Pour-Over Coffee Pre-Infusion Time Guide: Water Pouring, Coffee Grounds, and KALITA Dripper

The Art of Pour-Over Coffee: Kalita Wave Brewing Guide

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In our daily coffee brewing, we commonly use the V60 dripper, but V60 has a relatively fast flow rate and demands higher control over water flow rate and current control. For beginners, this might be challenging. In such cases, the Kalita dripper would be a better equipment choice.

Why is it called Kalita?

Kalita is actually a company name. Kalita Company began manufacturing coffee equipment under its Japanese company in 1950. The inventor of the fan-shaped dripper was not Kalita, but Mrs. Melitta. The invented dripper was made by drilling a hole at the bottom of a copper cup. Later, Melitta Company launched drippers that are now commonly seen as single-hole fan-shaped drippers. With a smaller diameter and slower flow rate, they are more suitable for German-style dark roast coffee, until the third wave of coffee culture revived them in Japan.

In 1959, Kalita imitated and improved the fan-shaped dripper, changing from single-hole to three-hole design to reduce blockage. Brewers can adjust coffee concentration by controlling water flow speed. The Kalita fan-shaped dripper, also known as "trapezoidal dripper" or "platform-shaped dripper," has smaller holes at the bottom. They range from single-hole to multi-hole (six-hole or eight-hole), with the most common being single-hole and three-hole fan-shaped drippers.

What are the characteristics of the Kalita dripper?

Observed from the side, it presents a shape that is wide at the top and narrow at the bottom, which helps concentrate water volume. The circular top creates a wider area to ensure even distribution of coffee particles and reduce stacking conditions. The Kalita dripper has many straight-line distributed ribs on its walls with consistent spacing between them, designed to increase air venting and water flow speed. Meanwhile, its flow rate is relatively slow, primarily using immersion extraction method.

How to make pour-over coffee with Kalita?

First, prepare the equipment:

Dripper Selection

Choose the Kalita dripper. Because the bottom has three small round holes, the water flows out relatively slowly, making the entire process a semi-immersion extraction. For beginners who are not good at controlling water flow, it easily helps you achieve full extraction without worrying about under-extraction caused by excessive water flow. Kalita's three-hole drippers come in two types: one with straight-line arrangement and another with triangular distribution.

Filter Paper

Kalita trapezoidal filter paper. It's worth noting that the upper cups come in different sizes: 101, 102, 103, and corresponding filter papers are also available in these models. For home use, model 101 is generally recommended. Some people also use Swiss Gold KF-2/4, originally designed for American coffee machines. Since it's a metal filter screen, it's inevitable that a small amount of coffee powder will filter through.

Pour-Over Kettle

There are many brands of pour-over coffee equipment. It's generally recommended that beginners start with a narrow-spout kettle, using a narrow-mouth kettle with an inner diameter of less than 5mm. General narrow-mouth kettles, palace kettles, and pointed-bill crane kettles are easy to control water flow and won't produce excessive water flow. Excessive water flow will directly pass through the coffee powder to the lower pot, causing under-extraction.

Other equipment to prepare includes: electronic scale, timer, thermometer

Coffee Beans and Parameters

Coffee beans: 15g Guatemala Borsa

Grind size: Fuji 3.5

Coffee-to-water ratio: 1:15

Water temperature: 90°C

Time: Around 1 minute 50 seconds

Brewing Method

The beans were rested for 7 days. First, rinse the filter paper with hot water, add coffee powder, gently tap to level it. Using 90°C water temperature and 1:15 coffee-to-water ratio, perform a three-stage pour-over. Use 25g of water for bloom for 30 seconds, allowing the powder layer to fully absorb water and release air, preparing for the second stage of water addition and extraction;

Second stage: Add water to 120g; Use moderate height, small water flow, uniform slow circular motion with gentle pouring method. Adopt immersion method to let coffee powder release good substances and reduce scouring of the powder layer;

Third stage: Add water to 225g; When the water level drops by 1/3, perform the third stage water addition to 225g. At this time, the water level drop speed is relatively slow, indicating that fine powder has begun to deposit at the bottom of the dripper. Slightly increase the water flow rate and circular speed to let the fine powder at the bottom dance around, reducing over-extraction and bitter taste; finally stop extraction around 1 minute 40 seconds, remove the dripper around 1 minute 50 seconds, and don't use the last 5g of liquid.

Flavor Profile

When smelling, there are aromas of caramel and ripe fruits. Upon entry, there's soft citrus acidity with plum, passion fruit, and yellow lemon notes. Gradually, sweetness similar to sucrose and honey emerges, with a hint of brown sugar aroma in the aftertaste. The texture is smooth, clean, with higher body than V60 and rich layering.

Using Kalita dripper for brewing is actually not difficult. With appropriate grind size, water temperature, and stable pouring method, the taste won't deviate too much. Stable water flow requires regular practice. That's all for today's sharing, hope it helps everyone—

Daily Brewing | Light Roast Geisha + Wave Dripper

Light roast Geisha + Wave dripper, this combination is used to explain how to brew light roast beans to extract sweetness.

Equipment Introduction

Pour-Over Kettle

Kalita copper kettle, narrow-spout kettle

Beans

FrontStreet Coffee sun-dried Janson Geisha, light roast

Dripper

Kalita Wave coffee dripper comes in two sizes: #155 and #185. #155 is smaller and suitable for brewing one cup of coffee, while #185 is larger and suitable for 2-4 servings. Kalita Wave coffee drippers come in glass and stainless steel materials, and for #185 there's also a ceramic version.

The difference between Kalita Wave and our familiar Hario V60 is that the bottom is flat. The flat bottom design allows for more complete extraction. Up close observation of the Kalita stainless steel dripper reveals three small holes on the flat bottom.

#155 size

You need to purchase special Wave cup filter paper - Kalita filter paper. It's recommended to use Bonavita Wave cup filter paper. The thickened version is thicker than Kalita's, with special deepened design side guide grooves.

Light roast coffee beans have substances that are extremely difficult to extract, so a relatively fine grind is often adopted. For V60, it would need to be even finer than the picture below. This can increase the water contact area of coffee powder and improve extraction rate. Using a Wave dripper is actually an immersion extraction process, similar to the Kalita trapezoidal dripper. Next, FrontStreet Coffee provides pour-over suggestions:

First, Temperature

For Geisha beans, it's recommended to use 91-92°C water temperature for brewing. Lowering the water temperature can slow down the extraction speed and reduce the extraction of bitter substances.

Second, Gentleness (Water Flow Must Be Gentle)

Gently pour water flow to reduce the impact of water flow on the powder bed. Control the water level height in the dripper. After blooming, slowly pour water from a lower height, then let the coffee powder in the dripper be as if it's being soaked. This can slow down the extraction rhythm and easily produce coffee with soft mouthfeel and solid flavor.

Third, Slowness (Slow Circular Motion)

Slowly pour water on the powder bed from inside to outside and then from outside to inside. Too fast circular motion will increase the stirring effect of water flow on coffee, easily making medium-dark roast beans more bitter. Try to minimize stirring of the powder bed and let the coffee flavor be extracted through immersion method. This can effectively control bitterness and astringency.

Slow, stable, continuous pouring: Use thin water flow for circular motion, gently pouring for even extraction. Very, very slow. Kalita's water drainage is slower than Kono conical dripper and V60 dripper. You can also appropriately use a stirring rod for stirring. Usually during the blooming stage, perform one cross-stir to let water fully contact coffee powder and increase the release of aromatic substances.

Fourth, Light Roast Coffee-to-Water Ratio: 1:13-1:14

That is, 18g of powder with 250ml of water. This ratio is moderate and won't produce overly thin coffee with too much water taste.

Specific Parameters

Use the hot water in the pour-over kettle to draw circles clockwise around the center of the dripper. Start timing when brewing begins. Brew the coffee to about 40g within 15 seconds, then stop pouring. When the time reaches 1 minute 06 seconds, perform the second water addition. During the second water addition, same as before, draw circles clockwise around the center of the dripper. Don't let the water flow touch the area where coffee powder meets the filter paper to avoid channel effect. When brewing coffee powder to the outermost circle, leave one circle, then brew circle by circle toward the middle. Within 3 minutes, brew the coffee to 250g. The manual pour-over coffee is complete.

Key Points

During blooming, the force of water addition should not be too strong, be more gentle, and don't touch the filter paper edge.

The amount of water used during blooming should be about 10% of the total water amount. For brewing 300ml of coffee, the water needed for blooming is about 30ml. Or based on powder amount: if 15g of powder, blooming ratio 1:2, you can add 30g of water; if 20g of powder, blooming ratio 1:2, you can add 40g of water.

During the blooming process, the extracted liquid flowing down should be as little as possible. When too much extracted liquid appears in the lower pot, reduce the amount of water added or pay attention to the grind size.

Important Notice :

前街咖啡 FrontStreet Coffee has moved to new addredd:

FrontStreet Coffee Address: 315,Donghua East Road,GuangZhou

Tel:020 38364473