Drip Bag Coffee Brewing Tutorial Guide How Many Times Can You Brew Drip Coffee Bags

Coffee has now become everyone's "daily spiritual nourishment." FrontStreet Coffee believes that drip bag coffee is a simplified version of pour-over coffee, and the portability of drip bag coffee precisely breaks down the complexity of needing complex equipment for brewing specialty coffee.

When did drip bag coffee appear?

In 2001, Japan's UCC Ueshima Coffee Company invented drip bag coffee and registered a patent, subsequently launching it to the market. In Japanese, it's called "one-cup extraction type coffee." This is because its principle involves putting coffee powder in a filter bag made of non-woven fabric or cotton paper, with two paper boards on the outside that can be opened and hung on narrow-mouthed cups. After brewing, you can simply extract it to enjoy aromatic black coffee.

Pros and Cons of Drip Bag Coffee

The structure of drip bag coffee consists of a coffee filter bag with "ears" containing a pre-measured amount of pre-ground coffee powder. It eliminates the tedious steps in pour-over coffee such as grinding coffee beans and preparing filter paper and drippers, allowing you to proceed directly to brewing. It's a coffee product perfect for busy office workers looking to steal moments of relaxation.

However, every advantage comes with a disadvantage. While drip bag coffee offers convenience, due to pre-ground coffee and the lack of assistance from a dripper, its flavor is slightly inferior to freshly ground pour-over coffee.

Advantages

Drip bag coffee is essentially a super-simplified version of pour-over coffee. Its structure consists of a coffee filter bag with "ears" containing a pre-measured amount of pre-ground coffee powder, eliminating tedious operations like grinding coffee beans and preparing filter paper and drippers in pour-over coffee, allowing for direct brewing.

Disadvantages

While convenient, because the coffee powder is ground in advance, even with individual sealed packaging, the coffee's aroma cannot be preserved for extended periods. Therefore, FrontStreet Coffee only sells drip bag coffee within 5 days of production and recommends consumption within 30 days, so we don't recommend stocking up on too many drip bags at once. Additionally, due to the design of the drip filter bag, the coffee grounds cannot be evenly distributed, making it impossible to achieve the even extraction possible with a dripper, resulting in slightly inferior layered flavor performance.

How many times can drip bag coffee be brewed?

FrontStreet Coffee believes that drip bag coffee is similar to a simplified version of pour-over coffee. Like pour-over coffee, drip bag coffee can only be brewed once, while also controlling the ratio. If the ratio is too high (injecting too much water), it will result in weak coffee flavor. Why? Because the extractable substances from coffee beans only account for about 30% of the bean's weight, so even if you add more water, it won't make the coffee taste better.

Why can't drip bag coffee be brewed repeatedly?

Why? Actually, both pour-over coffee and drip bag coffee can only be brewed once. What we usually call brewing coffee, we also call extraction. Water is the solvent in the extraction process. Through water-coffee contact, flavor substances in the coffee are dissolved into the water, and the water becomes the coffee we drink.

Calculated by coffee weight, only about 30% of coffee is extractable, while the remaining 70% consists of non-extractable fibrous materials. Therefore, no matter how much you increase extraction, at most about 30% of the coffee can be extracted. Just like tea becomes weak after multiple brews, coffee is the same.

FrontStreet Coffee · Sidamo Coffee Bags

FrontStreet Coffee's Sidamo coffee beans have always been deeply loved by everyone. To make everyone's daily coffee brewing more convenient, FrontStreet Coffee has now made Sidamo coffee into drip bags. To create the best-tasting drip bags, FrontStreet Coffee pays great attention to grinder cleanliness, grind size, and packaging.

Ethiopia · Sidamo Coffee Beans

Sidamo is located in southern Ethiopia. In the past, Sidamo coffee beans also included Yirgacheffe and Guji coffee. However, the ECX trading system has already separated Yirgacheffe and Guji from Sidamo. Sidamo coffee is rich in fruit acids and has strong aromas. FrontStreet Coffee feels that in terms of aroma, compared to Yirgacheffe, it's even better, making it perfect for those who like strong flavors but don't want too heavy a taste, achieving perfect balance and neutrality between aroma and mouthfeel.

FrontStreet Coffee · Tips for Brewing Drip Bag Coffee

The first determining factor in drip bag brewing quality is flow rate - neither too slow nor too fast is acceptable, and this depends on the grinder's grind size. FrontStreet Coffee's drip bags are packaged at 10g per bag with a preset grind size. If the grinder quality is insufficient and the grinding quality is poor, it will inevitably create a large amount of fine powder and uneven grinding during the grinding process. During brewing, this will cause "traffic jams" with slowed flow rate, and overly long steeping time will lead to over-extraction, resulting in muddled taste and poor flavor. No matter how good the beans, they won't be able to express their proper flavor.

Brewing Steps

The materials needed are also very simple - just ice cubes, a short glass, hot water, and drip bag coffee. If conditions allow, you can also prepare an electronic scale.

Step 1

With indicator markings and easy tearing, open the outer packaging of the drip bag coffee, tear along the "open" line - it's very easy to tear. Then open the drip bag and hang it on a short glass. We recommend that the cup mouth shouldn't be too large, otherwise it might not hang properly on the cup.

Step 2

Prepare hot water at around 90°C, enough to cover the coffee grounds, and let it bloom for 20-45 seconds. If you don't have a thermometer, you can boil water and then open the lid to let it sit for 2 minutes, which will bring the temperature down to about 90-94°C.

Step 3

After a brief bloom, the coffee grounds have released a very rich aroma. FrontStreet Coffee's drip bags contain 10g of coffee, with a 1:15 coffee-to-water ratio, so add about 150ml of hot water. If you like it stronger, add less water; if you prefer it lighter, add more water. The ratio can be adjusted according to personal taste.

Regarding pouring method, FrontStreet Coffee often encounters customers asking whether to pour in stages. Actually, with a small water stream, you can directly pour in circles to 150ml. Drip bag coffee is meant to be simple and convenient, without too many requirements.

How should coffee beginners choose drip bag coffee?

If you regularly like to drink strong coffee, we recommend FrontStreet Coffee · Brazil region drip bags, which have rich nutty flavors, the smoothness of peanut butter and cream, no acidity, and a full-bodied mouthfeel.

If you can accept acidic coffee, we recommend 2 coffees:

1. FrontStreet Coffee · Ethiopia Yirgacheffe region drip bags

These have lemon-like acidity, white floral aromas, bright acidity, and a refreshing mouthfeel.

2. FrontStreet Coffee · Panama La Esmeralda estate drip bags

These have special, bright floral aromas and citrus notes.

If you like special flavors, we recommend FrontStreet Coffee · Honduras Whiskey Sherry region drip bags, which have rich whiskey aroma and the smoothness of vanilla cream, with low acidity and a full mouthfeel.

For more coffee bean information, please follow Coffee Workshop (WeChat official account: cafe_style)

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Important Notice :

前街咖啡 FrontStreet Coffee has moved to new addredd:

FrontStreet Coffee Address: 315,Donghua East Road,GuangZhou

Tel:020 38364473