Tips for brewing a great cup of coffee!  We roast our own beans, head on over to see the process in this post I wrote a few years ago.



Coffee Beans

• Figure out what kind of coffee you like, do you like dark and chocolatey or bright and acidic. Fine tuning your tastes will help you settle on the best coffee for your palate.


• Buy beans in small batches or roast your own.


• Use them up. Don’t let them sit around


• Store them in an airtight container (don’t put them in the freezer). If you buy a large quantity keep some in a small jar for daily use so that the majority of beans will not be exposed to the air. We store ours in a Le Parfait Glass Jar

Buy a good grinder

• A burr grinder is essential. Uniform size won’t let the water get through the coffee faster than it should.


• Only grind what you are going to use


• You can get a really nice hand cranked burr grinder from Red Rooster Trading Company

Try different types of coffee makers

• Espresso


• Chemex


• French press


• Cold brew coffee


• Vacuum Brewers


• Moka pots


• Drip coffee makers

Maintain Your Coffee Brewing Device

• Clean your machine


• Filtered water


• Drink after brewing. Don’t brew ten cups of coffee and drink them throughout the day. Better to brew twice and have good coffee all day.

Sources for green coffee beans:

Sweet Maria’s (this is where we buy our beans)

Dean’s Beans



Sweet Maria’s article about Getting Started Roasting Coffee at Home. Here’s their article about using a hot air popcorn popper to roast coffee. Finally a link to a great article on the health benefits of coffee.

If you really want to use up several hours, visit Coffee Geek or Home Barista and check out the forums. At 10 people, get 12 opinions.

Are you a coffee drinker?  How do you take yours: cream, sugar, black?