Good coffee is enjoyable to drink black. Poor coffee needs cream and sugar to kill the bad taste. One secret to good coffee is a scrupulously clean coffee maker. An oily residue settles out of brewed coffee and then turns rancid, giving a nasty flavor to the next pot of coffee until it gets washed away in hot soapy water. Some coffee makers, percolators especially, have interior nooks and crannies that are impossible to clean, short of wrecking the thing. Whereas the French press is the most easily cleaned coffee maker out there. The old all glass vacuum Silex was OK providing you had a long thin brush to clean the inside of the suction tube to the upper bowl. The all glass Chemex with the paper filters is OK. I don't trust the plastic Mr. Coffee machines, I think the plastic takes up the rancid taste of coffee oils. For myself I have been using a small two cup French press I got from LaHoutes camping supply store.
I get excellent results buying plain ground canned coffee. The $3 a can Shurfine Columbian makes as good a cup of coffee as the $10 a can Dunkin Donuts and Green Mountain Coffee Roasters. I keep the coffee can in the refrigerator to reduce evaporation of the coffee essences.
My rural water supply system has gone ape on chlorine lately, the tap water can smell like a swimming pool. I let my coffee water stand in a pitcher on the kitchen table overnight. Improves everything.
I put two rounded tablespoons of coffee and a shake of the salt cellar into the French press. The salt smooths out the flavor and takes the edge off the bitterness. Fill it up with boiling water and let it brew four minutes.
Good coffee, drinkable black.
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