Hans Coffee Effect - Don't Question the Coffee But Yourself
Experiment Name: Blind Coffee Tasting with Coffee Prepared in Different Coarseness and Water of Different Temperatures.
Goal: Exploring the Importance of Self-Questioning through a Coffee Experiment
The initial execution of the coffee experiment took place on August 9, 2023, in Chengdu.
Experiment Participants:
A group gathered by Hans from a baijiu tasting course.
Coffee Bean Selection:
High-quality coffee beans were chosen.
Grinding:
Coffee beans were ground into coarse, medium, and fine textures.
Extraction Water Temperatures:
1. 100 degrees Celsius,
2. 85 degrees Celsius,
3. 70 degrees Celsius.
Extraction Equipment:
V60, coffee filter paper, 9 high borosilicate coffee pots, a long-spout kettle, thermometer, electronic scale.
Output:
9 different coffee liquids.
| Temperature\Coarseness | Coarse | Medium | Fine |
|---|---|---|---|
| High | Coarse High | Medium High | Fine High |
| Medium | Coarse Medium | Medium Medium | Fine Medium |
| Low | Coarse Low | Medium Low | Fine Low |
Coffee Tasting Process
1. Participants smelled the coffee in the 9 containers and tasted any number of coffees.
2. Based on subjective feelings, participants ranked the coffee from most liked to least liked.
Results
Although the baijiu tasting enthusiasts were not coffee experts, most agreed that one coffee stood out:
- Not bitter, not sour.
- Rich layers with strong floral and fruity aromas.
Ultimately, the coffee brewed with a suitable coarseness and a water temperature of 85 degrees Celsius garnered the most preferences.
Afterthought
After tasting, everyone wanted to know the type of beans used. The astonishing answer revealed that all the coffee used the same beans, differing only in the grind coarseness and brewing water temperature.
The coarseness of coffee bean grinding affects the extraction rate. Finer grinding increases the surface area, extracting more flavor compounds, including bitterness, acidity, sweetness, and richness.
Brewing water temperature also affects extraction rate. Higher temperatures extract flavors faster, risking excessive bitterness. Lower temperatures may result in under-extracted, acidic coffee.
In this experiment, considering only grind coarseness and brewing water temperature led to 8 ways to brew unpleasant coffee. The ideal method involved the right coarseness and water temperature.
Reflection
I posed a question to everyone:
How many people of us dislike coffee because of the coffee itself?
This question led even a non-coffee drinker to deep contemplation.
Is there anything else that we don't like in the same way as some people don't know how to prepare coffee and they hate coffee?
A nation? A religion? A culture?