How high is the high-sweet water level when making coffee? What is the principle of the high-sweetness method of making coffee by hand?

If you often read about coffee in a book, you should often see videos with the words "high sweet water level". The video tells us that when we control the water level to a certain height by controlling the current, the coffee will have a more prominent sweetness.

Then many friends will be more curious, can the height of the water level still affect the performance of coffee?

What is the effect of the water level on coffee? It is! In fact, Qianjie has mentioned the influence of water level height many times in the previous sharing, which will affect the extraction by changing the structure of the powder bed. The higher the water level, the higher the powder bed, and the lower the water level, the lower the powder bed. The influence is mainly concentrated in two aspects, on the one hand, the uniform degree of extraction of coffee powder, and on the other hand, the contact time between coffee powder and water.

When the water we inject is small and the water level and the powder bed are not lifted so high, the coffee powder as a whole is more concentrated, which leads to a relatively more uniform extraction of the coffee powder. At the same time, because the hot water needs to pass through more coffee powder, coupled with the smaller flow rate of water injection, the extraction time will be relatively longer and the extraction efficiency will be higher; and when the water flow we inject is relatively large (greater than the launching speed), the water level and powder bed will be raised to a certain height. At this time, the distribution of coffee powder will be more scattered, because some of it will be attached to the cup wall. A structure like this can lead to a change in the main target of hot water during extraction (into coffee powder at the bottom). At the same time, because the flowable channel of hot water is greatly increased, the launching speed becomes faster, and the extraction time is shortened.

This is the result of Qianjie combined with many practices. When the water level and powder bed are lifted to a relatively high position during brewing, the launching speed of the same coffee bean will be faster, and then the acid performance of the coffee will be more lively. The hierarchical sense of flavor will be more distinct. When the water level rises relatively low, its launching speed will be slower, and then the taste of the coffee will be more balanced, the taste will be thick and full, and the sweetness will be more prominent. This is the different effects of different high and low water levels on extraction.

How to apply it in actual cooking?

Through the introduction of the front street above, I believe you have understood the different advantages of high and low water levels. Then, how to use them reasonably is what we need to know next.

But it's also easy to understand that if you want the brewed coffee to have a higher hierarchy or more active acidity, you can raise the water level and powder bed by increasing the flow. The specific lifting height depends on the amount of powder. for example, when we use a small filter cup to brew 15g coffee powder, we can raise the height of the powder bed to 3/4 of the filter cup, taking V60 as an example, it is half of the short ribs.

When rising to this height, because of the acceleration of the launching speed, the extraction uniformity is not so high, and the coffee will show more active acidity and richer layers. It should be noted that unless the amount of powder is increased, this position can be regarded as the limit of 15g powder for small filter cups. The main reason is that the amount of powder is too small to build a higher powder wall. If the water level is raised regardless of the existence of the powder wall, it will give hot water a chance to slip away from the edge to form bypass water, which in turn affects the extraction and taste of coffee. So if we want the brewed coffee to have a higher sweetness or a more balanced performance, we can use a small flow of water to make the coffee to prevent the powder wall from being raised too high. Take the small V60 for brewing 15g coffee powder as an example, basically controlling the position of the powder bed in the filter cup 2/3 is almost enough.

This height will concentrate the coffee powder! As Qianjie said, coffee will have a more balanced taste due to a more efficient and uniform extraction, resulting in a more prominent sweetness and a more mellow taste (all relatively speaking). Yes, this is the very popular "high sweet water level"! However, there is a difficulty in brewing at low water level, which will greatly test the ability of brewers to control water, because it requires a small flow of water to cook throughout the process. Well, if everyone's ability to control water is not so skillful, you can try to inject water into more segments and control the height of the powder bed by reducing the amount of water injected into each section, just like the technique used in boiling high-density shallow baked beans.

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