The pour over is a quintessential and time-honored manual brewing method that has, in many ways, defined the third wave of coffee. Pour over requires your attention and is unapologetically manual, but once you master your recipe, the act of brewing and the resulting cup are a thing of true beauty.
There are as many brewing methods for the venerable Hario V60 as there are coffees to brew, but we're sharing our go-to recipe for a consistently great cup, every time.
Who's it for?
Coffee drinkers who are used to automatic drip machines may, at first, be intimidated by pour over coffee or lament that the process is "too much work." We encourage you to give it a try, as it's not nearly as difficult as it seems and once you get the hang of it, brewing yourself a cup of pour over coffee will become much more of a pleasurable daily ritual than work.
The trickiest part of the pour over is dialing in the appropriate grind size, a component that can make or break your brew. We're here to help you get started, but if your first cup brews too quickly or takes too long, just adjust your grinder try again!
We reach for our V60 when brewing light to medium roasted coffees, especially single origin coffees and those with delicate and nuanced flavors. Hario V60 drippers and their paper filters often produce a lighter bodies coffee with bright clarity.
The Recipe
Gather the Goods:
- Freshly Roasted FreeForm Coffee
- Hario V60-02 Ceramic Coffee Dripper
- Gooseneck kettle
- Burr Grinder
- Gram Scale
- Timer
- Filtered Water
- Spoon or stir stick
- Hario V60-02 Paper Filter
Brewing Instructions:
- Bring ~.5L of filtered water to 200° in a kettle.
- Place paper filter in the dripper, folding the sealed portion as needed to create a perfect cone.
- With the dripper and filter on top of a serving vessel or mug, free pour hot water from the kettle in a circular motion, ensuring the paper filter is thoroughly wet to rinse the filter and preheat your serving vessel. Drain water from serving vessel once complete.
- Grind 22g of coffee on a fine-medium setting on your grinder and place in the filter. Gently shake the dripper so that the bed of coffee grounds is nice and flat.
- Place the entire brewing set up - dripper, filter and coffee on top of a serving vessel or mug - on a scale and tare to zero.
- Start the timer and begin to gently pour water in a clockwise motion over the coffee grounds, ensuring that there are no dry patches of coffee grounds. When the scale reads 50g, stop pouring.
- Take a spoon or stirring stick and gently stir the soaked coffee grounds 3 times in a clockwise direction. At this point, the coffee is simply absorbing the water and - if the coffee is fresh - you will see it "bloom" as it releases carbon dioxide.
- At 30 seconds, perform another gentle clockwise pour until the scale reads 150g (adding 100g to existing brew). Again, but gentler this time, stir the slurry once or twice in a clockwise direction. Allow the coffee to begin to drain through the filter.
- At 1:30, perform another gentle clockwise pour until the scale reads 250g (adding 100g to existing brew). Again, but gentler this time, stir the slurry just once or twice in a clockwise direction. Allow the coffee to continue to drain through the filter.
- At 2:30, perform your final gentle clockwise pour until the scale reads 352g (adding 102g to existing brew). This time, do not stir the slurry. Allow the coffee to completely drain through the filter.
- At around 3:30, the coffee should have completely drained through the filter. If not, wait for it to drain completely and remove dripper from serving vessel. Dispose of filter and ground in compost or trash.
- Give the brewed cup a couple of stirs with a clean spoon and let it sit for 2-3 minutes. Once the coffee is cool enough to sip, savor a beautifully crafted cup of pour over coffee!
Notes:
- For this recipe, we are using a 16:1 water to coffee ratio (16 grams of water for every gram of coffee), which seems to hit the sweet spot for most coffees. However, different coffees can perform better at higher or lower ratios. Experiment and find your own happy place, the only rule here is that you enjoy your coffee!
- The goal in this recipe is to have a completed brew between 3 and 4 minutes. If you are using our recommended dosing and experience a shorter or longer brew time, adjust your grind the next time you brew. For longer brews, grind finer, for shorter brews, grind coarser.
- While many people use volume to brew at home (cups of water and scoops of coffee), a small investment in a gram scale is nearly essential for properly brewing pour over and will do wonders for the consistency of your coffee, regardless of the brewing method. You may already have a kitchen scale at home you can use, or a simple affordable coffee scale such as the OXO 6lb Precision Scale is well worth the investment and will be useful for all of your future brewing adventures.
Happy sipping!