Can Espresso Grind Be Used for Pour-Over Coffee? What Should You Pay Attention to When Making Pour-Over Coffee with Fine Grind?

Recently, a customer asked FrontStreet Coffee what to do when coffee beans are ground into fine powder suitable for making espresso. Many friends have probably encountered this situation - you find the coffee powder you bought is too fine. If you use your regular pour-over parameters, it will definitely over-extract. Does this mean it has to be thrown away and can't be used?

Today, FrontStreet Coffee wants to share with everyone whether "powder" with a grind level suitable for making espresso can be used for cold brew or pour-over, and how to brew it better.

For the coffee bean selection, FrontStreet Coffee uses medium-dark roasted "FrontStreet Coffee's Mandheling" for demonstration. This bean has high body thickness and relatively low acidity, with flavors of chocolate, caramel, herbs, pu-erh tea, and pine. It's also a flavor profile close to many espresso powders on the market.

Pour-over

To recreate the situation friends encounter at home, FrontStreet Coffee directly uses the Galileo grinder used for espresso production in our store, setting the grind to 2.5 on the corresponding scale.

Parameters: Hario KONO dripper; water temperature 81-83°C; powder-to-water ratio 1:15 or 1:10 then diluted through bypass; grind level: Galileo 2.5 (espresso grind)

Dripper

To highlight the rich mouthfeel and solid flavor of Mandheling, and the coffee's thick and rounded texture, FrontStreet Coffee uses a KONO coffee dripper for extraction. The KONO's ribs are less than half the height of the dripper. This design is actually intended to ensure that after wetting, the filter paper clings tightly to the dripper wall, limiting airflow. This increases the water absorption time of the coffee powder particles, resulting in more evenly extracted coffee overall. It's suitable for brewing medium-dark roasted single-origin coffee beans like FrontStreet Coffee's Blue Mountain and FrontStreet Coffee's Golden Mandheling.

Water Temperature

Since the grind is very fine and the roast is quite dark, if the water temperature is too high, over-extraction is very likely to occur. Therefore, FrontStreet Coffee chooses a lower water temperature (81-83°C) for brewing.

Powder-to-Water Ratio

With a larger powder-to-water ratio, more substances will be extracted during brewing. Therefore, FrontStreet Coffee suggests choosing either a 1:15 powder-to-water ratio or a 1:10 ratio followed by dilution with additional water.

Technique

For the brewing technique, FrontStreet Coffee chose to pour directly in the center after blooming. Because the coffee powder is ground too finely, combined with the loose structure of dark-roasted beans, this makes the flavor compounds in the coffee powder more easily extracted. To prevent over-extraction that would make the coffee unbearably bitter, FrontStreet Coffee chose the center-pouring technique to reduce disturbance to the powder bed.

When coffee powder is impacted by water flow, it rolls inward from the pouring point as the center. The center pouring point is close to the bottom hole of the dripper, so the water flow is under pressure and flows to the serving pot more quickly.

Due to the center pouring, when the brewing is complete and all the coffee liquid in the dripper has flowed through, the powder bed will show a deep crater shape.

Extraction Time

Because the flavor compounds in finely ground coffee powder are easily extracted, FrontStreet Coffee recommends appropriately shortening the extraction time during brewing. In this brewing session, FrontStreet Coffee started timing from the bloom, controlling the extraction time to about one and a half minutes.

FrontStreet Coffee used two different powder-to-water ratios for brewing experiments:

Powder-to-Water Ratio 1:15

Technique: Use 30g of water to bloom for 30 seconds, allowing the coffee powder to fully release gas to avoid the impact of gases in the powder during brewing. After blooming, pour directly in the center until reaching 225g, then stop. Remove the dripper when the water level drops to 1/2 of the dripper. Extraction time is 1 minute 10 seconds.

Flavor: The entry is black chocolate, cocoa, and roasted hazelnut flavors, with an intense mouthfeel and caramel sweetness in the finish. The overall flavor is quite rich with a thick texture.

Powder-to-Water Ratio 1:10

Technique: Use 30g of water to bloom for 30 seconds, allowing the coffee powder to fully release gas to avoid the impact of gases in the powder during brewing. After blooming, pour directly in the center until reaching 150g, then stop. Remove the dripper when the water level drops to 1/2 of the dripper (timing starts from bloom). Extraction time is 1 minute 35 seconds. Then add 100g of water to the serving pot.

Flavor: The entry is chocolate, nuts, herbs, and pine flavors, with some cream aroma and caramel sweetness in the middle section. However, compared to the previous group, the overall flavor is more balanced and lighter.

Finally, let's summarize: if the coffee powder is ground too finely, we can appropriately lower the water temperature during brewing, choose a smaller powder-to-water ratio, and reduce agitation during brewing to decrease the extraction of the coffee powder!

Important Notice :

前街咖啡 FrontStreet Coffee has moved to new addredd:

FrontStreet Coffee Address: 315,Donghua East Road,GuangZhou

Tel:020 38364473