Coffee newcomers learn main points: it is important to brew a good cup of coffee and choose fresh coffee beans.

If we further explain the meaning of "brewing coffee", it can be said to be "extracting aromatic substances from coffee beans by water." in the process of brewing, various ingredients in coffee beans are released into the water by the dissolution of water. this process is called "extraction". There are many ingredients in coffee beans, the best known is the refreshing caffeine, in addition to coffee beans there are many oils, minerals, acids and aromatic substances. Wait, if a lot of these substances dissolve into the water in the process of brewing coffee, we can say that the extraction rate of this cup of coffee is very high, otherwise, the extraction rate of this cup of coffee is low.

Since we only want to extract oil and aroma substances from coffee beans, not caffeine and other bitter ingredients, so another way to say a good cup of coffee is: "A cup of coffee with the right extract from coffee beans." if you keep the impression of coffee as "coffee = bitter", congratulations on entering the previously unknown coffee time.

We already know from the above that brewing coffee is to extract the good and fragrant substances from coffee beans and give up the bad substances, but how to judge when the good substances will come out and when the bad substances will come out? The only way is to taste it with your tongue. If you think the brewed coffee is bitter and astringent and difficult to swallow, it must be a failed cup of coffee! Fortunately, the good substances in coffee beans will be dissolved by water more quickly, while caffeine and most of the bitter substances we don't want will be dissolved more slowly, so we can use this feature to make the right coffee. In other words, the correct brewing is to carefully control the time the coffee powder is immersed in water (along with the thickness of grinding) and stop the extraction reaction at the right time in order to get the best quality coffee.

Many of the brewing methods or data I have introduced can be appropriately adjusted according to everyone's preference, experience and taste, but there are still some major principles that are common to brewing coffee. I try to sum up five points. let's call it the "five principles of making coffee."

1. Fresh coffee beans

two。 Correct grinding

3. Good water quality

4. Appropriate water temperature

5. Make it gently

No matter what kind of brewing method or personal habit, these five rules can be said to apply everywhere, if any of them are violated in the brewing process, the result is likely to be a failed cup of coffee!

Today, let's take a closer look at the first point.

Rule number one: fresh coffee beans

If you ask a famous chef: how to cook delicious food? I believe that there must be "fresh ingredients" in his answer, because as long as a good cook will not use stale, out-of-date materials to cook his specialty dishes, coffee is the same, the first step in a good cup of coffee is fresh coffee beans.

What are fresh coffee beans? Please refer to the shelf life of coffee beans listed in the table below, you may be surprised by the harsh conditions, but in fact, coffee beans begin to lose their freshness after baking, and as the time spent in contact with the air increases, the beautiful substances in coffee beans gradually decrease, especially those that have been ground. Why do ground coffee beans have a shelf life of only 5-10 minutes? The main reason is that the ground coffee beans have a very large surface area, so the oxidation rate is relatively several times faster, and it won't be long before the coffee beans deteriorate due to oxidation, let alone try to make good coffee.

Therefore, it is strongly recommended that any coffee must be ground before brewing, and only one cup at a time! Even if there are ten cups to cook, it is best to wait until you have finished one cup and then grind the next cup. Do not grind a pile in advance to save time in making coffee. So the next time you walk into a strange coffee shop, you can feel at least half relieved if you take a look at the store's fresh brewing, but if you see that the coffee maker scoops out the pre-ground coffee powder from the sealed jar, you have to think carefully about whether you want to drink this coffee!

From the point of view of fresh grinding and cooking, buying ground coffee beans is obviously the most difficult way to keep them fresh. the most common situation is to go to a coffee shop and buy a pound of coffee beans and ask the store to grind them instead. Think about it. How long will it take to finish a pound of coffee beans? A week? Or two weeks? No matter how long it takes to finish it, it has exceeded the 10-minute fresh deadline on the way home alone. how can you expect to make good coffee with coffee beans that have lost their freshness?

By the same token, there is no need to blindly believe in foreign brand-name coffee beans, especially those that have been ground-even though manufacturers have repeatedly stressed in their advertisements that we attach great importance to the freshness of coffee beans, airlift to China, low-temperature nitrogen irrigation to keep them fresh, and so on, but what is in front of us is expired coffee beans. Therefore, I would like to suggest that if you like coffee, like to drink good coffee, and like to make coffee at home, it is better to spend more money on a bean grinder.

Shelf life of coffee beans

Coffee bean species retention time (limit)

Unbaked coffee raw beans 1 Mel-2 years

Roasted coffee beans (for cooking espresso) take about 3 weeks.

Roasted coffee beans (other than espresso) for 30-45 days

Ground coffee beans for 5-10 minutes

Coffee beans must be kept in a good environment to have the above life.

Source: network