Coffee is one the most popular beverages in the world, especially in the morning. Sadly, a lot of people are missing out on having some of the best coffee possible and decide to settle for mediocrity. Making your own coffee at home will allow you to customize and tweak your recipe so that its perfect for your tastes and you will also save money not buying a cup at a coffee shop everyday. With just a few simple changes you can go from having ok coffee to amazing coffee.
Buy Better Quality Beans
Its just not worth it to go to the grocery store and buy pre-ground beans in huge 5 pound bags. Once you open the bag and expose the beans to oxygen you start the process that will eventually cause the beans to go stale.
Buy coffee in small bags and make sure its full bean not pre-ground. Don't buy your standard name brands like Folgers or Maxwell House, you can find far better coffee if you just look around. If you go to a cafe or coffee house and try one of their house blends and like it, ask the server if they sell it by the bag.
Grind Fresh Beans
The difference between fresh ground beans and pre-ground beans is shocking. There is no way of telling how long the pre-ground coffee has been sitting on the shelf for and it may actually be stale before you buy it.
To conserve the maximum amount of flavour in your beans buy whole bean and grind them yourself before you make a cup. Coffee grinders are cheap and take up very little space so take a few bucks and invest in one. Grind your coffee just before you want to make it.
Add Flavouring
Coffee purists insist that you cannot add flavouring to coffee because it takes away from the natural taste of the bean but if you want to upgrade your coffee a bit don't be afraid of doing this. You don't need to go crazy and dump a ton of additives in your coffee, just add a bit to alter the flavour to your liking.
Some things you can add could include: cinnamon, nutmeg, cardamom, pinch of salt, vanilla extract, butter and coconut milk or water. If you like adding spices you can also try Turkish coffee which has the spices like cardamom already added to it.
Use Filtered Water
Even-though municipal tap water in mostly all of north america is of good quality, it could be better. It still has relatively high amounts of dissolved minerals and traces of other chemicals. Using better quality water can make a big difference in your coffee because lets face it, your coffee is mostly water anyway.
Invest in a home water filter. You can buy one that fits on your tap or one that uses a pitcher. These systems use charcoal filters which are very efficient at filtering out contaminants. If you want to use bottled water instead look on the label at the amount of dissolved mineral salts and find the one with the lowest P.P.M. (parts per million) number. If you are using water that has around 300 ppm than you are wasting your money because most tap water is close to that number anyway.
Keep Your Coffee Maker Clean
Depending on how much you use your coffee maker, you should be cleaning it regularly. At the very least once a month. Even though you are processing hot liquids, bacteria. mould and residue can still build up inside. This will definitely alter the taste of your coffee for the worse.
Clean your coffee maker by processing a solution of 1 part vinegar and 5 parts water. After that do it 1-2 more times with just water until you cant smell the vinegar anymore. You will be surprised how much residue will come out using the vinegar solution.
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The morning cup of coffee has an exhilaration about it which the cheering influence of the afternoon or evening cup of tea cannot be expected to reproduce. ~Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr., "Over the Teacups," 1891
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