The Often-Debated Coffee-Water Ratio

Question: "I just read the process on making a good cup of coffee,however; I did not see anything about measuring, how much coffee or water to use, that's my BIG problem." - NitaAnswer: It is a very common question, Nita.  I get lots of emails from people telling me how many cups of coffee they want to make and asking how much coffee to use.  The first thing is that a mug or glass of coffee to me is made of two metric cups.  When the carafe of your coffee maker says it makes 12 cups, I consider that 6 glasses of coffee.  For each glass of coffee I'm making, I use one even "coffee scoop" of ground coffee or one generous scoop of coffee beans - generous, because of the amount of air in between coffee beans versus in between ground coffee.  How big is the "standard" coffee scoop?  It is equal to two US tablespoons.  That means you using two tablespoons of coffee for each mug you'll be brewing, or one tablespoon per each metric cup.  If you're making yourself a couple cups of coffee (or four metric cups), scoop four generous tablespoons of coffee beans to grind (or two coffee scoops).  One cup of coffee = one generous coffee scoop.  One metric cup of coffee = one generous tablespoon.  I love coffee, that's why I keep saying generous.  I hope that helps.