Cold + Hot water pour-over recipe

[StillShaving]

Interesting v60 recipe posted by Tsubasa over at Kurasu in Japan. The basic approach is to bloom the coffee with room temperature water and finish brewing with boiling water. So it is very simple approach, not requiring any fancy equipment.

<What you need>​

- Coffee 14g (medium fine grind)​

- Room temperature water 40g​

- Boiling water 170g​

​

<Recipe>​

*Use room temperature water for the first pour only. ​

​

0:00 ~ 0:10 +40g ​

0:10 ~ 0:20 Agitate​

0:45 ~ 0:55 +80g (Total: 120g)​

1:15 ~ 1:30 +90g (Total: 210g)​

1:25 ~ Stir the coffee bed 3 times along the dripper surface​

​

Total Brew Time : around 3:00​

***​

Experimenting with various brewing temperatures is something I have longed intended to, but rarely have done so. Not wanting to have a tepid cup of coffee that might need reheating. Have any of you tried such unconventional approach? I am thinking this recipe might also make a good iced coffee.

A Home Brew Revolution: Recipe by Head Barista Tsubasa

Hi it's Tsubasa here! I've come up with a revolutionary home brew recipe and I'm excited to share it with you today. By the time you're finished with the blog, you'd be excited as I am in trying out this new recipe...Get your coffee beans ready! If you find the recipe and coffee impressive, call...

kurasu.kyoto

 

[APBinNCA]

I am reading too quickly, but my first reaction is: does this help preserve/release more of the natural acidity? That is usually the only reason I can think of for lower temps, but I wonder what the temperature difference in the finished brew is?

 

[StillShaving]

I am curious about the finished brew temperature as well. And how close this might come to original Aeropress recipe calling for 80-85 C degree water. I believe Alan Adler (Aeropress inventor) was trying to reduce acidity with the lower brewing temperature, so maybe this could produce something similar.

...Just did a crude calculation of the Tsubasa recipe to find that the average dripper temperature will be more or less the same as a regular brew. The average of 40g * 20C + 330g * 100C = 91 C (196 F). I was surprised to see it so close to the commonly recommended brew water temperature, making me wonder how much of that was coincidence and how much was targeting that average. Maybe this is a way to pull out more flavor, since the steeping will occur at different temperatures thoroughout? Some experimentation is needed.

 

[StillShaving]

The final temperature I posted above is incorrect. Using the correct numbers the average is 40g * 20C + 170g * 100C = 84.8 C (~185F). So still a fairly hot cup of coffee. I decided to try this recipe this morning and remembered enough of what I posted the night before to look for a mug that could hold something over 1/3 of a liter. I thought that was an odd amount for one person, but I thought maybe they were targeting making 2 small cups. Only when it came time to pour the water did I read more carefully to see that I had inadvertently used the running cumulative total.

I did not follow the recipe exactly, I used 15g of coffee and accidentally used about 60g of room temperature water for the bloom. But the resulting cup was pretty good, and seemed to have more body than my typical pour-over. I will be trying this approach again with a few different coffees.

 

[APBinNCA]

I am not sure if my brain is working right, but it looks like you are calculating temperature. I was thinking more along the lines of final measured temperature in cup/vessel. The small amount of water that makes it through in the bloom phase, has a longer time to cool than the rest of the water. This should only be 1-2C cooler overall. Maybe that is the point, that it has an affect on the cup quality(body, acidity) but doesn't dramatically affect final temperature. Which wouldn't be a good thing for most people.

 

[StillShaving]

I am not sure if my brain is working right, but it looks like you are calculating temperature. I was thinking more along the lines of final measured temperature in cup/vessel. The small amount of water that makes it through in the bloom phase, has a longer time to cool than the rest of the water. This should only be 1-2C cooler overall. Maybe that is the point, that it has an affect on the cup quality(body, acidity) but doesn't dramatically affect final temperature. Which wouldn't be a good thing for most people.

Yes, I was just calculating the idealized temperature without considering heat losses introduced by the dripper, cup, etc. Or think too hard what the shape of the temperature curve might look like throughout the brew. As it is unclear how much time the slurry will spend at any particular temperature. But I thought it could be useful to get a rough comparison to say brewing with a kettle of 200F water which would be subject to these same losses. Without factoring in things like preheating or heat losses.

I tried this recipe a couple of times today with some Colombian and Rwandan coffee. Each time I preheated the cup but one time did not heat the dripper. I found the temperature to be okay for drinking if a bit lower that I might prefer. I liked the Colombian more than the Rwandan but that could have been the roast or the smaller details of the pour and stirring which I was not consistent with. The Rwandan seemed to be missing some of the brightness it otherwise has, but still okay.

 

[MurderousCrow]

This is interesting. I used to do something similar for Aeropress when at one workplace, the only hot water was near-boiling from a dedicated tap. I'd bloom the coffee with a bit of cold first to reduce the overall temp to something acceptable - there was no hard data involved though, I just used to slosh a bit of cold in, stir it and hope for the best. It was usually tasty but I wouldn't say revolutionary.

Thanks for the info and link. I will give it a try.