The Beginners Guide To Pour Over Coffee

Have you stood in line at a coffee shop and overheard people ordering pour over coffee (a.k.a, brewed coffee?)

Perhaps you got curious and ordered one yourself? I assume you’re here because that cup of pour over coffee blew your mind. You loved it so much that you decided to find out if you can make it at home (yes, you can!).

It’s about time you learned how to brew great coffee like a true coffee hipster.

What exactly is Pour Over Coffee?

Have you ever wondered what is pour over coffee? What makes this style of coffee so damn special? It's all in the process, and the result. It’s preferred among coffee enthusiasts because it allows you to control factors such as taste and strength better than other brewing methods. After you try it for yourself you’ll definitely be wondering where this method has been all of your coffee drinking life!

The 3 Basic Elements of Great Pour Over Filter Coffee:

• Freshly ground coffee
• A coffee filter (of some sort)
• A pour over brewer (duh)

In simple terms: you create a very clean tasting brew by drizzling water over a coffee bed, slowly, to extract the coffee from the beans, and it’s all collected by your cup or carafe. Steven from Home Grounds provides an excellent introduction for beginners in this video guide:

Manual brewing may sound simple, but creating that perfect brew isn't easy. It will require patience, practice and persistence… As is the case with the finer things in life.

But don’t worry – you’re about to learn the secrets.

Equipment List for Filter Coffee

Don't cut corners if you want to make amazing coffee. Apart from the obvious – a pour over/drip coffee maker, here are the tools you'll need:

• A pour over coffee maker
• A coffee filter (the type reliant on the brewer you choose)
• A high quality burr coffee grinder
• A ‘gooseneck kettle‘ (You need hot water to flow at the optimal rate. You achieve this by using a special pour over kettle)
• A thermometer of some way of controlling the water temperature.
• A coffee scale that measures in grams
• A serving vessel (optional)
• Good quality water

Before doing anything else, make sure you have the right pour over brewer. Watch Steven from Home Grounds tell you all about the best 5 brewer picks:

How To Make Pour Over Coffee

Grind beans, add water, drink delicious coffee. Sounds easy, right? The truth is, this brew style rewards practice and patience.

But follow this step by step guide and you can brew the coffee of your dreams – rich, smooth, aromatic – everything you want it to be and more.

Before anything else – let's learn why you need good-quality water:

1. Heat water to 90 to 96 degrees Celsius.

Getting the water temperature right is critical: 90 – 96 degrees Celsius.

If you don’t have a thermometer, use this simple trick: wait for the water to boil, then remove from heat and wait 30 seconds before brewing.

If you want to bring a little technology into the process, try a smart kettle. These kettles will bring the water to a certain temperature and keep it there until you’re ready to use it.

An industry favourite, and one I absolutely love, is the Bonavita digital variable temperature pour over kettle. Its beautiful, easy to use and will set you water at temperature to the perfect level as long as you want it to.

2. Weigh your coffee.

How much coffee do you need? The biggest flavour factor is the ratio of water to coffee. A popular recommendation uses 18 grams of water for every gram of coffee.

This works out to between 9 and 11 grams of coffee for every 180-ml (180 gram) cup you brew. But ask a dozen baristas, and their answers may vary between 16:1 and 19:1. Why? Because they like the way their coffee tastes.

As a VERY general rule, more coffee = more flavour.

How will you know what tastes best for you? Try different ratios (you ARE using a scale, right?) and make notes.

3. Rinse/Wet your filter.

This is an important step to remember lest you end up with coffee that has a hint of paper in the final product. Get rid of the paper taste by rinsing the filter.

To rinse correctly, you simply need to place the brewer in the dripper and then pour water around it in a circle (making sure to get up the sides) for about five seconds to rinse the filter, then discard the water in the cup or carafe that ran through it.

Need convincing? Do this once and take a whiff of the wet-cardboard stink coming off the filter paper. You’ll never skip this step again.

Don’t forget to pour the stink-water out of the carafe. Nobody wants to drink that.

While you're here, watch our video on different filter types:

4. Grind the coffee.

Grinding your coffee just before brewing gives you fine control (see what we did there?) over flavour. A finer grind gives more flavour but can introduce bitterness. A coarser grind makes a sweeter cup but can be under-extracted, acidic and weak.

Your assignment: find the happy medium (the perfect particle size). Most pour over experts recommend a medium-fine grind, like sea salt or sand.

Feeling scientific? Select the middle of your grinder’s range and test your brew (note down the result for next time). Want it milder? Grind it coarser. Want it richer? Grind it finer.

Now add your ground coffee to the rinsed filter, and…

5. Pour water.

Pouring the water has two parts: bloom and brew time.

Bloom: Pour a little water (30 grams or so) over the grounds and let them soak it up. You’ll see the grounds swell, rise, and bubble. Allow 30 seconds for the bloom to finish.

Brew time: Pour the rest of the water over the grounds slowly.Start at the center and move out in a widening spiral so as to wet all the grounds evenly. Stop when you’ve added water to your chosen ratio.

Some pour over brewers require a simple pouring technique, others, like the Hario V60, require some skill.

Now, all that in a video form:

Pour Over Coffee Ratio

The water ratio is where you have the most control over your coffee’s flavour. S​trong or weak? Rich or mild? Blah or bitter? Here’s how to nail the perfect brew.

The Specialty Coffee Association’s “golden ratio” recommends 55 grams of coffee per liter of water (1). That works out to be around 9-11 grams for every 180-ml cup. A few taps on the calculator and this works out to an 18:1 water-to-coffee ratio.

But some baristas brew at 16:1 or 19:1. Why? Because they like the way their coffee tastes.

So if these ratios are just a guideline, how do you know what’s right for you? Experiment. Jot down the weight of your coffee and the weight of water and brew a cup.

Now sip your coffee. Does it taste rich? Is it a little weak? Is it stronger or more bitter than you like?

If you’ve written down the ratio, here’s how to get closer to your ideal taste:

You should have the perfect cup after a few tries.

Tips To Help You NAIL The Perfect Brew

These tips may seem simple, but it’s the little things, all working together, that really make the difference with this style of brewing:

Remember that your grinder is your secret ingredient

The reason we, as coffee geeks, go through all of this is for one thing: Taste.

You take the time to pick the right beans for pour over coffee and research the process, so you need to take the time to choose the right kind of grinder too.

As with ALL types of coffee brewing, your grind is going to be very important because it impacts the timing. Remember, this is a process and any part of with a hiccup will impact the end product. You have to be able to control the grind in order to control the timing. The grind size is a crucial factor in manually brewing filter coffee.

The folks at Kicking Horse Coffee agree.

A coarse grind will produce larger coffee granules, and that causes the water to percolate through the granules at a faster rate. The opposite is true of a finer grind since the granules are much smaller. They will stop the water from easily percolating through them and extracting the flavour.

Being off just a little will either over-extract the coffee or under-extract it.

That’s why you need a really good coffee grinder to help you achieve consistent grinds and hence, even extraction of your coffee grounds. I can’t stress this enough – you absolutely need grounds that are uniform in size. If you really want to understand grinding (you should) and you need a grind size chart – take a squiz at our coffee grind size chart here.

Now that you know how important your coffee grounds are in brewing amazing coffee, let's make some darn coffee, shall we?

Don't skip the bloom

Here's an important concept: wetting, or blooming. Buckle up everyone, because it’s science!

A by-product of grinding those lovely coffee beans is the buildup of carbon dioxide in the grinds (2). This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but the carbon dioxide won’t allow the water to penetrate the grinds fully unless it is released first. You release the carbon dioxide by blooming or wetting the coffee.

As part of any good coffee making process, you will pour enough water into your grounds to wet them, then you’ll watch them bloom – this is when they release carbon dioxide. Do this by:

1. Adding just the right amount of water to get all the grounds wet.
2. Stopping for about 30 seconds to let the carbon dioxide escape.
3. Watching the grounds expand and swell – it’s blooming!

At this point, the grounds also release a wonderful smell. So go ahead and breathe in the heavenly aroma. You deserve it.

Be consistent (and keep a record)

One of the most important things you can do in this process is to practice consistency. Not only will it help you to correct any mistakes you make along the way because, hey, you’re only human; it will also allow you to experiment when you get the basics down. Because as our friends at Perfect Daily Grind would say (3):

So, for the love of all that is coffee, practice good consistency with these tips:

• Use a good quality scale that is accurate.
• Use a high-quality burr grinder.
• Follow a brewing guide very closely (so you get even extraction).
• If you really want to nail it – record everything in the beginning (use a brew journal, so you know where to start next time).

For example – let's say you create a really really good brew. Record how you did it: Maybe you used ‘X' amount of coffee, your water was ‘X' degrees in temperature, and you spent ‘X' minutes pouring; Write it down in a notebook, and slightly change variables to get different results!

Don’t ignore the cleaning part

Cleaning your gear is the least sexy part about making coffee, but Sweet Maria's mentions in their framework for brewing the best cup of coffee (4).

Give your brewing equipment the clean it deserves once you’re finished with it to ensure its devoid of coffee oils before you begin next time. Your taste buds will thank you.

There are many resources available to help you how to learn to use your new pour over brewing equipment. Two of the best resources on the market are Scott Rao’s Everything but Espresso and Blue Bottles Craft of Coffee Book by James Freeman et al.

Another good trick is to try recipes from the world's best. Steven from Home Grounds does exactly that, sampling three World Brewers Cup champion recipes in this video:

Choosing a Brewer

Now that you know all about how to brew the perfect cup of pour over or drip coffee, it’s time to choose what equipment you want to use. Choosing a brewer is like choosing a spouse – you have to make sure it’s the right one so you can navigate the trials and tribulations of the journey together.

It’s not as simple as buying the one that you think looks best. Each brewer has its own personality, its own ‘needs' and ultimately results in a different experience. Some you will love, some you will not.

Here's what I mean. Some pour over brewers can be used with standard paper filters; others with special filters only available online. Some brewers will require a meticulous setup and brewing process; others just require a bed of grounds and water.

Need a suggestion? Choose a pour over coffee maker from our list, but I'd recommend the Kalita Wave brewer if you're just starting out.

This article gave you an overview of pour over brewing in general. To see what the brewing process of a particular pour over dripper is like, check out these brewing guides:

• Hario V60 brewing guide
• Clever dripper pour over recipe
• Chemex brew guide
• Kalita Wave Brew guide

What You Need for Pour Over (or Drip) Coffee

Don't cut corners if you want to make amazing coffee. Here are some extra tools you'll need:

• A coffee filter (the type reliant on the brewer you choose)
• A good coffee grinder (I stressed this earlier but its so important that its worth repeating!)
• A special kettle. Hot water isn't enough. You need hot water at the optimal flow rate.
• You achieve this by using a special pour over kettle: here are the best gooseneck kettles
• A coffee scale that measures in grams – because it's all about being precise.
• A thermometer of some way of controlling the water temperature.
• A serving vessel (optional)
• To take your pour over to the next level, get granular with your grinds using something like the Kruve sifter.

Final Thoughts

And that just about wraps it up for this beginners guide to hand filter coffee. Once you master the basics as outlined above you’ll be able to start experimenting with new brewers and controlling your brew based on your mood! If you're looking to further refine your coffee brewing experience, here are some cool coffee brewing Youtube channels you can subscribe to.

Any tips we left out that you’d like to add? We’d love to hear about them – leave a comment below!