9 Guides
Foundations
The explainers everything else links to.
- What extraction isExtraction is water dissolving flavor out of coffee, in a rough order over time. Pull too little and the cup tastes sour; too much and it turns bitter. Taste tells you which way to move.
- How to dial in a brewDialing in means changing one thing at a time and tasting the result. Grind is your first lever. Sour means under-extracted, bitter means over-extracted, weak means too little coffee.
- The brew ratioThe brew ratio is the weight of coffee against the weight of water, written 1:N. It sets how strong the cup is, not how it extracted. Start near 1:16 and adjust from there.
- Grind sizeGrind size is the strongest lever you have over a cup. Finer slows the water and pulls more flavor; coarser speeds it up and pulls less. Match the grind to the method, and adjust it first when the cup tastes off.
- Water temperatureHotter water pulls more flavor from the grounds; cooler water pulls less. Filter coffee sits around 90 to 96 °C. Use temperature as the fine adjustment when a cup is already close.
- Freshness and storageRoasted coffee tastes best in a window that opens a few days after roasting and closes a few weeks later. Keep whole beans airtight, cool, and dark, and grind them just before you brew.
- Which water to useA cup of coffee is almost all water, so the water shapes the taste. Use clean, filtered water with a moderate mineral content. Skip distilled and very hard water.
- Measuring extraction: TDS, yield, and the refractometerA deep-dive on measuring coffee extraction: read strength as TDS on a refractometer, compute extraction yield, and place the cup on the SCA Brewing Control Chart for repeatable brews.
- Water chemistry for brewing: minerals, recipes, and ppmA deep-dive into brewing water chemistry: what GH, KH, and TDS mean, the SCA mineral targets in ppm, and how to mix your own coffee water from RO with mineral salts.