Coffee

Increasingly I've realized I not only get jittery and irritable but my work concentration is much worse.

^^ wrong thread obv, but reducing my coffee intake to just one cup in the morning was the best thing i ever did

so much less anxiety, better concrentration, sleep etc

"...better concrentration..." Well ...

one just never feels like its ~enough~

caffeine demon is strong w me tho tbh

Might try to cut down because ive been doing a few full training days and my christ i cant do five mins without the brainskitters

Feeling the one cup a day thing and I think I've posted about it here before, too. These days I'm doing a cup when I wake up, then a half right around lunch. I nurse each serving in a Yeti for an hour or so. It's still too much caffeine, but that first cup just isn't satisfying enough. It definitely hinders more than helps my focus as well. It's gotten to where I've been on the fence about buying more coffee gear because I'm not certain I'll still be drinking it in a year or two. Like, I really want this $299 burr grinder, but that's a hard cost to justify for a cup a day and considering weaning out caffeine entirely.

If I’m drinking at home, which is usually the case, I have one cup when I wake up and one at 3 pm. In both cases it’s not uncommon to still be sipping on the same cup two hours later. If drinking out, it takes me about an hour to make it through a 12 oz with milk.

should i do a poll about how many times it is acceptable to microwave the same cup of coffee

I always imagine it messes up the milk

I mean, do as you please but I haven't been able to find a way to reheat coffee that doesn't make it taste bad to me. I've tried low power microwaving and that slightly improves the result but it's ultimately still bad. Not gonna say I haven't done it when I didn't feel like making an entirely new pot.

That's probably more because the coffee is old than that it's being re-heated. Especially if it got old sitting on the maker's heating plate.

I'm currently on one 10oz mug in the morning and another usually in the afternoon. Sometimes I'll replace the afternoon cup with an espresso drink or a pot of tea.

thermal carafe is the only way to live

Day 1 of the Kalita experiment: my theory about it reducing my consumption is working so far, it's almost 11am and I haven't gone for a second cup yet, and feeling much more focused and less jittery. Also it was delicious. I think I used a little more grinds than I needed -- I was skeptical that so little would do the trick, but it came out very strong even by my standards.

is there any diff between Kalita and hario?

Or any other pour over?

i'm a savage and i microwave my coffee every other day. in fact i look forward to it when i get up and realize i will have coffee in 90 seconds instead of waiting for water to boil.

I enjoy the wait

is there any diff between Kalita and hario?

― flopson, Thursday, April 1, 2021 5:01 PM (four hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

Or any other pour over?

― mom tossed in kimchee (quincie), Thursday, April 1, 2021 6:50 PM (three hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

I mean, Hario is cone shaped so it funnels the water through into a single spot, whereas the Kalita is more cylindrical and has multiple holes. I could see that making some difference but I don't know if it's huge and no idea what would make one superior to the other.

Ultimately it seems to me like the main thing that would matter in the design of the pour-over thingy is the effect it has on the speed of the water pouring through.

James Hoffman has suggested in a couple videos that what matters most in a pourover thingy is keeping the water hot enough, so plastic pourover thingys that insulate are better than glass or ceramic, and best of all apparently is the Fellow pourover thingy that's insulated.

Mine is stainless steel, but it seems like the water spends such a small amount of time inside it that the material wouldn't matter much.

I mean I probably couldn't taste the difference, but this is the internet and I'm a guy so I had to post.

srsly what am I going to do not opine on something?

i totally buy that not all pour overs are created equal, even though it seems insane that ‘pour boiling water on coffee which drips through hole’ can yield different results, because when i make coffee in hario v60 it’s a fine cup whereas when my gf makes chemex it tastes awful

You can definitely get different results with a pour-over with slight differences in technique, grind, etc. I have both a Hario V60 and Kalita Wave 185 which I switch between depending on the type of bean. I tend to like the results I get with the Hario especially with Ethiopian and similar African coffees with more floral notes. I find the Kalita is better for Central American coffees with a milder more caramel-like flavor. But there are lots of variables that can affect the results, so it's possible that these results could be achieved with either one.

Speaking of Hoffmann and reheating... he has a reheating video. He concludes that maintaining temperature is best. But if you have to reheat, the microwave is best if you can avoid overheating, which could take some experimentation. His ranking:

1. Ember mug
2. Thermos
3. Microwave
4. Pot/Stove
5. Steam wand

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yqgKlqAUM9g

At the very start of the pandemic, when for perhaps the first time in my life I had to consider what absolute essentials I wanted or needed to horde in case of disruption/discontinuation, for some reason one of the only things that came to mind was Chemex filters, so loaded up on four boxes of 100. Now (about a year later - math!) I dug out the last of the four and decided to buy some backups, so only just realized that apparently I made it through a Chemex filter shortage that still hasn't totally corrected itself. Bourgeois disaster averted!

lol

I realized recently that I've been cutting back on my consumption recently, too, and it's been great— I used to go through approximately four cups a day. Now I sometimes don't even drink a half-cup in the early afternoon, as was my wont for a bit.

My intake has slowly crept up to 2 cups of coffee in the morning + often a cup of tea in the afternoon.

i’m doing 2 cups of drip in the morning
then a latte in the afternoon, usually after i finish work

1 cup in the morning, then a small espresso-type drink after lunch. I used to crash in the afternoon, now that's pretty rare. Dunno if that has to do with caffeine consumption.

2-3 cofs in the a.m.

1 cof in the p.m.

feels good man

1.5-2 cofs in the a.m.
1 8 oz capp at 2pm

Unlikely to change because why?

Pret has this deal in NY now where you can get unlimited drip coffees for $10 a month

when i drip you drip we drip

Pret coffee is solid, I would absolutely do that if I still worked near a Pret.

Right now my typical consumption is one first thing in the morning, another around maybe 11, and potentially one in the afternoon depending how much I'm working.

I agree Pret cof is good. Used to be my regular go-to when I worked near one, definitely preferable to Starbucks.

Oh and I got the Fellow Prismo (attachment to Aeropress to make espresso-like cof.) I tried it today and it was good.

Pain in the ass to hand-grind 20g to espresso grind levels, though. I could feel the desire for an electric grinder arise. I'll put a vise in my kitchen to hold my hand grinder before I buy an expensive-ass electric espresso grinder though.

lol i tried a hand grinder once, that belonged to someone else, and the length of time to grind one cup's worth of coffee was comical - i honestly felt that i was the victim of a joke

It's totally fine if you're grinding for just a cup of coffee!

For espresso though ... uh ... maybe I'll get used to it?

Do you have to grind it that fine for the Prismo? I thought they were just a way to do a right-side-up Aeropress without the water running through the grounds into the cup. I was thinking about getting one, but as a hand grinder, that makes me less interested.

I've mentioned before but I've been using the same Krups grinder since 2003. I know how many seconds to grind the beans to get to the desired state depending on brew method. I will cry when it dies.

(also worth mentioning is that I've lived in 20+ different places since 2003, so my dedication to coffee and fresh ground beans is thoroughly understood)

I agree Pret cof is good. Used to be my regular go-to when I worked near one, definitely preferable to Starbucks.

― o. nate, Thursday, 29 April 2021 21:20 (yesterday) link

We were really excited when they added Prets to some of the NJ Turnpike rest stops since that's our route on the way to my folks (not only best coffee option but best food option). We had a running joke where we would prattle on about Pret like effete city snobs (which I guess we are) whenever we approached a rest stop.

I'm definitely an effete snob when it comes to coffee. I've accepted my fate. I used to be perfectly happy with burnt truck-stop coffee, but my eyes of been opened and I can't go back. Of the NYC chains that are relatively easy to find in midtown, for drip coffee, my top 3 were Bluestone Lane (priciest), Gregory's, and Pret (best value). Luckily I could usually find at least one of those nearby, or sometimes a smaller boutique shop.

Recently I splurged and bought a 1/2 lb of Maui estate beans. I think it's the most expensive variety my coffee shop sells, and they only carry it at Easter and Christmas. I found the taste to be very light with what I'd call a slight sourness compared to my usual Papua New Guinea bean. I liked it more the more times I tried it, but I won't make a habit of it because of the availability issue (I guess I could order some but I'm faithful to my neighborhood coffee shop) and overall I still prefer my Papua, which also is about 1/2 the price.

i have had the same blend autoshipping to me every two weeks from Olympia Coffee Roasters for basically the whole pandemic, it's fine, I had a moment yesterday where I desperately wanted diner coffee and eggs and hash browns and felt like I would gladly saw off my own leg to go eat at a breakfast place