Crossings Coffee Corner: August

How to Adjust for Acidity Vs. Bitterness When Brewing At-Home.

Sep 04, 2023

Topic: How to adjust for Acidity Versus Bitterness these when you're brewing at home.
Coffee Smarter Expert: Alden Hozouri, Crossings Coffee Roasters
Connect: www.crossings.coffee • @crossingscoffee

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Acidity and Bitterness are on opposite sides of the flavor profile spectrum.
Coffee is all about controlling variables. Sometimes the things we can control are limited. Temperature, Grind Size, Ratio of water-to-bean are just some of the major ones.
Surface area of the grind (grind size) is a big factor in how much coffee flavor can be extracted. The smaller the grind, the more surface area is exposed to water.
Hotter water will extract flavor faster.
Tweaking the variables will change the flavor of a coffee. You can experiment by tracking how you brew a coffee, then making small changes for each cup or batch, and noting the differences in taste.
Alden recommends using a coffee journal. You could easily carry a pocket notepad, or we’ve sourced some great coffee journals that enable you to make sure you’re tracking the same details page after page.

From left: A yellow pocketsized notepad that says "Another Coffee In The Books" on the cover in gold foil. Inside page with breakdown of coffee traits. Blank page for notes or sketches.

BUY COFFEE JOURNAL

LISTEN!

Alden explains coffee defects in all forms to us. Transcript below.

Listen to this short clip, featuring Alden Hozouri.

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INTERVIEW

This transcription has been edited for length and clarity.

R!WC: Alden, welcome to you and to that truck backing up outside my window to another Crossings Coffee Corner. Thank you for showing up and teaching us stuff. Specifically me. I'm wondering, What am I learning about today?

Alden: So today, I want to go over acidity versus bitterness and how to adjust for these when you're brewing at home.

R!WC: Just so I'm clear, are those like the opposite ends of the spectrum kind of on the flavor profile?

Alden: In a manner of speaking? Yes. Okay,

R!WC: Well, what do I need to know?

Alden: To start off like, I kind of want to preface this whole thing by saying coffee is literally the science of extraction and understanding the variables—the input variables—that affect extraction one way or the other. There are so many variables, and the more of these variables that you can control, the more control you have over your cup.

But at home, [you] might be limited in what [you] have available or if you're out camping or this or that or anything else. So it's like, what can you be aware of to look at this from a systemic view, to see what you can influence to achieve the cup that you're looking for.

So just to kind of name a few: temperature of your water, the type of your coffee, the grind of your coffee, and grind size. I mean, the ratio of your water to beans. These are just a few to name. When you kind of look at these from a systemic view, they really start to make sense.

Just to kind of paint a picture for you guys. Some of you may remember this from like high school chemistry, the surface area is directly correlated with a fraction. The smaller the surface area, or the smaller the grind size, the higher the surface area we have over a net unit of coffee. So the more surface area you have, the higher potential we have for higher extraction.

R!WC: That was something that was very confusing to me early in my coffee journey. It still is, but also I never took chemistry in high school. So that's probably why it sounds backward because it's a smaller grind. It's like how does it have more, but it's because there are more [bean] pieces for the water to impact with—to touch, and suck out that flavor. Nothing is getting hidden inside a chunk of coffee,

Alden: Exactly. Visually, if you imagine a Rubik's Cube, you know, a three-by-three Rubik's Cube, you can kind of see each of the nine [squares] if you're looking at a face. There are nine cubes on one face. But as a whole brick, there are six sides. If suddenly you take all those bricks apart into their smaller pieces, the sides that were facing each other [internally] and not in touch with one another, those previously weren't exposed to water. When you break it open, you have the same volume of coffee, but you've got way more surface area. That is exactly what you said. There are more points of contact for water to touch and play with.

So surface area and grind size, that's the thing. Water temperature...the higher our water temperature, the higher our extraction potential. Think of adding sugar to a cup of water. Eventually, you get to a point where the sugar is not gonna dissolve anymore. But if you heat the water, you increase the solubility, and you can add more sugar and dissolve even more. The same idea goes with coffee. The hotter the water, the more we're pulling out of the grind.

Next up is your ratio. Different coffees, depending on the origin or how it was roasted, kind of shift the ratio [of water to beans]. But most coffees kind of stick between like a 1:12 or a 1:17 ratio of grams of coffee to water.

So for every one gram of coffee, you'll use 16 grams of water. And this is so variable. This is exactly where it comes down to you just having to play around and see what works for you, especially if you're using a Kalita or a V60 or a Chemex or just like a coffeemaker at home. Having command of all these different things can really affect what's coming out.

R!WC: By adjusting the grind and adjusting the ratio or both or any of these other variables. You're saying that we can impact the end cup's acidity versus bitterness.

Alden: Exactly. And for the most part, I think that kind of comes down to...I think in our last month's episode, we talked about trying a wide range of coffees. This is where that is going to really help support your coffee journey. The wider the variety of coffees you have, the wider your palate, and the more articulation and attunement you can have to, ooh, this is tasting a little acidic, or this is tasting a little bitter. And all these other flavor notes that coffee roasters love talking about.

I say to start, if you are an aspiring coffee drinker, get a small journal or something to keep next to your coffee setup at home and record, like a daily journal, what you're noticing and what you did.

And then stepwise, change one variable each day, and then record any differences that you do notice. So let's just say, for example, we're starting off, and we're doing a V60 pour-over with this one coffee. And also, I encourage you to stick to the same coffee because if you're changing the coffee, you're kind of losing the rhythm of what changes you made that had an effect on your cup.

But on a coffee from this local roaster, I did a 1:16 ratio. So for 20 grams [of coffee, I used] 320 grams of water. I ground it at a seven on my grinder, in particular. I used water that was 201 degrees Fahrenheit.

And it (the coffee) tasted chocolatey. It tasted a little citric. And I think it even tasted a little there's a little bitterness at the end there. You know, it's fine, especially when I put a little milk and sugar in there, but I'm definitely noticing the bitterness in there.

Okay, cool. That's Day One. On Day Two, we're going to come to the exact same setup, 1:16 ratio—so my 20 grams of coffee to 320 grams of water. But instead of my water being at 201 degrees Fahrenheit, maybe it'll take that down to like 199 degrees. I'm still gonna keep the same grind size at a seven, and I'm gonna brew it again and see what happens.

Oh, wow. Okay, cool. Yeah, so I'm still tasting a little bit of chocolate, maybe not as richly [as yesterday]. There is still a little of that citric If anything, it's a little stronger. It's even more acidic. The bitterness is gone. But now that acidity is really sitting heavy on my tongue. Hmm. Okay, cool. So now we've kind of flipped to the other side of this pendulum swung the other way. You know, we're looking for the Goldilocks here!

So the next day, I'm going to come back to the setup and be like, Okay, the same setup, 20 grams coffee, 320 grams of water ground at a seven, I'm going to stick to a 200 degrees Fahrenheit, with my water kettle. Okay, cool. We've hit the Goldilocks. It's just acidic enough, there's just the right amount of like body, there's not a lot of bitterness, like, I'm happy with this.

Then you've noted you now have cataloged for this coffee in particular, that this is the ratio or the recipe that you'd like to use. And if you're interested, we can go even deeper and find new ways to find to bring out even more flavors that maybe weren't being addressed by controlling these variables in particular. But it's that stepwise methodology that I use.

R!WC: Yeah, methodology, I got it. I'll add that I like that coffee journal idea. The concept really does make a difference. I am somebody who cooks and bakes a lot but never writes anything down, which drives my wife crazy because she'll say, Oh, I love this. What did you do? And I'll be like, I don't know, I threw some nutmeg in it. No idea. I don't remember.

With coffee, I was always like that too. Or I just was never really paying attention. And I needed to. So I got a pocket notebook. Writing things down, that really helped. But then I found I needed something more specific. I needed an actual coffee journal because I was forgetting what things I needed to write down.

I was like forgetting, oh, you need to have this information. And the next day, I'd go back and be like, well, I forgot to write that down. So between now and when this show comes out, which is soon, I'm going to find some coffee journals to recommend and maybe even get some that I can send out to a few listeners.

Alden: That sounds like a brilliant idea. I'm all for it.

R!WC: All right, so what's our one-sentence breakdown of acidity versus bitterness and how to adjust your cup at home?

Alden: So let's break it down to the most simplistic setup you have at home. Let's say you don't have a scale. Let's say you don't even have a gooseneck kettle. You can control the temperature, and you find ways to control each of these variables. The variables are your volume of water, the volume of coffee, the temperature of your water, and the grind size.

These three things are going to be the biggest, most forefront things you can control. And the way that you can do that for weight is to maybe use a spoon, you know, or some sort of measuring things to keep the measurement of coffee to the measurement of water as consistent with one another as possible.

Water temperature, how do we control for that if you don't have a gooseneck kettle? You can control the temperature by getting it to a boil, cutting the heat, and then timing how long you're letting it cool down from the boil. Is it 30 seconds today? Is it 45 seconds or a minute today? That way, you can also have some arbitrary but somewhat specific way to control how cool your water is when you're brewing with it.

Then the last is your grind size. If you're gonna grind at home, having a grinder that you can mark down what grind you did today versus tomorrow is really helpful. If you don't have a grinder at home and your coffee shop will let you ground there, then that's one variable you don't have to worry about. You can just play with the weight or the ratio and the temperature of your water.

R!WC: Very cool. Alden. Thank you so much. Always great to see you. By the way, I like the backward hat today. I'm looking forward to talking to you again and learning something new. I feel like every time, we're supposed to only learn one thing on the show, but I feel like I'm always learning like 10 things.

Alden: My pleasure. Thanks for having me.