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Category: Immersion Brewing (Page 1 of 7)

How to Use an Indian Coffee Filter to Make Kaapi

Last November, the fine folks at Mad Rush Coffee contacted me and ask if I would like an Indian coffee filter to experiment with. Always being up for trying new manual coffee brewing methods (I had never heard of one), I eagerly accepted their offer. A few weeks later, a curious six inch tall, cylindrical, stainless steel brewing contraption arrived in my blog mailbox and I began experimenting with Kaapi and my new Indian coffee filter.

It took almost seven months (after a few major holidays, a family vacation and an extensive kitchen remodel) but I am now ready to discuss Kaapi and the Indian coffee filter.

What is an Indian Coffee Filter?

An Indian coffee filter is a small tubular brewing device with roots in southern India. It brews about 60-70mL of a super concentrated coffee.

The device consists of four parts: a bottom container for collecting the brewed coffee, a top compartment which fits onto the bottom and contains small holes for filtering, a small tamper and a lid for the top of the unit.

It is a unique brewing apparatus that will probably not take the place of some of the more popular manual coffee brewers. It is a fun device to experiment with and a fun one to try and master none-the-less (I have not).

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The American Press Manual Coffee Brewer

Last year, the fine folks over at the American Press headquarters sent me an American Press brewer to check out and review (I was upfront with them and let them know it would take me some time to evaluate the brewer).

When my package arrived, I was quite impressed with the contents of my rectangular brown box—the American Press is fancy looking. I have spent many months field testing this unique brewer and here are my thoughts:

Introduction- What is an American Press

The American Press is a relatively new brewer to the market. Funded by an Indiegogo campaign in early 2016, it takes an innovative approach to manual brewing. It is sleek and somewhat resembles a French press in look and outward brewing mechanics.

The American Press is different from the the French press because of what happens on the inside of the carafe. With a French press, when the coffee is finished brewing the coffee grounds are (mostly) filtered away from the brewed coffee by a mesh filter that is plunged downward through the coffee sludge.

In contrast, the American Press has a filter basket that holds the ground coffee separate from the brewing water. As the filter basket is pressed downward through hot water, the water is forced up through the filter basket creating a slightly pressurized extraction environment. The 100 micron filter basket keeps most of the muck out of the brewed coffee and doesn’t absorb the oils like a paper filtered coffee.

The result is a delicious cup of coffee and, due to the design, a fairly repeatable brewing process.

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The Homewara (Stain-Free) Black Clever Coffee Dripper

The Clever Coffee Dripper is a manual brewing device that is near and dear to my heart. Its ease of use and low barrier of entry made manual brewing approachable to me. I have many fond memories of brewing up my homeroasted coffee fresh out of my Behmor 1600 and savoring the interesting and intense flavors.

Unfortunately, my Clever’s clear plastic body slowly became cloudy and coffee stained. One day, I couldn’t take it anymore and threw out my clever coffee friend.

A year or two later, I ended up purchasing a new Clever Coffee Dripper and writing a review on the blog. One of the only negative things I could say about the Clever Coffee Dripper was that it would inevitably stain and “look a little scary”.

Enter Andrew for Homewara.

Andrew contacted me a few weeks ago and let me know that he had come up with a solution; he made a Clever Coffee Dripper type brewer out of black plastic. It was a simple change but possibly a major improvement (embarrassment over a heavy stained Clever Coffee Dripper is a real thing and no one is talking about it).

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