Making coffee with the Clever Dripper (Pictorial)

[cwloo]

A follow up to the initial post by Yoon, with pictures and some changes to the recipe:

1) You'll need: Delicious coffee, scale, Clever Dripper, paper filter, grinder, timer, teaspoon, cup/vessel.


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2) Put filter into the Clever Dripper, pour hot water in to rinse the filter and to heat the dripper


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3) Weight your coffee beans. I use 23g here.


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4) Put the beans into the grinder, and grind away!


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5) Pour ground coffee into the filter. You'll need to drain off the hot water in the dripper first.


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6) Pour hot water into the dripper, wetting all the ground as you do. Start the timer as you start the pour. I use 330ml here.


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7) After 2 mins steeping time, put the dripper atop a vessel of your choice to begin draw-down. Give the coffee a stir as you start the draw-down.


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8 ) Stop the draw-down when you see the top of coffee bed. (Thanks Yoon for the scientifics)


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9) Coffee time!


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  Enjoy...

[steven]

Bought a CC Dripper from cwloo at Departure Lounge today. While I was making my first cuppa, i looked around for a cover to retain heat while the coffee was brewing. Guess what fits almost exactly? The insulated cover for our local half boiled egg dripper!

Here's a quick iphone pic attached.

[cwloo]

Hahaha, and did you use the water-dripping as your timer as well? 

Did you enjoy the coffee? Do kindly share with us any techniques that helped you making better coffee with it.

[steven]

Hahaha, and did you use the water-dripping as your timer as well? 

Did you enjoy the coffee? Do kindly share with us any techniques that helped you making better coffee with it.

Hahaha... No, I didn't use the egg dripper as a timer... that would be a waste of water!

Maybe next cuppa, I'll stick a thermometer in to see what the temperature drop is over 2 mins... with and without the insulated cover!

[Khorfee]

I have a question...

Should the coffee draw all the way down smoothly at an even pace without stalling as an indicator of how fine/coarse the grind should be?

[cwloo]

Khorfee,

From observations, with any grind size, the flow rate decreases as the drawdown approaches the end, due to less liquid weight and coffee bed compact-ness. Also, with finer grind size the flow rate near the end of drawdown would be slower than that of a coarser grind size, and this is observed easily.

How to you consider a complete drawdown to be? When all liquid is drained? I'd normally stop the drawdown when I see the top of the coffee bed, even so the flow rate is visually observed to slow considerably from start to stop.

However, why would you consider drawdown flow rate, and the respective grind size setting, to be the indicator of how well the coffee extraction was? 

[kkyoon]

I have not seen a big difference in drawdown when changing grind settings. However, I notice a smoother surface on the drained grounds. Too smooth means that the grind is too fine.

[cwloo]

However, I notice a smoother surface on the drained grounds. Too smooth means that the grind is too fine.

If the grind is to the fine side, the last quarter of the drawdown would have taken a longer time, increasing the possibility of over-extraction. Unless steep-time compensation can be reliably applied, perhaps stopping the drawdown earlier, before complete drainage, could yield a better cup. That said, the corelation between grind size and steep time can be relatively easy to experiment and the resulting cup tasted for comparison. However, personal liking will also play a part as to whether a brew is good or not.