What's the difference between siphon and French press? How to choose between siphon and French press?

When it comes to coffee brewing methods, FrontStreet Coffee has introduced hundreds of varieties: some popular, some simple, some niche, some full of ceremony, offering a complete array of options.

Judging by the steps involved, FrontStreet Coffee believes the French press is the simplest method. With the right coffee beans and grind size, you can, like brewing tea, have a mellow cup of black coffee in just a few minutes. When FrontStreet Coffee uses a siphon, by contrast, it is far more complicated than other methods, because the steps are complex and the work before and after brewing is also troublesome, which discourages many people who want to try it. So is there a big difference in taste between these two methods? Let's compare them directly.

What is a French Press and How to Use It?

Originating in France, the French press consists of a cylindrical container and a lid with a metal filter mesh in the middle that can be pulled up and down, separating coffee grounds from coffee liquid to control extraction.

Its principle is just like brewing tea. After soaking coffee grounds in hot water for a set period, you push the plunger down to filter out the liquid. Water is poured onto the grounds all at once, penetrates them, the flavor compounds are released, and the grounds are finally filtered out to leave a cup of black coffee. The great advantage of immersion devices is that they demand no special brewing skill and no special accessories, making them easier to master than pour-over methods, which is why they are also called "lazy coffee devices." Because the whole process is immersion, French press coffee emphasizes a richer mouthfeel and relatively balanced flavors.

Unlike the complexity of pour-over, the French press's "one-shot" pour is simple, which means only four factors affect the coffee: brew ratio, grind size, water temperature, and immersion time. Similar to cupping, the extraction is relatively stable, and the coffee flavor better reflects the original taste.

Because the French press completes the pour all at once, the extraction temperature gradually falls over time, so it needs to start slightly higher than pour-over temperature. For light to medium-roasted acidic coffee, use 92-94°C; for medium to dark-roasted bitter coffee, 89-90°C is recommended. In autumn and winter, when room temperature is lower, preheat the French press with boiling water to reduce heat loss during extraction.

Time is the parameter the French press lets you adjust freely. Without any stirring, immersion time becomes one of the key factors affecting extraction. Under the same conditions, the longer the immersion, the richer the taste, but the more prone to over-extraction and to bitter, astringent, and woody flavors. Paired with a coarse grind, FrontStreet Coffee suggests about 4 minutes for light to medium roast coffee. Medium to dark roast coffee extracts bitterness more easily, so 3 minutes 30 seconds is enough. That time fully releases the positive flavor compounds while avoiding the bitter, muddled taste that comes from steeping too long.

What's the Principle of Brewing Coffee with a Siphon?

The English name for the siphon is "SIPHON," so it is also called a vacuum pot. It uses the expansion and contraction of water vapor when water is heated to push hot water from the lower pot into the upper chamber to mix with coffee grounds. When the temperature drops, the water flows back to the lower pot through the vacuum tube, leaving coffee in the lower pot.

Many people assume that the extraction method for siphon coffee is "siphon-style," but that is not correct. Although the siphon pot uses the siphon principle only to draw hot water to the upper pot, that is not what extracts the coffee.

When hot water is drawn to the upper pot, adding coffee grounds for immersion is where extraction officially begins. Strictly speaking, then, the extraction method for siphon coffee should be called "immersion-style." By immersing water and grounds together, flavor compounds are drawn out of the grounds.

Because immersion extraction brings all the hot water into contact with the grounds, once the concentration in the water reaches a certain level the dissolution rate slows, and the coffee stops giving up so many flavor compounds; this is what we often call reaching saturation. As a result, siphon coffee tastes relatively balanced, with a rounded mouthfeel and a solid coffee aroma, though compared with pour-over its flavors are less prominent.

It is worth mentioning that siphon immersion differs somewhat from conventional immersion. Because of the siphon principle, the water is continuously heated during extraction, and the lower pot generates enough air to keep the hot water up top. Siphon immersion is therefore completely constant-temperature, whereas conventional immersion and drip extraction both lose heat continuously, so their water temperature falls over time. That leads to higher extraction rates in a siphon, which, with stirring, can complete extraction in a shorter time.

In addition, siphons mainly use flannel filter cloths. Filter paper can also be used, but because it cannot fully cover the opening it cannot form the "sealed" space that pour-over coffee does; fine particles and oils can pass through gaps into the lower pot and join the coffee, so siphon coffee looks relatively cloudy. Although oils and fine particles make the liquid less clean, they give the coffee a richer mouthfeel, which is why siphon coffee tastes more mellow.

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

The French press is the most forgiving way to brew, and the choice of bean matters more here than technique, because immersion draws out sweetness and body rather than delicate top notes. FrontStreet's Strawberry Candy is an excellent place to start if you like a fragrant, clean cup. It is a Geisha blend built from a Costa Rican honey-processed coffee and a Panamanian washed Geisha, combining some of Central America's best flavor characteristics; brewed in a French press it gives off rose, citrus, grape, and dried blueberry aromas, and with milk it turns into the scent of strawberry fudge. If you prefer a low-acid, full-bodied black coffee instead, FrontStreet's PWN Golden Mandheling is the natural choice. As one of Asia's best-known specialty coffees, it goes through three hand sorts plus one machine sort during production, so the beans are uniform and translucent; after medium-dark roasting they are large and carry rich spice, caramel, cedar, and dark chocolate aromas, and a French press extraction gives a dense body with good oils.

Grind is the detail most people get wrong with a French press. FrontStreet suggests a coarse setting, roughly the texture of coarse sugar: about 10.5 on an EK43s electric grinder, or 26 on a hand grinder, more like small gravel than fine sand. Grinding too fine lets water move through the grounds too quickly and, more importantly, lets fine particles slip through the metal mesh, leaving a gritty sediment in the cup. If you do want more layered flavor and choose a finer grind, shorten the immersion time accordingly to avoid over-extraction.

For the rest of the recipe, FrontStreet uses a 1:15 ratio (15g of coffee to 225g of water), which lands at roughly 1.1-1.2% strength and gives a fuller, richer taste. If you have no thermometer, boil the water and let it stand 2-3 minutes, adjusting for air temperature, to reach roughly 90°C. Because the French press pours all the water at once and involves no stirring to raise extraction, you sometimes need to nudge the water temperature up by 1-2°C above your usual pour-over temperature. Immersion time generally falls between 3 and 5 minutes; darker roasts should not go past 5 minutes or they turn bitter and astringent, while light roasts may need more than 3 minutes to give up their flavor, so FrontStreet suggests starting at 4 minutes and adjusting from there.