Which Coffee Beans to Choose for Pour-Over Coffee? How to Select Pour-Over Coffee Equipment?

If you're a coffee lover, pour-over coffee is an essential skill to master. Whether using regular coffee beans or specialty coffee beans, pour-over coffee is not only one of the most popular extraction methods but also a mainstream brewing technique that accompanies our coffee journey. Nowadays, as coffee culture becomes increasingly rich in our country, pour-over coffee has become very common in daily life. Next, FrontStreet Coffee will guide you on how to make a delicious cup of pour-over coffee.

What Does Pour-Over Mean in Coffee?

Pour-over coffee, also known as drip coffee, was invented in 1908 by German housewife Melitta Bentz. To promote this new coffee extraction method to the world, Mrs. Melitta also established the Melitta Company in the same year, selling various coffee equipment products. Pour-over coffee involves pouring hot water to allow soluble substances from the coffee grounds to dissolve into the water, with the extracted liquid then passing through filter paper or a mesh filter into a container, resulting in black coffee.

For those just starting to learn about pour-over coffee, FrontStreet Coffee doesn't recommend getting too caught up in what grind size, what technique, or what water temperature to use. As long as you pay attention to a few principles and details, you can actually easily make a delicious cup of coffee at home.

Tools Needed Before Making Pour-Over Coffee

You'll need: an electronic scale with timing function, a 0.85mm standard sieve mesh, a thermometer, a coffee grinder, a pour-over kettle, a dripper, and filter papers.

Prepare Hot Water

Heat the water, generally controlling the temperature between 85°C~95°C. For your first attempt, you can directly use 90°C for brewing. (If it's too bitter, lower the water temperature; if too sour, increase the water temperature)

Weigh Coffee Beans

The weight of coffee beans depends on how large a cup of coffee you want to drink. Generally, 15 grams is sufficient for a single serving. Next, based on the weight of coffee beans, choose an appropriate coffee-to-water ratio to control the concentration of the brewed coffee. FrontStreet Coffee recommends using a 1:15 coffee-to-water ratio, so for 15 grams of coffee grounds, pour 225 grams of hot water. You can then make fine adjustments based on taste - if it's too weak, reduce water to 1:14; if it's too strong or bitter, add more water to make it 1:16.

Grind Coffee Beans

What determines the coarseness of pour-over coffee grounds is the setting on your coffee grinder. Good pour-over coffee requires a good grinder. Common grinders on the market include Timemore hand grinders, Commandant hand grinders, Little Falcon electric grinders, Little Fuji electric grinders, Baratza Encore grinders, and Hwaker grinders. FrontStreet Coffee uses the EK43s electric grinder.

In the world of pour-over coffee, compared to other parameters, grind size is always a parameter that's difficult for people to express clearly in words. Since everyone has different grinders, when discussing brewing grind size with customers, many baristas first use visual analogies to describe it. Despite knowing this has certain limitations, it's indeed one of the fastest ways for us to establish a conservative framework.

Grind Size Guide

Fine Sugar Grind

The biggest characteristic of fine sugar grind is "fine and delicate," feeling soft and slightly sandy with no obvious clumps. During extraction, the small particles can release flavor compounds more fully and are generally suitable for light to medium roast coffee beans that primarily express floral and fruity aromas.

Coarse Sugar Grind

Coarse sugar, also called white sugar, is not easily distinguishable from fine sugar by visual observation alone, but when rubbed between thumb and forefinger, you can feel obvious颗粒感 (if chewed, you can hear a crunching sound). Coarse sugar has a relatively larger surface area, which helps avoid over-extraction due to long soaking times, making it suitable for medium-dark or dark roast beans, such as those featuring chocolate, caramel, and cocoa flavor profiles.

Sea Salt Grind

Sea salt grind is the easiest to identify, referring to large crystalline coarse salt particles. Visibly chunky with overall unevenness, it's more suitable for immersion extraction methods like French press or Clever Dripper rather than drip extraction.

From FrontStreet Coffee's experience, if visual inspection doesn't yield results, we can also combine particle morphology during extraction stages with duration to determine whether the grind is too coarse, too fine, or just right. Because regardless of particle size distribution, we still need to test based on the formal brewing stages and final flavor performance. At this time, we can use the morphology of suspended particles during blooming, total drip duration, and the size of coffee grounds particles to find answers.

Three-Stage Pouring Technique for Pour-Over Coffee

FrontStreet Coffee typically uses a three-stage technique when brewing coffee, controlling the entire pouring time to around 2 minutes. The so-called "three stages" mainly consist of blooming, second pour, and third pour. This three-stage pouring extraction technique can clarify the front, middle, and back-end flavors of the coffee while ensuring rich complexity.

FrontStreet Coffee believes that coffee beans play a crucial role in whether a pour-over tastes good. First, as the main character, they must be fresh, ground and used immediately - this is why FrontStreet Coffee insists on fresh roasting. When using freshly roasted coffee beans for brewing, the high-temperature roasting process causes them to accumulate large amounts of gas (mostly carbon dioxide), so they expand upon contact with hot water, creating what we call "small hills." This process of initial contact between coffee grounds and water and expansion is called "blooming" by baristas.

First Pour: Blooming

For blooming time, FrontStreet Coffee follows the majority with 30 seconds. When the expansion of the coffee grounds surface ends, you'll see the coffee surface start to wrinkle, indicating that the blooming's degassing is complete and formal pouring can begin. Basically, for rested beans within one month of roast date, FrontStreet Coffee performs a 30-second bloom.

Second Pour

The timing for the second pour is when blooming ends, meaning when the electronic scale shows 30 seconds. After 30 seconds have passed, we start pouring the second 95 grams with a straight and stable water flow, paying attention to slowly circle from center to outer edge. The goal is to raise the entire coffee bed. The water stream needs to be poured vertically and evenly. After pouring, the scale should show 125g, with time at approximately 55 seconds.

Third Pour

When the liquid level drops to about halfway, start using a small water stream to circle and pour the third 100 grams until the electronic scale shows 225 grams. Be careful to control the water flow from being too large, as it can easily scatter the coffee grounds and cause under-extraction. After pouring, wait for the coffee to slowly drip through - it should all finish dripping in about 2 minutes, at which point you can remove the dripper. Finally, remember to shake the coffee in the sharing pitcher evenly before tasting, so the aroma can be fully distributed.

Here, FrontStreet Coffee would like to remind everyone that in the three-stage pour-over coffee method, the amount of water poured in each stage is not fixed. Everyone can first practice according to FrontStreet Coffee's plan, and after accumulating some pour-over experience, adjust according to your understanding of coffee beans and personal taste preferences. FrontStreet Coffee believes there are thousands of ways to brew a delicious cup of coffee. As long as we learn and improve more, easily mastering pour-over coffee becomes completely achievable.

For different pour-over enthusiasts, FrontStreet Coffee generally recommends single-origin coffees based on customers' descriptions to select the most suitable pour-over coffee beans for them. There are various types of single-origin coffee, so coffee flavors are also extremely diverse. It's very challenging to select a pour-over coffee bean that suits you best among the many producing regions. However, FrontStreet Coffee typically first explains the three major coffee flavor regions to customers: African coffee beans, which tend to have more acidity with jasmine floral notes; Central and South American coffees, which are generally fuller-bodied, lower in acidity, with nutty and chocolate flavors; and Asian coffee beans, which are overall full-bodied with low acidity.

This way, FrontStreet Coffee's customers will have a clear direction for the pour-over coffee they want to try. For example, if you say you want to try Ethiopian beans because you prefer a more acidic taste, FrontStreet Coffee will recommend suitable pour-over coffee beans based on your coffee flavor preferences. FrontStreet Coffee has listed many beans from Ethiopia. You can first try Yirgacheffe coffee, which belongs to the very classic citrus and lemon flavor profile. For beginners in pour-over, it's very easy to detect the lemon-citrus acidity with jasmine floral notes. Or you can try pour-over coffee beans from Ethiopia's Sidamo region, such as Guji, which are all very suitable for pour-over enthusiasts.

Of course, the acidity from different parts of Africa varies greatly. FrontStreet Coffee's Kenya Asali coffee beans, when pour-over brewed, offer berry acidity and cherry tomato fruit flavors with a fresh taste, very different from Ethiopian acidity. Everyone can try experiencing the difference between these two coffee flavors.

However, not everyone loves acidic coffee tastes. Some of FrontStreet Coffee's customers prefer non-acidic flavors. In that case, FrontStreet Coffee would recommend Indonesian Mandheling coffee. FrontStreet Coffee offers five types of Mandheling coffee: Natural Mandheling, Aged Mandheling, Tiger Mandheling, and Gold Mandheling. Each type of Mandheling has different coffee flavors. FrontStreet Coffee will list the flavor differences of these five Mandheling coffees:

Lintong Mandheling: Toasted bread, nuts, caramel, pine, herbs
Gold Mandheling: Spices, herbal, caramel, pine, nuts, chocolate
Tiger Mandheling: Nuts, cream, dark chocolate, caramel, pine
Aged Mandheling: Ripe pu-erh tea, caramel, herbs, chocolate, lower acidity
Natural Mandheling: Melon, fermented aroma, mango, tropical fruits, peach

So you can choose the most suitable Mandheling coffee based on your taste preferences. However, in FrontStreet Coffee's view, Mandheling coffee is quite challenging for beginners in pour-over coffee to brew, as this Mandheling uses dark roast. If not brewed properly, it will extract all the bitterness from the Mandheling, creating a taste you'll "never forget." Therefore, FrontStreet Coffee suggests using a lower water temperature when pour-over brewing this coffee bean. FrontStreet Coffee's baristas typically use 88°C water temperature and brew for two minutes for this Mandheling. Beginners should pay special attention to pouring speed when brewing, as too slow will make the extracted coffee too bitter.

Alternatively, you can try pour-over coffee from Colombia or Brazil, the world's top three coffee export giants. The flavors from these two producing countries are somewhat similar, both featuring nutty and chocolate flavors as the main profile, though they still have their differences. When FrontStreet Coffee brews Colombian Huilan daily beans, besides tasting the nuts and dark chocolate of Colombian coffee, there's also caramel with a hint of soft fruit acidity. When brewing FrontStreet Coffee's Brazilian Red Cherry daily bean series, the peanut and cream flavors are richer. However, when you actually pour-over these two coffees, you'll clearly feel that Colombian coffee has a fuller body, while Brazilian coffee is lighter in body.

FrontStreet Coffee has also discussed flavor profiles of these two coffees with customers. This is mainly related to terrain. Colombian coffee trees are generally planted on high mountain slopes, at high altitudes with large day-night temperature differences, which is very beneficial for coffee beans to develop good flavors. Brazilian coffee trees are generally planted on plains without shade trees, making coffee trees very easy to grow, but the coffee flavor isn't as good as Colombian's. However, both coffees that FrontStreet Coffee offers are very suitable for pour-over beginners.

So when you've actually tried flavors from these regions, you'll have a concrete understanding of coffee flavors from major coffee regions. FrontStreet Coffee believes that at this point, you can be more specific when choosing pour-over coffee beans, such as selecting Honduras pour-over coffee flavors like FrontStreet Coffee's Honduras Sherry or Litchi Lan, which are special processing method pour-over coffee beans. To be even more specific, you could also choose Costa Rica's honey-processed Musician Series. Then you'll discover that each country's characteristic flavor profiles are very distinct. FrontStreet Coffee believes that by now, you probably have a good idea in your mind of the pour-over coffee beans you like.

At this point, FrontStreet Coffee would recommend some special processing method coffees or estate beans, etc. You could then choose coffees like FrontStreet Coffee's Colombian Huayuanye and Rose Valley, or Panama's Geisha series, etc. These single-origin coffee beans are all very suitable for pour-over brewing.

Of course, FrontStreet Coffee doesn't mean that choosing good pour-over coffee beans is enough to brew a good cup of coffee. The selection of pour-over coffee equipment is also very important for pour-over brewing. Light roast and dark roast require different water temperatures. Regarding brewing parameters for each coffee bean, FrontStreet Coffee has related articles on our official account that everyone can use as reference. Of course, if you still have questions after reading the articles, FrontStreet Coffee warmly welcomes everyone to come to the FrontStreet Coffee shop to exchange and communicate coffee information to progress together.

Important Notice :

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FrontStreet Coffee Address: 315,Donghua East Road,GuangZhou

Tel:020 38364473