Brewing
Six ways in. None of them wrong.
The same bean can become six different drinks. These are the recipes we actually use at the table and at every pop-up — start here, then move one variable at a time and taste what it did.
Pour Over
A cone strips a coffee of anywhere to hide. If a lot has a jasmine tail or a mineral edge, this is where you will find it — and if it has a flaw, this is where that shows up too. We cup on a V60 for exactly that reason.
- Ratio
- 1 : 16
- Dose
- 20 g / 320 g
- Water
- 92 °C
- Total time
- 3:15–3:30
Cupped best with MistRoot Highland Reserve
- 0:00Rinse the paper with boiling water, discard, add 20 g of grounds and level the bed.
- 0:00–0:30Bloom with 50 g. Swirl once, gently, until the surface goes matte. Wait.
- 0:30–1:30Pour to 200 g in slow concentric circles. Never touch the wall of the paper.
- 1:30–2:30Pour to 300 g. Give the brewer one last swirl to flatten the bed.
- 2:30–3:30Pour to 320 g and wait for the drawdown to complete. If it finished before 3:15 go finer; after 3:30, coarser.
AeroPress
Immersion plus a little pressure. Lower temperature than you think, because the contact is total — 90 °C keeps the sweetness in place instead of pulling it bitter. Inverted, always, whatever the internet says.
- Ratio
- 1 : 13
- Dose
- 17 g / 220 g
- Water
- 90 °C
- Total time
- 2:10
Cupped best with MistRoot Highland Arabica
- 0:00Inverted. 17 g in, 220 g of 90 °C water straight down the middle.
- 0:10Stir five times, north-south. Cap with a rinsed paper filter.
- 0:10–1:30Leave it. Do not agitate, do not fidget with it.
- 1:30Flip onto the cup and press, slowly, over thirty to forty seconds.
- 2:10Stop the moment you hear the hiss. Everything after the hiss is regret.
French Press
The only method that keeps every oil the roast produced. It will not give you clarity and it is not trying to. What it gives you is body — the closest thing to drinking the coffee the way the cupping table drinks it.
- Ratio
- 1 : 15
- Dose
- 40 g / 600 g
- Water
- 96 °C
- Total time
- 8:00
Cupped best with MistRoot Forest Reserve
- 0:0040 g coarse, 600 g of water just off the boil, poured hard to break the bed.
- 4:00Break the crust with a spoon, then skim the foam and floaters off the top.
- 4:00–8:00Lid on, plunger resting on the surface. Do not press yet.
- 8:00Press slowly to just below the surface — never all the way to the bottom.
- 8:30Decant everything immediately. Coffee left on the grounds turns to ash.
Moka Pot
Unfairly maligned, usually because people start it cold and walk away. Fill the boiler with water that has already boiled, keep the flame low, and take it off the heat the moment the stream turns pale. Done properly it is closer to a rich filter coffee than to espresso, and it is very hard to beat on a wet morning.
- Ratio
- 1 : 8
- Dose
- 18 g / 150 g
- Water
- Pre-boiled
- Total time
- 4:00
Cupped best with MistRoot Estate Robusta
- PrepFill the boiler to just below the valve with water off the boil. Use a towel — it is hot.
- 0:0018 g in the basket, levelled, never tamped. Screw the top on and set a low flame.
- 2:30–3:30Coffee should arrive as a slow, dark stream. A violent sputter means the flame is too high.
- 4:00The moment the stream goes pale and hisses, off the heat and onto a wet cloth.
- AfterStir the pot before pouring — the first and last of the extraction are not the same coffee.
Cold Brew
The most forgiving thing on this list and the best convincer we own. No heat means almost none of the acidity that puts people off, so what is left is sweetness and body. Make it as a concentrate and cut it to taste — over ice, with water, with milk, with tonic if it is April.
- Ratio
- 1 : 8
- Dose
- 100 g / 800 g
- Water
- Room, then cold
- Total time
- 16 hrs
Cupped best with MistRoot Forest Reserve
- 0:00100 g coarse into 800 g of filtered water at room temperature. Stir once to wet it all.
- 0:00–4:00Leave it on the counter. The first hours at room temperature do most of the extracting.
- 4:00–16:00Into the fridge for the rest. Beyond about twenty hours it turns woody.
- 16:00Strain through a cloth, then once more through paper. Do not squeeze the grounds.
- ServingThis is a concentrate. Start at one part coffee to two parts water or milk, then adjust.
Espresso
A good Robusta pulls the best shot we make — low acidity, heavy body, and a crema that actually holds. We go slightly long at 1:2.2 rather than 1:2, which keeps the chocolate sweet instead of letting it turn to ash. The Arabicas work here too; they simply want a finer grind and more patience.
- Ratio
- 1 : 2.2
- Dose
- 18 g / 40 g
- Water
- 93 °C
- Total time
- 28 s
Cupped best with MistRoot Estate Robusta
- Prep18 g in a clean basket. Distribute, then tamp level. Level matters more than hard.
- 0:00Lock in and start immediately. A hot basket sitting idle scorches the puck.
- 0:00–0:08First drops should appear between six and nine seconds. Later means grind coarser.
- 0:28Stop at 40 g in the cup. Weigh it — the eye lies about espresso every time.
- AfterTaste before you adjust anything, and change only one variable at a time.
The unglamorous half
Brewed coffee is about 98 per cent water.
Almost everything in the cup is water, which is why it is worth getting right. Every recipe above assumes water in this range — change nothing else and fix your water first.
Still not right?
Bring it to the table and we will taste it with you.
Bring your grinder settings and your worst cup to a pop-up, or send us what you are tasting and we will work through it with you.