How To Brew The Best Auto Drip Kona Coffee
Although specialty coffee is often made using methods that tend to provide a bit more control over the brewing process, we do find ourselves in situations where an auto drip coffee maker is the best method for the moment. Here we provide a guide on the steps needed to ensure the best Kona Coffee experience using an auto drip brew coffee maker. Use the increments below as a baseline that you can adjust accordingly based on your preferences.
Equipment needed -
Fresh Roasted Kona Coffee ◦ Auto Drip Coffee Maker ◦ Coffee Filter ◦ Coffee Grinder ◦ Standard kitchen measuring cup (8oz) ◦ Standard kitchen measuring tablespoon
Fresh Roasted Whole Bean Kona Coffee
The most important factor regardless of brew method is using high quality, fresh roasted, whole bean coffee. Make sure to only source 100% Kona Coffee preferably from a source direct from Hawaii. Buying direct is helpful to ensure you get a premium product that hasn’t been sitting on a store shelf for months. Premium Kona Coffee is at its best when brewed within two months of roasting. At Kona Roasted Coffee we place the roast date on the bottom of each bag.
Once you have chosen a coffee source we recommend only buying whole bean Kona Coffee. As soon as coffee is ground it begins to lose the volatile flavor notes that make premium Kona Coffee so special. Grind only the amount of coffee you need for that brew session to ensure your coffee stays fresh.
How Much Kona Coffee To Use
The manufacturer markings on the side of an auto drip coffee maker can vary dramatically by brand and are notoriously difficult to use when attempting to follow a coffee-to-water recipe. To help standardize a recipe, we recommend using a standard 8oz kitchen measuring cup to add your water along with a standard kitchen measuring tablespoon to add your ground coffee.
We find a good starting point for an auto drip coffee maker is to use 1.5 tablespoons of fresh ground Kona Coffee per 8oz measuring cup of water. Use our easy to follow infographic for different increment suggestions. Based on your preference, adjust the ground coffee amount accordingly to achieve the ideal strength on your next pot.
Tip: If using a scale - 1 tablespoon of fresh ground coffee weighs 6.25 grams
standard 8oz measuring cup / standard tablespoon
Grind Your Kona Coffee
We recommend using a burr grinder to ensure a consistent grind size. If a burr grinder is not available, a blade grinder is still preferable to using pre-ground coffee. If you use a blade grinder however, pay close attention during grinding as it can be easy to under or over grind your coffee.
The ideal grind consistency for an auto drip coffee maker is a piece size similar to course salt. Grind your coffee too fine and the result could be bitter. Grind your coffee too large and you may under-extract leading to a weak cup.
Push The Button And Wait
Our favorite step and the easiest one of them all. Simply press the “brew” button on your auto drip coffee maker and wait for the house to fill with the sweet and floral smell of fresh brewed Kona Coffee.
Although most auto drip coffee makers do not provide a way to observe the water contacting the ground coffee, the photo to the left shows the bubbles that form when using fresh roasted Kona Coffee. Fresh roasted coffee will slowly release carbon dioxide gas for a few weeks after roasting. This is the reason many coffee bags have a one-way gas release valve. Once the ground coffee is exposed to water, the carbon dioxide will begin to rapidly release and cause bubbles to form. This gas release and expansion is referred to as the “coffee bloom”. The older the coffee, the less carbon dioxide will be released. Coffee connoisseurs often use the coffee bloom as an indicator that their beans are still fresh.
