The Best Way to Make Coffee

Question: "Hi Marc, I am seeking advice as to which is the best way to make my coffee. I have a grind and press delivery machine at present but this does not seem much better than a drip feed into a jug except its fresher. I also have numerous cafetieres and a been grinder. I just want to know in your opinion which way is best based on using same beans in each situation. Hope you can advise me.  Many thanks." - Graham[ad#Google Adsense]Answer: Graham, it's a great question and in my opinion, boils down to two factors: freshness and convenience.You don't want to trade off too much freshness for the sake of convenience, or else you end up simply with instant coffee which is barely drinkable but an extremely convenient way to make coffee.  The three methods I would recommend (two of which you mentioned) are:

• The French Press: In my opinion and when made right, the freshest way to make coffee.  For those of you unfamiliar with this method, click the link to learn more about it.  Make sure you use a coarse grind and not let the water saturate the ground coffee for too long.  If you grind the coffee too fine or let the water sit too long before pressing, you will overextract too many solids from the coffee and end up with a fresh but bitter and unpleasant cup of "sludge" coffee.  The disadvantage with the Press is that it makes only so much coffee at a time and the container is glass and quickly loses heat so you need to serve the coffee quickly.
• Drip-Brewed: There are fewer steps to making drip-brewed coffee and purists who love their French Press will tell you that you give up a little flavor in the cup as a result.  Despite that, this is the method that I personally favor.  On a weekend morning where I have time to relax, I'll generally use the French Press.  When I'm filling my thermos with a day's worth of fresh coffee, I need to make it by drip-brewer and I am very pleased with the coffee it makes.  Click to learn more about the Coffee Makers we reviewed.
• Pod Coffee: The single-serve pod coffee is already ground before it's brewed (which we don't like) but it's also sealed airtight in the pod (which is good).  At some point in the process, the ground coffee was exposed to air and had to expire at least to some extent.  So while the coffee stays fresh while in its opaque airtight container, French Pressers and drip-brewers will tell you it's the least fresh of the three methods.  But for the convenience of preparing coffee this way, you may not notice a substantial difference...the pod coffee maker still makes a good cup of coffee.  I wrote about single-serve pod coffee in a recent article.

I hope this helps.  Any more convenient than a pod coffee, and you should assume it won't make a fresh cup.  This goes for coffee that was already ground for you and certainly goes for instant coffee...both more convenient but both with a noticeable difference in freshness.As I mentioned, I normally use a drip-brewer but every now and then love the freshness of French Pressed coffee.