which coffee should I buy?

vermooten

I have a nice cafetiere.

But no matter what coffee I get, it tastes rubbish. I want to have the same coffee that they sell in cafes in France, I get the sense immediately that it's different to what I've been using.

Any recommendations?

ride_whenever

Mexican coffee,

it is soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo good, currently they only do phone orders, but basically they ship the beans to the uk raw, and you phone them up, they blend as roast as you request and ship it to you by overnight courier, roasting-to inside 24 hours!!!!


Words cannot express how good this stuff is.

APIII

Get yourself a stove-top expresso pot. They're about £15-£20 and will make a fine cup of coffee.
If you want some 'froth' on your coffe you can then stick some milk in your cafetiere and plunge up and down for a minute or so, and hey presto frothy milk

Stewie Griffin

Kimbo is first choice, Lavazza my second but I dont use a cafetiere, I have a stove/hob pot.

http://www.aromatico.co.uk/kimbo-coffee ... p-373.html

http://www.aromatico.co.uk/lavazza-coff ... p-165.html

I have never had coffee from a cafetiere and thought wow, I need this, unlike coffee from a stove pot. First time I had that it was "Wow, I need this" 8) .

Quick Edt; I have never used this Co to order coffee, just came up when I googled it. Get mine from a deli. My stove top coffee pot cost about £4.

iainf72

There can be only one.

http://www.tdcoffee.com/home.php



I don't drink coffee so I wouldn't really know.

daniel_b

I would go for an Irish Coffee

Jez mon

Is it the way your storing the coffee, for a while my mother had an obsession with decanting everything into plastic containers and the coffee began to taste cr*p. I find the Lavazza stuff good btw.

mhuk

The key to good coffee is how fresh the beans are. I roast my own but failing that Hasbean.co.uk sell freshly roasted beans. If you're trying to make a good cup of coffee from pre-ground coffee you can't do it.

Using freshly roasted beans rather than the coffee maker will have the biggest impact on taste (although a French Press, espresso machine or Italian screw-together stove top pot will each make a different tasting cup of cofee).

ride_whenever

Which is why i like the coffee i mentioned above, it is insanely fresh! And


YUUUUUUUUUUUUUUMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY

crown_jewel

This is an excellent source for coffee: http://terroircoffee.com/

captain_oakley

Jamaican 'Blue Mountain'...... not cheap, but fantastic.


'Butt's Up, Doc'

Doobz

Lavazza and illy is good stuff..

Also if you go into starbucks you can get some fresh beans ground for you

synchronicity

Only people living in Italy, France or Spain should be qualified to answer this question.

People have written volumes about making coffee. I used to live in OZ where half of these bloody books were written by 'coffee experts'. Most of it is rubbish because the coffee (not the beans, but the end product) itself is rubbish. Tastes like it's got sawdust in it, so I was always a tea-drinker.

Since coming here, things have changed...

I use caracol, a local Canarian brand, but remember that it's all in the preparation.
http://farm1.static.flickr.com/225/4715 ... d3.jpg?v=0

We use the cafetera method, exclusively. It takes time to prepare, it takes time to boil, and no one ever wants to clean the darn thing out, most people in Spain that I know use this method (apart from the local bars).

expresso love

I use Columbian for preference - more fruity - and avoid dark expresso roasts, altho' that's what I drink in Europe. Make it strong and black, pour into a small china cup with just enough sugar to cut through the bitterness, sip, sit back and think you're in a French cafe. Pretentious? Moi?
Life is too short to drink crap coffee.

Expresso Love

vermooten

wow... didn't expect such a response, that's great thanks! The links are ace thanks.

Lessons learned:

I've got a little stove thingy somewhere, must dig it out.
Fresh beans ground by me is the way to go.
Lavazza is also pretty good in case I can't be bothered?

mrushton

Your cafetiere requires a much coarser grind than the stove top pots. Coffee suppliers generally recomend a single estate coffee for cafetieres and a blend for the espresso type pots/machines. For my cafetiere I use a Sumatran coffee and for the Gaggia or Bialetti i use a blend called Siena; both are supplied from www.e-coffee.co.uk

mhuk

Once you've tasted freshly roasted, Lavazza and the other Italian coffee whose name I forget both taste harsh.

If you're passing Worcester you're welcome to pop in for some coffee (espresso, French Press or the Italian stove top)

p.s. have a look at http://www.coffeetimeuk.com/ and http://www.toomuchcoffee.com/ if you're really like coffee.

And it's good for you: http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style ... 01665.html

Scrumple

Has to be roasted within 48 hrs. and allowed to breathe.
hasbean are fantastic, and Steve will give you all the advice you need (email them?).

Supermarket packed stuff is naff in comparison. Lavazza is adequate, but more of on espresso blend.

My best advice... go for a hasbean subscription: £30 summat for a bag a month of "house" recommended coffee. You'll get to try different roasts, and types.

No one here has pointed out that the same beans can be roasted from light to dark, and the taste changes (it has NOTHING to do with strength).
You need to taste test a few types and settle on a style you like. And for true freshness, grind it as you use it, and bin beans over 2 or 3 weeks old.

Or, just accept the stuff on the supermarket shelf.

neeb

There is a bit of an art to making something close to espresso using one of those stove-top Bialetti things, but it can be done, and it's much cheaper than getting a real espresso machine. Probably the coffee in the French cafe you are thinking of is based on some sort of espresso.

You need to experiment with the fineness of the grind and how tightly you pack the coffee in the little round metal thing. You can't really pack it in like you would for a proper espresso machine as the pressure of the water from underneath won't be enough to get through the coffee without getting stuck and making it bitter. If the coffee is too loose you will just get watery coffee though, which will be no improvement from what you would get from a filter or jug but in a much smaller quantity... I have both the 1 cup and the 3 cup version of the Bialetti. For the 3 cup one I just tap the metal thing on the bench to make the coffee settle a bit more tightly, but the 1 cup version actually needs it to be pressed in. Fill it right up to the top and skim the extra off with the back of a knife.

Freshly ground is definitely the way to go, and a moderately dark roast works best for espresso (especially if you are having it the proper way, just black with sugar). Is there a Whittards in Manchester? Their stuff is usually far better and fresher than anything out of the supermarket. If you don't want to buy a grinder at least buy the coffee from somewhere they will grind it for you when you buy it, and keep it as airtight as possible. Ground coffee goes off at about the same rate (and for similar reasons) as an opened bottle of wine does.

the ferry

........drink earl grey at home.....and look forward to trips out and holidays for good cofee 8)

vermooten

So getting it right is an art - something I've believed ever since seeing Mulholland Drive.



Should one roast one's own beans? With what?

Stewie Griffin

Just had my morning shot. it will start to work soon, as will I as a result .

unclemalc

You Sodz coffee, coffee, coffee, is that all you can talk about.... :shock:

I am somewhere where a decent cup of coffee can be found next to the Holy Grail if you wan to look for it...


aaaaaaahhhhhhh :shock:

neeb

THIS is the label on the front of the coffee I usually buy here in Finland - perfectly sums up the addict's relationship to the evil god espresso!

Nuggs

Vermooten - when it comes to coffee, you owe it to youself to get the best.

I've used french presses, Bialetti stove top thingies, an expensive Gaggia espresso machine but by far and away the best coffee I have ever drunk at home is Nespresso stuff.



Coffee comes in packed-fresh capsules, so each cup of coffee is as fresh as the last. I know the die-hard DIY fans will scoff at using capsules, but they really are great.

danseur

A further question for the coffee gods:

When using one of the stove top coffee makers, how hard do you boil the water? A quick blast or a slow rolling boil?

One day I'll make something tasty using mine!

neeb

When using one of the stove top coffee makers, how hard do you boil the water? A quick blast or a slow rolling boil?

I am cursed with having to use an electric hob at the moment. I usually turn on the small hob at full power and leave it to warm up while I grind and pack the coffee, so it's reasonably hot when the pot goes on. More of a quick blast then. With gas you have far more control, I would think a moderately high flame would be best. You don't want to do it too gradually as that is more likely to make the coffee bitter if it is packed densely. Basically it's a trade-off between the heat (or pressure in the bottom of the pot), the fineness of the grind and how densely it is packed, so you could get similar results with a courser grind more firmly packed and a fine one loosely packed. You need to experiment lots and when you get it right, be completely consistent! The main difference from a real espresso machine is that with the latter you can get much higher pressures and control it more precisely.

Other things I do - boil a small amount of water in the kettle and use this to pre-warm the top of the pot first, and also pre-warm the espresso cup. Otherwise the coffee is luke-warm by the time you drink it.

Remove the pot from the hob soon after the coffee has stopped flowing into the top (or after it has started producing foam rather than coffee for a couple of seconds, often accompanied by that wonderful gurgling sound).

Disclaimer: this is all just the result of my personal obsessive fiddling, I am no barista... (I seem to have annoyed some people on other threads by unintentionally sounding authoritative about things I only have opinions on! )

Special K

If you dig out your stove top pot, then just remember to boil up a couple of lots of coffee before tasting. The first lot of coffee from a new or disused pot is always a bit nasty. Don't put the pot in the dishwasher. Rinsing and allow to dry is essential so that the ruber seal does not rot and the pot doesn't smell.

Otherwise I would second all the other advice about keeping the coffee fresh etc etc. Can't go wrong with Lavazza...

Scrumple

If you want the Daddy roaster, google "hottop"

synchronicity

neeb and Special K are right on.

I have a hunch that the cafetera method works better with gas. Most people (here at least) have gas. You're right in that it depends on the size... the most common we use is the 3 cup version, but now and then the large-sized cafetera comes out... 8 cups? I've seen a MEGA one in a shop here that is almost a metre high! They're all identical, just the scale is enormous!! :shock:

I just level the aluminium cup off with coffee... generally overfilling with water, a little bit past the line to make it a bit weaker & get a bit more out of it.

NOTE: I only like to drink it with milk as the expressos are too strong. I don't know all the locals manage to drink that stuff... I can only manage it if I'm in someone else's house & too chicken to ask for milk. The resulting coffee is almost as good as you can get in Italy.

I use the medium hob. Too much flame & you melt the plastic handle :!:. Too little flame and it can take 10+ minutes I think... you can't sit there all day waiting for that to boil.

Upon first use (or a new ubber seal) load it up with water but no coffee & boil it this way once or twice... rids the o-ring of some chemicals.

donaldinho

vermooten wrote:

So getting it right is an art - something I've believed ever since seeing Mulholland Drive.

Did you know that David Lynch has got his own ESPRESSO

I usually get Lavazza or Illy, but my favourite is Bei e Nannini. It's a bit harder to find unfortunately, though a lot of good Italian restaurants serve it.
http://www.beienannini.com/