two glass globes that attach to either side of a filter.
Water is poured into the lower globe, the lower globe is set on the
stove. As in the moka pot, the increased air pressure (see? chemistry
class was relevant!) forces water to escape through a tube, through
the filter, and into the upper compartment. Hot coffee then cools and
is sucked back down to the bottom globe via yet another imbalance of
air pressure. No papery taste, rich but without the sediment of the
french press.
Bodum Mini Santos
USA ESPRESSO MACHINE
As its Italian name implies, Espresso is pressed coffee. Even if you
are loyal to your drip brewer, you have no doubt seen the giant
espresso machines in coffee houses, the tampded-down grounds, the slow
trickle of the dark rich liquid into delightfully delicate
receptacles. You have heard the hiss of steam as it makes the coffee
and is used to steam the milk, and you have smelled the luxurious
aroma. This is espresso, and to many people, having a machine in the
house that will create this thick, dark, crema-topped coffee is well
worth the effort and expense.
What the espresso machine basically does is force water through a
compacted cake of finely ground coffee with pressure and heat high
enough to emulsify the oils and organic compounds that are left out of
regular gravity-brewed coffee. Beans should be blended especially,
roasted accordingly, and ground into a fine powder.
Jura Avantgarde S9 Espresso Maker
Impressa F9 Espresso Maker
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Want to buy small appliances, and parts for those appliances? Try
SmallAppliance.com.
They have many appliances and genuine replacement parts to choose from, and you
can order online.
The Coffee
Tip of the Day is:
Never
store your coffee in the refrigerator. Coffee will absorb flavors
and aromas from other food products in your refrigerator. Freezing
coffee can also have a damaging effect, and we do not recommend this
practice unless you will not use-up your supply of coffee for a
prolonged period of time (two weeks or more). Coffee should be
stored in a clean, dry, airtight container, in a cool, dark place
.
Coffee Fun Facts
There are only two types of coffee on
Earth but hundreds of styles of brew can be concocted, depending on
where the beans are grown, and how they're handled post-harvest.
Lighter roasted coffee actually has
more caffeine per coffee bean than dark roasts. So a cup of French
Roast coffee has noticeably less caffeine than say, a cup of a Light
City Roast coffee
Ethiopia is thought to be the
motherland of the first coffee beans, which found their way to
Brazil and Colombia--the two largest coffee producers today.
Coffee is the second-most traded
commodity in the world economy, after oil, but one coffee tree
yields slightly less than 1 pound of coffee per year.
Set up your Coffee Pot, Smell the aroma, Enjoy a hot
cup of Coffee !
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