This is a question of personal preference, preferred method, etc. Within the pour over world, there seems to be two major styles of brewing. There are those that use a slow steady pour in circles to keep the brew slurry low, but stable in height. On the other hand, many prefer pulse pouring small amounts of water and continuously adding water in a pulse format. To further complicate things, there are certain devices (Kalita 155) that necessitate a pulse pour, because of the small size. What is your preferred approach and why?

Personally, I use a continuous slow pour with my V60, and find that it helps me better time an extraction. More so than other methods, the flow rate of the V60 makes controlling the flow rate of water through a slow controlled and continuous pour a necessary thing for me. With the Kalita, I use small unmeasured pulse pours. I try to think of it as placing water on top of the grounds and letting gravity do the work. I recently came into possession of a small bee house dripper and will be trying out a pulse pouring method similar to the Kalita to see how it goes. I find the pulse pouring easier than trying to control a steady small stream (unless using my kettle gicleur). A continuous pour is doable, but took my quite a bit of practice in order to not undershoot my brew time in a big way.

So, what is your approach... continuous pour, pulse pouring, or just filling the dripper and letting gravity manage the rest?

Continuous FTW.

To quote a guy on twitter I don't know who was quoted by @LorenzoPerkins

@sinclairj

I love when people ask me for pointers on brewing on a V60. I get to tell them, "Okay, step one: buy a different brewer.

A continuous flow-restricted pour sounds ideal, but I'm a multi-tasker and pulsing is great for that. I usually prepare a cappuccino for my wife while I'm pulsing a pourover for myself. Both drinks finish at the same time. Bob's your uncle. Works great. Tastes great.

Both methods have important things in common-namely, they brew coffee without flooding the grounds and without getting grounds stuck all up the side of the filter above the water level. Personally, I've never been able to tell the difference between a clockwise pour or a counter-clockwise pour. I'm more concerned about how well the filter is being rinsed and a whether the grounds are being flooded.

That's pretty much where my opinion lies at the moment.

While I enjoy my V60, I do find the Kalita so much easier to use and approachable as a brewer. The V60 definitely requires a little technique to get a good extraction, but produces a wonderful resulting cup, imo.

I use this method with 16g and a Hario V60:

First I pour 40g water for the bloom and wait 30 seconds. At 31 seconds I start adding 20g water till the scale reads 60g. This might or might not coincide with 45 seconds on the clock. When the timer hits the 45 second mark I add another 20g. I repeat this process until at 2:45 seconds in my scale reads 220g and I am pouring the last 20g of water.

All told I add water 11 times (pulses?) in 3 minutes - 20g every 15 seconds after the 40g bloom pour, so 80g per minute. Some pulses run together and are more like a continuous flow by accident This is the easiest method for me and is one I can repeat with ease.

That's a very interesting pouring regiment. I have seen many methods for number of pours, but never one that focuses on small amount of water at a time (compared to longer 100ml pours). What I find most interesting about your method is that is likely results in close to no drawdown. I made a V60 cup this morning using a 21g/350ml ratio and pulse poured. Unlike you, I did not measure my pours, but rather kept the bed as low as possible and hit my 2:30 finish with 10-15 seconds of drawdown. Almost no high and dry grounds and a great sweet cup. To mimic this result with a continuous pour, I think I would have to use a restricter to keep the flow rate slow enough.

Thanks for sharing your approach! I'll have to give it a try at some point.

jzuzphreek wrote:To quote a guy on twitter I don't know who was quoted by @LorenzoPerkins

That guy was a pompous jerk to say that. It would be one thing if it were a mokka pot he was referring to, but the V-60 is arguably the best hand brewing device there is.

What I saw of the top contenders at this years Brewers Cup was pulse pouring. Of course, the format almost necessitates it. However, Matt Perger won with a pulse poured V-60 and fines filtered out such that the water drained very fast.

Never mind the water fully draining between pulses, the grounds are still extracting. Fresh water is a better solvent. I'm a fan of the pulse, 2:30 brew time, and I have only one cup to brew with unlimited time.

Interesting observation that most are using methods that require pulse pouring. I wonder of that is simply due to the ease of that approach or experiments that resulted in measurable differences in the cup. Then again, having to brew multiple cups simultaneously necessitates it. Either way, it's interesting.

I wonder if those that are advocates of the pulse pour are using flow restrictors. It is really difficult to perform a continuous pour without a restrictor of some sort. Before I had mine I did what resembled more of a pulse pour, although I feel as though my cup quality has improved now that I pour more slowly for the whole brewing process.

The only flow-through extraction brewer I prefer to a V60 is a woodneck, but they do produce similar profiles if attention to detail is taken. It's true that it takes more skill then others brewers, probably the reason why so many people bash it...

Haters gonna hate, as they say.

Different strokes for different folks I suppose.



I did wince a bit when I was a restaurant in San Jose, Costa Rica, and our waiter used the 'gravity' technique along with spoon stir to top it all off ::shudders::


?se puede decir demasiado concentrate?