Today's Cup: Sulawesi Toraja Grade 1

I really like this coffee at this roast, although it is darker than most people like to take this bean. (It is however by no means a dark roast. It's much lighter than a French roast or a so-called espresso roast.)

This bean is an Indonesian and shares many of the qualities of a good Sumatran. The full city roast slightly mutes the high notes of this bean, but the full and fresh coffee flavor still comes through.

Mike did not like this roast. He was much happier with his Papua New Guinea, which he roasted using Sweet Maria's roast with about two minutes lopped off of the back of the 3rd stage. It was a very good cup, with an unmistakable lemon taste (and no he did not add any lemon). I had a very similar tasting roast with a Papua New Guinea Arokara AA on May 11, 2006. I roasted 1/2 cup of that bean at preset 1 for 6:30.

Brewing

One issue I have been struggling with is my 6-year-old CuisineArt Grind and Brew coffee maker, which is getting gnarly after all these years. This coffee maker grinds and brews (which is why its name is such an eerie coincidence), but over time strays beans and stray coffee dust have ended up in the reservoir, where they float on top of the water until the water is gone. At this point they accumulate in the bottom corners of the reservoir in places where you just can't clean it. If the reservoir were detachable from the electrical parts you might have a fighting chance, but it's not so you don't.

So now I am thinking to replace this coffee maker with something else, but the choices are mind numbing. I eventually settled on the Chemex 10 Cup coffee maker, which is this hour-glass pyrex device that works by pouring hot water into the open top of the hour glass.

A special paper filter fits between the top and the bottom parts of the Chemex and the coffee sits above the filter. Because of water's fanatical respect for the law of gravity, the hot water really, really wants to be in the bottom part of the hour glass. But to get there it will have to pass through the coffee and the filter.

According to reviews I've seen on CoffeeGeek, this is one of the best ways to make coffee.

I chose the Chemex because it meets most of my criteria. It makes enough coffee to fill my thermos and my 1st-cup-of-the-day mug, and it brews at the correct temperature (or at least it will if I let it). Also, it does not have a burner so it will not burn my coffee. And it is supposed to be simple to clean (the importance of which you would understand if you could glimpse into the depths of my current machine).

The drawbacks I see from this device is that, being entirely glass with no electrical parts, it requires boiled water to work. So I will have to boil water and then gradually add the water until I have added enough to fill my thermos and my 1st-cup-of-the-day coffee mug (which as you surely have guessed is large).

It will take at least for the coffee maker to arrive, but once it does I will be able to leverage the following components:

1. my Britta filtration pitcher,
   
2. my Braun burr mill grinder,
   
3. my iRoast coffee roaster, and
   
4. my (soon to arrive) Chemex coffee maker.
   

My goal is to be able to brew coffee that is better than Mike's and Rich's!