Three ground coffees actually cut for a cafetière

The best ground coffee for a cafetière in the UK is Coffee Masters Cafetière Exclusive Master Blend, because its roaster grinds it specifically for cafetières and it costs well under the ground coffee median per cup. For a darker mug buy illy Intenso, listed as coarse ground for cafetière and filter, and for a single origin with a named co-operative behind it buy Union Timana Colombia in Union's cafetière grind.

What is the best ground coffee for a cafetière?

Coffee Masters Cafetière Exclusive Master Blend, for most people who brew in a plunger every day. It wins on the detail that matters most with pre-ground coffee: the roaster says what it is ground for. Coffee Masters state that it is 'specifically ground for use in Cafetieres and the clever coffee dripper', and both are immersion brewers that want the same coarse, even particle.

All three picks passed one test before anything else was weighed: the maker, or the Amazon listing for the pack, names the cafetière. That rules out most of the ground coffee aisle, which is cut for espresso and moka pots or sold as one grind for every brewer.

Coffee Masters Cafetière Exclusive Master Blend: best overall

Coffee Masters blend arabica from Honduras, Costa Rica and Brazil and describe the result as dark chocolate sweetness and nutty notes, 'complemented by subtle, sweet lemony overtones'. Their own page calls it a medium-dark roast; the Amazon listing calls it medium. It comes as a 1kg bag at 44p a cup on our 18g dose when we last checked, against a median of 71p across the 483 ground coffees we track.

The weak point is the bag. A kilo of ground coffee arrives in one pouch, and ground coffee loses aroma once air reaches it. At two mugs a day a kilo lasts about four weeks, so decant half into an airtight tin the day it arrives and leave it closed until the first half is gone.

Skip it if you want to know the farm, or if a kilo will take you much more than a month to finish.

The blend, the bag and what the premium over cheaper ground coffee buys are covered in the full review. Coffee Masters Master Blend review

illy Intenso: best dark roast

illy publish Intenso as 100% arabica at intensity 7 of 9 on their own scale, 'intense, robust and full flavored with notes of deep cocoa'. The Amazon listing describes the tin as 'coarsely ground for French press (cafetiere) and filter coffee'. illy's own UK shop sells the same 250g tin as filter coffee and gives no grind size, so treat it as a grind cut for both brewers rather than for the plunger alone.

At 48p a cup when we last checked it costs a few pence more than Coffee Masters, and a 250g tin is the better format if you get through coffee slowly. Choose it for the roast: by the makers' own descriptions, it is the darkest of the three.

Skip it if you drink your coffee black and dislike roast bitterness, or if you want the grind spelled out on the roaster's own page.

Union Timana Colombia: best single origin

Union buy Timana from Asprotimana, a co-operative of around 220 farmers in southern Huila, Colombia, and have done since 2003. It is a medium roast of the Caturra variety, scored 85.25 by Union, which puts it in speciality grade. For filter-style brewing Union list plum, white grape and a hint of lemon, with a toffee-like taste. On Amazon it comes as a 200g bag in Union's cafetière grind.

This is the dear one, at 84p a cup when we last checked, above the ground coffee median. The extra money buys traceability: a named co-operative and a published quality score, where the two blends above publish only countries. Union also publish the cafetière recipe it is cut for, covered under the grind question below.

Skip it if you add milk and sugar, which cover most of what the premium is paying for.

Live prices for the 200g bag are on its product page. Union Timana Colombia prices

Why does espresso-ground coffee fail in a cafetière?

Because the particles are too small for both the filter and the brew time. A cafetière holds coffee in water for about four minutes and then strains it through a metal mesh. Fine espresso grounds pass through that mesh into your mug, and with that much contact time they over-extract, which tastes bitter. Wikipedia's French press article adds that finer grounds have lower permeability, so pushing the plunger down takes 'an excessive amount of force'.

Seattle Coffee Gear's guide to the Bodum Brazil press puts the result in one line: a grind that is too fine 'will pass through the filter and produce muddy, gritty, over-extracted coffee, and will also make the plunger very difficult to press'. Espresso is ground fine because water is pushed through it under pressure for well under a minute. Steep the same powder for four minutes and you get the opposite of what it was ground for.

This is why the grind matters more than the bean when you buy pre-ground. With whole beans you set the grinder yourself. With a bag of ground coffee the roaster has already made that decision, and a good coffee cut for espresso can brew a worse cafetière than a cheaper one cut coarse.

How coarse should cafetière coffee be?

Medium-coarse, roughly the texture of coarse salt. Union's cafetière guide asks for 'medium to coarse, slightly finer than rock salt', and Brown Bear's grind guide puts cafetière grinding at 0.60 to 0.85mm, against 0.2 to 0.55mm for the fine grinds that suit pressure brewers such as the moka pot.

Most pre-ground coffee sits between those two. Brown Bear describe their own pre-ground as a medium 'Omni-Grind' that will work for filter and cafetière, which is an honest name for the compromise most all-purpose bags make. Read the pack before you buy:

Dose matters as much as grind. Union's recipe is 55g of coffee to 850ml of water at 94°C, steeped for four minutes and plunged at a steady pace. That works out at about 16g for a 250ml mug.

How do the three compare?

Coffee Masters Master Blend and illy Intenso are both 100% arabica blends; Union Timana Colombia is the only single origin. illy sells in a 250g tin, Union in a 200g bag and Coffee Masters in a 1kg bag, which is the biggest single difference in how long each stays fresh once opened.

What does a cafetière of each cost per cup?

Between 44p and 84p a cup on an 18g dose when we last checked, and two of the three come in under the 71p median of the 483 ground coffees we track. At two mugs a day the gap between the cheapest and the dearest here is about £290 a year.

On Union's own recipe of about 16g a mug, every bag goes roughly 11% further than those figures suggest. Prices move, so the cards at the top of this page carry today's figure and the table is a snapshot.

Who should skip all of these?

• Anyone brewing in a moka pot or an espresso machine. A cafetière grind is too coarse for both: water runs through it too fast, and the cup is thin and sour.
• Anyone who owns a grinder. Beans ground just before brewing beat any pre-ground bag, and they cost less: the median whole bean coffee we track is 63p a cup against 71p for ground.
• Anyone who makes one cafetière a week. A kilo will be stale long before it is finished, so buy the 250g illy tin or the 200g Union bag instead.
• Anyone loyal to a high street blend. Costa sell their Signature Blend in a cafetière grind too, and it has its own review, linked below.

The verdict

Buy Coffee Masters Cafetière Exclusive Master Blend if you brew a cafetière every day and want the bag most clearly cut for it at a fair price. Buy illy Intenso if you want it darker and in a tin. Buy Union Timana Colombia if you drink it black and want to know who grew it.