Buying guide · 9 min readKnow what you are buying
Most bags tell you the roaster’s story rather than the facts. These are the four things that actually decide what ends up in your cup.
None of this is complicated, and knowing it is what makes a price comparison mean something. A £22 kilo and a £9 bag are not the same product, and the difference is usually explained by one of the four things below.
How you brew it
Method decides grind size, contact time and how much of the coffee ends up dissolved. It changes the cup more than most people expect, and more than the bag ever will.
Cafetière
Coarse grindFull immersion through a metal filter, so oils and fine sediment stay in the cup. Heavy body, very forgiving, and the cheapest way to taste what a bean actually does.
Pour-over
Medium-fine grindPaper takes out the oils and fines, which is why the cup reads clean and the acidity is obvious. A gooseneck kettle buys you control over the pour, not magic.
Aeropress
Fine to medium grindShort immersion, then pressure through a paper filter. Concentrated rather than espresso, and close to impossible to ruin. Travels well.
Espresso
Very fine grindRoughly nine bar of pressure through a tamped puck in 25 to 30 seconds. The least forgiving method, and the one where the grinder matters more than the machine.
Moka pot
Fine, not espresso fine grindSteam pressure of about one to two bar, so it makes something strong and syrupy rather than true espresso. Cheap, and better than its reputation.
Filter machine
Medium grindAn automated pour-over. Worth checking yours reaches 92 to 96°C at the basket, because plenty of cheap ones never get there.
Siphon
Medium grindVapour pressure lifts water into the upper chamber, then the brew is drawn back down through a cloth or glass filter. Clean, with more body than paper.
Turkish, in an ibrik
Powder fine grindCoffee, water and usually sugar brought up together on the hob and poured grounds and all. Unfiltered, sweet and intense.
Pods
Dosed for you grindGround, dosed and tamped at the factory. The most consistent and the most expensive per cup, with no control over grind, dose or freshness.
What is in the bag
How it was processed
- Washed
- The fruit is removed before drying. Cleaner and brighter, with the origin character and acidity most exposed.
- Natural, or dry
- Dried whole inside the cherry. Fruitier and heavier in body, sometimes with a fermented edge, and it tends to give more crema in espresso.
- Honey, or pulped natural
- The skin comes off but the sticky mucilage dries on the bean. It lands between the other two: the sweetness of a natural with more clarity.
What the plant is
- Arabica
- Coffea arabica. Almost everything sold as specialty in the UK. More acidity, more aromatic range, roughly half the caffeine of robusta.
- Robusta
- Coffea canephora. Heavier, more bitter, cheaper to grow, and still used deliberately in some espresso blends for body and crema.
- Hybrids
- Hibrido de Timor is a natural cross between the two, found on Timor. Crossed with Caturra in Portugal in 1959, it produced Catimor, bred for leaf rust resistance and planted widely. It is sold as arabica, and it is, but it carries robusta genes.
What good extraction looks like
- Water at 92 to 96°C
- Measured where the water meets the grounds, not in the kettle. Off the boil for half a minute is close enough without a thermometer.
- 55g of coffee per litre
- The Specialty Coffee Association benchmark, give or take ten per cent. Weigh it once and you will stop guessing.
- A burr grinder, not a blade
- Uniform particle size is what makes a brew repeatable. A blade grinder produces dust and boulders at the same time, and no recipe fixes that.
The honest caveat
Origin and processing notes describe tendencies, not rules. Altitude, variety, the roast profile and how fresh the bag is will all move the cup, which is why we price everything and only score what we have in front of us.