I've had my Kalita Wave 155 for a couple of weeks now and I'm struggling pretty bad to get things dialed in. I feel like this shouldn't be this complicated of a process and that I'm probably missing something obvious but I can't put my finger on it.

I've done quite a bit of reading up lately and I think I can tell the difference between under and over extracted coffee. I am tasting varying levels of bitterness from tolerable to downright terrible and I think it's from over extraction. What I can't make sense of is that I keep going coarser with my grind and it doesn't seem to get better. Here was my latest brew from today, along with a picture of my grind:

Kalita Wave 155 with a rinsed white filter
18g of Heart Columbia El Portal coffee
300g of bottled spring water at 203 degrees
Lido 3 at 1.5 turns
30 second bloom with 50g of water
pulse pours until I reached 300g
pouring finished at 2:00
brewing finished at 2:25

pic of the grind


This brew was less bitter than the last which was done with a few notches finer on the Lido but still pretty bad. When you take a sip the initial taste is not bed but then it has this horribly bitter finish to it and it leaves a dryness on your tongue that is really not very nice.

I have been tinkering with this for a while now. For the most part I have been keeping things the same and only adjusting the grind size. I've tried anywhere from 0+8.5 on the Lido to the full 1.5 turns that I was at today.

Just to rule out my tap water I have also been using bottled spring water for the past few days, it hasn't seemed to make a difference.

The beans are about a week and a half old. Just to compare, I borrowed a handful of beans from a friend. They were fresh beans from Bird Rock in San Diego and the results were about the same.

I'm not too sure what to do at this point. I could keep going coarser with the grind but that seems really coarse as it is. I'm also a little concerned that the grind consistency isn't what it should be?

Any help would be much appreciated

I'm on mobile and can't type as much as usual, but if you grind that coffee any coarser, you might as well not grind it at all. There's something off, because that's extremely coarse, way coarser than I've ever ground any coffee.

Ok, that at least confirms my suspicion that I went way too coarse. I really wasn't sure because I had come across some other posts of people with the same grinder saying they were doing 1.5 turns (which is what is pictured).

Unfortunately I started much finer and have worked my way to this coarseness and have not found success anywhere in between.

I would think if this was way too coarse then my coffee would be horribly under extracted but as best as I can tell that isn't what I'm tasting.

If you're not currently on antibiotics (which affect taste perception in some), then change coffee. From reading your thorough description, it doesn't sound like you're gear is insufficient or fouled up.

I'm on no meds although sometimes I think I should be for investing this much time trying to make coffee at home

I tried some other beans. I had a friend give me a handful of fresh beans from Bird Rock (Ethiopian Sasaba). They smelled amazing. Unfortunately they produced about the same results.

I should probably also mentioned that I really struggled for a while using a v60 as well. I recently picked up the Kalita because so many people have said that it's more forgiving and consistent than the v60. I don't know, maybe this points to something else being wrong in my setup or process.

If you're in SLC, you may need to brew with water right off boil. I've traveled through there with my travel kit. And I recall that temperature management felt vaguely futile, based how the boiling point changes based on elevation. That could certainly contribute to your frustration.

Also, what's your grinder situation? Are you able to tighten up the grind size without bogging down the brew time?

(Never mind. lido should be able to take you where you need to go.)

Your pictured grind size seems like the most out of spec variable to me. Some cafes use a lower strike temp than 203, but typically not by much.

Yeah, I looked into that. It looks like my water should boil right around 203 - 204 and I used a digital thermometer to check and that seems right. I've been keeping an eye on the brews I've been doing lately and they've all been right off boil, in that 202-204 range.

I was just thinking maybe I should try a much lower temp just for the heck of it.

As a point of reference, these grounds are sorted above and below an 850 micron sieve:



That's roughly the zip code you want to be in. Right now, you are across the state line.

If all else fails, give polished immersion brewing a try. My Kalita Wave mostly lives with my travel kit these days, because polished immersion brewing so much more forgiving and easier to dial in. (Some coffees present better as pour over, however.) Here's the recipe I use:

Step by step: polished immersion brewing

ok, that is super helpful! I will readjust and get as close to that as I can. Does everything else I'm doing look about right? At least as a starting point?

Here's my 2 cents. The first time I brewed with my kalita 185 I was surprised by how fine I actually had to grind to get the best out of it. Finer than on any other brew method I'd tried. So I'd say go finer not coarser. Additionally I'd recommend tackling one variable at a time. Keep your water and temp constant until you find a grind size that actually works. Lastly I prefer Kalita brews closer to 3 - 3:30.