Make Incredible Coffee At Home With A French Press

In this video, I demonstrate how to make great coffee at home using a French Press.  What is a French Press?  According to Wikipedia (http://bit.ly/MUNm), “A French press consists of a narrow cylindrical jug usually made of glass or clear plastic, equipped with a lid and a “plunger”, made of metal or plastic, which fits tightly in the cylinder and which has a fine wire or nylon mesh acting as a filter. Coffee is brewed by placing the coffee and water together, leaving to brew for a few minutes, then depressing the plunger to trap the coffee grinds at the bottom of the jug.”  This method was first patented in 1931 by Attilo Calimani.  In the video, I utilize methods gleaned from coffeegeek.com, but I’m by no means an expert.  The most important parts of this method is to ensure the coffee is ground coarse and not fine.  Also, you’ll notice I heat the water to around 200F which is below its boiling point of 212F.  If you boil the water, it’s too hot.  I stir the coffee with a chopstick for reasons I don’t quite understand other than a silver utensil could damage the pot.  After the coffee brews for 4 minutes, you must depress the plunger using only the weight of your hand.  If you force it down, it could make the coffee shoot out of the pot, or even worse, damage the pot and your hand!  The result is a silky smooth cup of coffee that is beyond what you’re used to from Starbucks or Dunkin Donuts.  The French Press we bought is a 12 cup, Bodum Chambord.  You can find it at your local Bed, Bath & Beyond for $50.  We went to our local Starbucks and picked up a couple of blends of coffee and asked them to grind them for us (specifying it’s for a French Press)  As I perfect the method of brewing French Press coffee, I’ll venture out to try better blends.  Enjoy the video! Background music is 90BPM Number 10 http://bit.ly/hMIz and 90BPM SY55 http://bit.ly/3h9OMZ from Soundsnap.