I have been toying around with various pourover recipes (techniques) over the past several months. My experiments have been enlightening.

Here are three recipes that resulted in very different cups. All use 48g of coffee & 28oz of water.

1. Medium-course grind. No bloom, just pour and stir continually. Resulted cup was a bright, full bodied cup, not too different from FP. Very nice.

2. Medium/fine (typical) grind w/ continual stirring resulted in a heavy bodied cup, rich in flavor however reduced temperature, due to much longer extraction--a result of the stirring and the finer grind, fines will slow the flow severely. The result was somewhere between a FP-like and turkish-like coffee. It was actually very good, perhaps a little rich for most folk. Quite oily, with some silty fines at the bottom (likely from spill over due to the stirring).

3. Medium fine grind. Initial stir, then allow to settle, then proceed as a normal pourover. Resulting cup was rich and clean. (The initial stirring increased extraction time). This method is already used by some shops.

Similar to espresso, fines play a critical role in controlling flow, and therefore extraction time. You can modify the flavor profile through controlling grind size and modifying grind distribution through sifting through a sieve. The catch there is weighing your final result to ensure you start with the right brew ratio.

Anyway.. just wanted to share this.. thoughts/opinions?

What're you brewing with? A melitta with one small hole will likely be impacted differently than a V60 or the Wave.

I've tried #3 with a V60 and a Chemex, and i definitely like it more in the V60. I feel it helps force a little extra early extraction, whereas my Chemex brews tend to brew longer to begin with. I haven't tried stirring in the wave yet, i don't think it much needs for it being a flat bottomed filter.

My gut thinks that conical filters would benefit more from the stir as it reintegrates the fines that initially settles. I wonder if heavy agitation from the pour replicates the stir without the stir?

Good question. For the experiments I used a Wave.

I avoided the flat filter/cone because they will get clogged very quickly and their flat nature limits their flow. You end up with a soupy mess.

I often do something similar to #3, usually when I am doing a small, 200mL brew in the v60-01. I copied it from perger's 2012 Brewer's Cup method, and I find that for smaller brew amounts it helps me get the flow rate I want without having to grind so fine that I mute the acidity I am seeking. I get best results by agitating vigorously with a cocktail whisk after pouring 30-50mL of water during the first 30 seconds, and then doing the rest of the pour without any stirring, trying to minimize further agitation. I don't like stirring batched above 18g/300mL because it tends to slow down the process too much.

I've only had luck stirring the bloom. Tried stirring the drain on numerous occasions, only to have clarity reduced (at least seemingly).