# Help with new ceramic brewer thingy



## robashton (May 9, 2015)

ho!

So I got an exciting new delivery today

View attachment 16162


I've ran half a dozen coffees through it now (and it's just in the oven baking so I can clean it properly again), but I've not managed to get a *good* brew from it yet.

First off, the mouthfeel in the output coffee is mega-confusing, at 0.8tds it feels like I'm drinking weakly flavoured syrup, at 1.3 it was like drinking treacle. (Both extractions were fluffed in their own unique way).

So, recipes so far: (GS = grind setting), these are all at 93-94C

GS 4, 14g + 250ml = 200ml of coffee ( 1.3 tds, really nasty bitterness on top of sweetness and thickness, took 8 minutes to come through)

*changed coffee so as not to waste the one I really want to use for this*

GS 9, 14g + 250ml = 200ml of coffee ( 0.8 tds, super weak but sticky and syrupy, took 2 minutes to come through )

GS 7, 13.5g + 230ml = 200ml of coffee ( 1.05 tds, tastes okay but a bit weak, super syrupy, took 4 minutes to come through )

====

Observations:


With no coffee in the filter, the flow rate is about 200ml in 10 seconds, so coffee is the main flow rate limiter

If I keep adding water so the coffee doesn't have time to settle completely, flow rate carries on being quite fast, almost stopping once coffee has settled

Full, the filter is probably only 180g, I could down-dose and just do 160g of output at a time - I'm okay with that as a single-cup thing if that's a suggestion

Agitation can start up flow again but this feels wrong as it's basically allowing water past the coffee without "flow"

I think it needs a good *clean*, just like with the behmor I'm being thrown off by the taste of "new"


I thought initially the best idea would be to soak the grinds, let them bloom, then pulse water through until I had the desired output - this method means that it chokes very quickly so perhaps not ideal but it would mean a more stable temp

I then tried to keep adding water until desired amount was added and just let it come through, this means quite a lot of weak coffee and then.. it chokes

I imagine this is probably similar to doing a chemex, but I don't do them either so queries:

How do I keep flow rate largely consistent (or at least avoid choking), I'd guess that I should be aiming for aroundabouts 20% EY unless anybody has bright ideas about pushing it even higher - I guess I could add all the water, stick a lid on it and just wait for 10 minutes...


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## froggystyle (Oct 30, 2013)

What is it?


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## robashton (May 9, 2015)

http://www.kyuemongama.com/en/eng_ceramic_filter.html

Some recipes I've seen have been fairly standard (400ml through 25g over 4 minutes - although how they managed that flow-rate I've no idea)

One friend suggested aiming for nel-drip style, high dose low yield (45g -> 180ml) type of thing, kinda tempting.

I bought it on a whim based on stories of crazy mouthfeel (which were not exaggerated)


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## garydyke1 (Mar 9, 2011)

Run it like a V60


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## robashton (May 9, 2015)

that's not too far off what attempt #2 was, it's not quite the perger 1.40 TDS...


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## robashton (May 9, 2015)

Okay, 12g of coffee, 200ml of water, 50 + 50 + 100 (0s 30 60s), choked - at 7 on the EK dial! That's more than halfway around and coarser than I use for cupping haha.


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## robashton (May 9, 2015)

View attachment 16163


coarser???!!!


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## robashton (May 9, 2015)

Down to 9.5 on the EK and still choking - I found a post suggesting 400ml over 4min at medium/coarse chemex and I'm wondering what on earth they were on!


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## garydyke1 (Mar 9, 2011)

robashton said:


> View attachment 16163
> 
> 
> coarser???!!!


Is that maxwell house?


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## robashton (May 9, 2015)

I know right? How I'm meant to extract anything meaningful from that I don't know


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## robashton (May 9, 2015)

Love the promise (and hipster creds) of this thing, I refuse to be beaten!


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## robashton (May 9, 2015)

Update: Made an almost tasty brew this morning, putting 200 (well 230g (LRR)) through 12g of coffee at '5' on the classic EK dial in about 8 minutes. (Seems a bit long but *shrug*)

Found the trick was to do pulses, short pulses - if you get too much water in the pressure and flow means the coffee plugs and the flow stops. So patience - super agitation ala Perger is pretty much the opposite thing you want to do because the coffee again just plugs and the flow stops.

Which seems on the surface would mean it's hard to get an *even* extraction, that said the taste buds don't lie and the brew from this three week old coffee was sweet, gloopy and had no dryness. No distinctive fruit (pulped natural bourbon) but lots of chocolate which maps to the tasting notes pretty cleanly.

That's a whole lottta technique for what is an interesting and novelty brew but not necessarily a great one..

Update: TDS was 1.58... you can do the maths but that'd explain the sweetness.


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## robashton (May 9, 2015)

And another - this one was 1.5 TDS with 12g in and 180g output (it choked and I stopped getting liquid through).

This week's IMM (I'm lending my behmor to Papercup so this is my only brew method other than aeropress for a bit!), definitely hit a bit of a dead spot (doesn't taste of a lot, it's slightly sweet but tastes of little distinct), coffee tools tells me 22.5% EY - think I might try and coarsen up and see if I can get a faster flow rate and keep extraction around the 20/21s (if I aim for 24 and fall short I don't think this is great - also I want a faster brew).

There is potential here - good taste coupled with this mouthfeel... um..

So recipe:

Add 12g of medium-coarse coffee to brewer

Get water to about 97C

Add about 30g of water, allow bloom

Add another 30g of water once coffee subsides, keep adding water frequently but patiently, enough to keep grounds just immersed but not enough to drown them. I find adding water to the centre and allowing it to soak into the edges yields in a better flow rate - every time I try to pour over the sides to keep the grounds immersed I start seeing a diminished flow rate all the way to choking Once I've got 230g in, wait for water to soak down until grounds are visible and take filter off. Resulting brew should be about 200g.

Bit janky, any suggestions?

View attachment 16213


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## robashton (May 9, 2015)

Current grind level

View attachment 16214


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## Phil104 (Apr 15, 2014)

Looks like an interesting addition to pour over methods - sounds like the (your) jury is still out as to whether it offers anything over and above the tried and tested methods. From a quick search, sounds like clogging with micro fines could be an issue. I'm looking forward to hearing how you get on.


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## robashton (May 9, 2015)

Cleaning it once it's clogged is a bit of a pain but yeah, it xlogs anyway during prep

Doing an experiment this afternoon with a coffee I know quite well, measuring EY of them all and using 3 different prep methods across a range of grind sizes

Will report back, the blog post will be comprehensive at least..


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## robashton (May 9, 2015)

Wow - so I just made 9 brews with three different methods at three different grind settings and essentially:

Method 1: Only add water as the bed needs it, slow (10 minutes) but EY scales drastically as grind size gets finer - 22-24% EY is super easy

Method 2: Just pour the water in and don't give a crap about anything unsurprisingly this results in a stupidly low EY of about 14-15% regardless of grind size as most of the water just spits through in the first minute or two and then the last 75ml takes 5 minutes

Method 3: Perger's v60 method: We get a little more EY as grind gets finer but we're basically stuck around the 16-17% mark because flow rate is so abysmal I assume, this can also take up to about 10 minutes depending on grind size but we get very little for our efforts

(Grind settings used were 5.8, 5 and 4)

I did all these by tasting and measured EY after the fact, but basically those 16% ones were actually okay (if a bit delicate) and the 22% one was a bit roasty/dry, the 24% was sweet but I don't think the coffee itself is up to it.

Now to do this week's IMM and aim for the stars before I head out...


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## robashton (May 9, 2015)

Using the pulse method, stuck grind at 4.7 aiming for a TDS of 1.3 for an output of 180g of coffee, hit 1.27 so a little shy but I guess the scale isn't going to be linear between 5 and 4...

Still, that's a near 20% EY and it has a lot more interesting acidity than the stupidly high EY brew, looks like I'm slowly getting a handle on this thing. The trick is to keep that bed wet and swampy without turning it into a pond. If you haven't got your desired weight out in 10 minutes you may as well give up because you'll get muddy flavours.

Cleaning the thing is interesting, so far my method is sticking it under the grill until it starts smoking and then stops smoking, then rinsing it under water. You can tell whether it's clean or not by filtering water through it and giving it a taste - it's very noticeable when it's dirty (shudder).


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## risky (May 11, 2015)

robashton said:


> Using the pulse method, stuck grind at 4.7 aiming for a TDS of 1.3 for an output of 180g of coffee, hit 1.27 so a little shy but I guess the scale isn't going to be linear between 5 and 4...
> 
> Still, that's a near 20% EY and it has a lot more interesting acidity than the stupidly high EY brew, looks like I'm slowly getting a handle on this thing. The trick is to keep that bed wet and swampy without turning it into a pond. If you haven't got your desired weight out in 10 minutes you may as well give up because you'll get muddy flavours.
> 
> Cleaning the thing is interesting, so far my method is sticking it under the grill until it starts smoking and then stops smoking, then rinsing it under water. You can tell whether it's clean or not by filtering water through it and giving it a taste - it's very noticeable when it's dirty (shudder).


I think you should bake it rather than grill it. Ovens that have the same lining have a pyrolytic cleaning function. Usually very high temperature for a short time.


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## robashton (May 9, 2015)

Interesting - the manual shows heating over a naked fire!


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## robashton (May 9, 2015)

Going slightly finer and lowering the temperature I've managed to create a brew of this week's IMM at a point where it tastes good.

It's got enough complexity to be interesting, it's got that syrupy mouthfeel, it's still warm and it's sweet. 21% EY according to my readings (180g of coffee from 12g in, 1.4 TDS).

It took about 15 minutes to brew using the pulse method. This brew method is not for the impatient...


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## robashton (May 9, 2015)

OH GOD IN ICE - THERE WE GO THIS IS IT - I think I just worked this out.


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## Phil104 (Apr 15, 2014)

Well done - a testimony to your perseverance in many senses.


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## robashton (May 9, 2015)

I'm now thinking if I shoot for a higher TDS at a similar extraction (so updose) and do it directly over ice we will lose the dirtier flavours caused by the coffee sitting there oxidising over 15 minutes - at this point we are using a Japanese filter to do well extracted Japanese hot cold brew.

i also have yet to try doing an immersion brew then filter using this - I'm thinking that could be good too because again, less oxidisation - the lowering temperature of the immersion will probably mean not so high an extraction but I can grind finer knowing Ill be filtering it anyway.


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## robashton (May 9, 2015)

Just did it directly into ice,got calculation a little wrong so should probably have up dosed even more!

result is fruity and sweet however, not as stale and weird as other efforts - definitely potential here!

increased coffee seems to also possibly mean increased flow rate too, that's something to play with...


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## Phil104 (Apr 15, 2014)

You are turning this into performance art.


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## robashton (May 9, 2015)

Like I said, I've lent my behmor to papercup this week so this is my best chance of a filter aha


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## robashton (May 9, 2015)

After establishing that larger amounts of coffee means a higher flow rate (presumably because of the larger bed size and contact with the bottom of the bowl allowing greater seepage and allowing for greater amounts of water/weight without direct channeling bypassing extraction), I tried 30g to about 500g

I split the pour into three cups however and measured TDS independently.

The first two thirds were 20% of the EY, the last third was barely even 0.5% (This isn't exactly surprising given we know how these things work).

That said, that means a brew ratio of 1:10 can probably give us a decent EY in an acceptable amount of time (less than 5 minutes).

Next brew! Down a grind size, aiming for 30g in and 350g out, watered down to taste (1.8TDS filter no thanks!) - let's see how this goes!


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## robashton (May 9, 2015)

What's really fascinating is that the last 100g has a TDS of about 0.1 and still has that syrupy mouth-feel, and as it's usually nothing but sweetness it's like drinking sugar syrup.

So - it seems as though you *have* to do half a litre of coffee one way or another with this thing, or you can't get the flow rate required.

Just did a batch of coffee, 30g in, 300 out (tds way over 2) over 5 minutes, now wondering if I coarsen up, keep it at 30g and go for 500 can I keep a flow rate going sensibly and get the output just right.

It might just be that you can't do single cups of coffee in this thing


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## simontc (May 21, 2014)

Dude... The ice thing sounds insane. Add some dry ice to proceedings and get to the brewers cup with you!


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## robashton (May 9, 2015)

I think I'm going to end up with two brewing modes for this - one where I go super concentrated over ice and one where I aim to get a plain old pourover out of it (if I can get the flow rate right, if not I'll do the topping up with hot water).

Brewers cup is for people with sieves and better coffee than me


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## robashton (May 9, 2015)

Grind size doesn't seem to really have any effect on flow rate - I just dropped a whole 2.5 coarser on the EK and still only got 300g through in 5 minutes (with 28g of coffee)

So, amount of coffee dictates how much water you can have in the bed at once, dictates the flow rate - more coffee more water faster flow (If you saturate the bed then the water will come through too quickly through the easiest path and you'll get a really low TDS and really low EY). Grind size only serves to change what EY you're shooting for. That's a kinda handy property.

Think given that I just got 400g out over 6 minutes from 28g of coffee and the EY was only 18.56% that the way to go is aim for that ratio of 1:10 (ish) and water down to desired strength.

Bet the chaps that reviewed this thing on the site I found it were thrown off by the crazy mouthfeel and actually only extracted 16% over 4 minutes with their "medium-coarse chemex grind"


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## robashton (May 9, 2015)

I've not forgotten about this and will be blogging shortly.

It's a biatch to clean - baking or grilling it is an awful idea, I can only imagine that the coffee they're using by default is so burned that burned residue makes little difference to the flavour.

After running 10 litres of boiling water through it and leaving it in a cooking pot filled with boiling water I'm finally able to stick hot water through it and not taste either stale coffee or burned stale coffee.

I think in the future I'll clean it when I'm cooking (If i ever use it), just stick it in a boiling pot of water and leave it for an hour - sorted.

30g coffee -> 300g over 5 minutes out at 2.1TDS earlier gave me something that tasted like I was eating a burned mars bar (see above notes about cleaning), suspect if I do a cleaned one shortly I'll get the full result and have something worth blogging about..


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## Dylan (Dec 5, 2011)

You could try a solvent like acetone for cleaning, should dissolve a lot of the oils and help dislodge the dirt. Will evaporate away after use so won't leave a taste.


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## robashton (May 9, 2015)

Clever - if I have difficulties with the water I'll drop back to that - I want to stay away from anything that isn't water or coffee simply because the damned thing cost me a pile of money in shipping and I'm paranoid I'm going to break it haha.

Have some bloom porn from an earlier go of it..

View attachment 16381


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## Dylan (Dec 5, 2011)

Always good to see new things tried, it does look like a royal PITA tho, have you tried it with a paper filter as well to see if it maintains the mouthfeel?


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