First, remove the top and preheat your French press with some hot water. You can preheat your cup at this time as well.
2. Water to coffee ratio of 16:1
We’ll be using a water to coffee ratio of 16:1. This is a great starting point, but you may find that a little more or a little less coffee is suitable to your palate. I’ll be using 50g, or about 7 tablespoons of whole bean coffee and 800g of water in total.
3. Grind your coffee
Once you’ve weighed out your coffee, we’ll grind it on a setting that is quite a bit more coarse than what we’d use for standard drip. While the coffee’s grinding we can pour out the water used for preheating the French press.
4. Start Brewing
Add your coffee to the French press, tare your scale, and you’re ready to brew! Start a 4-minute timer and begin by pouring in half of the total volume of water, or about 400g. We’ll then let the coffee bloom for a total of 45 seconds. This step is important as it allows the grounds to fully saturate, ensuring a uniform extraction.
5. Add The Rest Of The Water
Now we can add the remaining water bringing the total weight up to 800g. Place the top back on the French press to help retain heat, but don’t press the filter down quite yet as we want the coffee to continue brewing.
6. Serve
Now that we’ve reached our 4-minute brew time, slowly press the filter down through the coffee. Empty your preheated cup and pour a fresh cup of coffee.
6. Keeping The Coffee Warm
And one more thing: if you’re not ready to serve all the coffee quite yet, pour it into an insulated container. This will help keep it warm and avoid over-extraction, because as long as water is in contact with the grounds it will continue to extract. Cheers!
