lol i say the same exact thing. I am italian and was always always around coffee, so i grew to like the taste of it. I had a sip of my friends coffee once and litteraly had to spit it out. I think it was 1/4 coffee, 1/4 heavy cream and 1/2 sugar
The cone pour over is wonderful along with the thermal carafe. Not quite as full bodied as the French press, but no sludge at the end. I will say, for $10, it's hard to beat the cone pour over.
That is strange that you get sludge. Sludge??? is that a word? Sounds like it would be a word to describe coffee residue. Do you use coarse ground? If you use anything else, there will be sludge at the end of the bottom of your cup. The advantage of the french press is that there is no paper for the water to filter through. When drip filtered through paper, the oils will not penetrate the paper leaving a weaker coffee. My family likes it stronger so it is the best choice for us!!
Sludge is part of the english language. Coarse grind from a Baratza Preciso. There's always going to be some fines even with a coarse grind which will leave behind (what I term) sludge. It's definitely a tradeoff between the two processes and I do enjoy both. But, when I'm filling a travel mug, and can't see what's in the cup, I prefer the cone pour over.
I've got a little french press that makes 1 big cup or 2 regular cups. I always buy my coffee fresh ground and always drink it black.
My favorite coffee is Tanzanian Peaberry, followed closely by Kona coffee, both of which are relatively light-to-medium roasts with a wine-like acidity, rather than the bright acidity of a Kenya AA, and without the bitterness of anything darker than a typical Italian Roast. At the moment, I use a four-cup drip Mister Coffee machine. By preference, I'll use a moka pot. In either case, I'll add a couple teaspoons of non-dairy creamer. If I wanted sugar in my coffee, I'd buy coffee ice cream.
Thou shalt not taint thy coffee, be it with sugar OR creamer or any such other poison! Hey, it's your coffee. Enjoy it your way.
I HAVE to have my half and half or powdered non-diary creamer in my coffee, because it tastes so good! Sometimes I'll drink it black, but not often
Did you know that your über-toasty, smokey, kick-you-in-butt-with-every-sip, dark roast (French, Italian, Spanish...) actually has less caffeine than the lighter McDonald's cup-o-joe? Most home-roasters know this, but caffeine is extremely sensitive to temperature extremes, thus much is lost during those extended roast times to achieve the dark variety. To compensate, since volume is also lost (bean weight) during roasts, measure your coffee by weight to achieve the same buzz from the caffeine (i.e. 3 oz light grind = 3 oz of Dark; but you'll need MORE dark grind to hit the 3 oz mark.) Or simply DRINK more dark roast....that's what I usually do anyway.
Yup - the darker the roast, the less caffeine. For the past several decades I've been buying French Roast blends. Now that I roast my own, I've been experimenting with lighter roasts and I'm liking the results.
Caffeine is also affected by the time one's extraction method takes. Espresso, being the fastest (or most express ), has the least caffeine, while something like a perc pot probably has the most. What we end up with is counter-intuitive for most folks: dark roast espresso has less caffeine than most other kinds of coffee.
When I first started roasting, I went extra-dark—sometimes by accident. Overtime, I 'drifted' toward lighter roasts depending upon the variety of bean. I have discovered there are some really nice coffee beans available with really distinct flavor profiles. But, alas, both my wife & I still go back to the dark italian-roast blends, so that's the majority of what I roast now. A great resource for all things home-roasting including an exceptional variety of green beans, just over the hill from me in Oakland: http://www.sweetmarias.com/index.php
My brew method of choice when I have the time... I got these bean from La Costa Coffee Roasters. If I happen to be in San Diego, I'll usually pick up some of whatever they roasted that day. This is a blend...Sumatra, Ethiopia, Guatemala I believe. I gotta check out sweet Maria's though...
I have been a Sweet Maria customer for years and member of CSA (Coffee Snobs of America) for almost as long http://home.comcast.net/~mdmint/coffee/csa12steps.htm. I have been home roasting for at least 10 years now. I currently roast on a Quest M5 roaster and brew with a Technivorm and or a Yama vacuum brewer with a Cory rod. There are some misconceptions in this thread, however. First Espresso is a drink not a bean or a roast level. Dark oily roasts are to be avoided. Large companies like Charbucks and Peets and Folgers (referred to as the F word around my house) purposely over roast their coffees. When overroasted the sugars caramelize leaving the brew lacking in any nuances. The result is consistency in taste and the ability to use pedestrian beans in their blends.Getting the public used to and preferring over roasted coffee is much to the large roasters advantage. Not unlike the large manufacturers getting people to shave with canned foam and multiple blade cartridges.
