Greetings,

First of all I would like to say that I have recently rediscovered my love of preparing coffee. I used to be a Barista years ago and have just recently got back into the art of coffee preparation. Why I ever stopped is beyond me I am absolutely thrilled to be here. I have also discovered the wonderful art of Syphon Coffee and I had a few questions for the community. I am really striving to hone my technique.

Here is my normal technique for a 12 oz cup.

1. Measure 20.5 grams(I use ~1.7 grams/ounce of water as my ratio).
2. Measure 12 oz of water and place it on the stove in a small pot for boiling
3. As water is heating up... grind coffee, take out cloth filter and run under warm water, and assemble siphon
4. Add boiling water to lower bowl & start butane burner(keep on high)
5. When bubbles start to appear in lower bowl form the seal between the two chambers.
6. As water starts to rise measure temperature until it reads 199 F( then turn down burner and ensure 199F is remaining stable).
7. Add coffee and stir(ensuring proper saturation but for no longer than 5 seconds max/back and forth side to side motion)
8. After 30 seconds give it a second stir
9. At the 1 minute mark final stir/place cap on top of upper bowl/turn off burner/and remove it from under lower bowl
10. After contents have drained into lower bowl...serve in small cup and begin cleaning process.
11. After cleaning is done ~5 minutes...enjoy wonderful coffee.

The question I had is when I am brewing 20 oz of coffee as opposed to 12 should I increase the total brew time? Should I be brewing longer than 1 minute from the point where the coffee is added?

Thank you,

-Greg P

P.S. I must confess I absolutely love the taste of siphon coffee. I have both the metal and cloth filters. I find the cloth filter tends to yield a cleaner and brighter cup(I prefer this in the morning). I find the metal mesh filter yields more of a full bodied flavor as it lets more of the sediment & oils through(I prefer this in the evening).

Good questions. I'm not sure what others are doing, but I don't really alter my immersion time when scaling up batches with the siphon. (I certainly wouldn't do that with a press pot.) If anything, the opposite might hold true for the siphon. A larger batch will draw down slower than a small one, so maybe the immersion stage should get shorter as one scales up.

Thank you for the reply.
You mentioned that a larger batch would draw down slower than a smaller one. This is something I noticed when I brewed 20 oz as compared to 12 oz. The 12 oz drew down at a pretty consistent rate. The drawdown with the 20 oz was pretty consistent up to around half way and then it slowed down. Perhaps I need to experiment with a coarser grind(I'm a little finer than auto drip now).

Thanks again,

-Greg

I use a Yama 5 cup, 2.1 grams of coffee per ounce (0.7g/100 ml H2O). I usually make the whole thing, which I think is about 600 cc max.

I allow for a full 2 minutes of infusion and then remove from heat and await drawdown. Not sure where I got 2 minutes - maybe from an info sheet at Sweet Marias?

I do Clever infusion for 4 minutes.

I brew in the Yama 8 cup and like a 2 minute infusion. I've never tried brewing in a small, single cup siphon for comparison purposes.