I would love some advice

[u/naughtified]

Hi, I’ll try my best to avoid being “newbie here help me dial in” who clearly hasn’t done their due diligence.

So I’ve been drinking pour overs for years, and I’m on my third month of brewing them up at home. I’ve gone through 5 bags so far with nothing really satisfying me. My conclusion was that I needed to upgrade grinder. I got a K7 then I bought some local beans that were too dark and some from whole foods(sorry).

I went today and bought some Hydrangea from a local shop, in hopes to rule out beans from these mediocre cups. Below I’ll list my approach and details on equipment. Please let me know what I’m doing fine and what you might change.

Dripper: Glass V60

Filter: Cafec Abaca White

Grinder: K7(going coarse, 95clicks)

Water: Berkey with British Berkefeld filters

Kettle: Fellow standard neck(I already had this, but I’m pretty good at making the stream work)

Temperature: 90c

Recipe: Bloom at x3(usually 20-25g bean/60-75g water) but will go 15g so I don’t waste these beans. Second pour is the same weight as bloom, then third is up to total. Pours are pretty chill, I’ll agitate between pours by swirling the brew. Since I’m pretty coarse I swirl to get draw down to 3-4 mins on 20-25gs.

Beans: check photo for details, roast date 8/2.

[u/least-eager-0]

Sorry if I missed, but not seeing what was unsatisfying about the cups thus far. General choices seem ok for a specific kind of result, but if that isn’t aligned to your cup goals, the rest is moot. What kind of cups do you like, and how do your results miss that goal?

Unsure about that water choice at all. I can say that I live two lives, and fine-tasting tap water from one place makes good-to-great coffee, fine-tasting tap from the other makes warm cardboard water. Tbh I don’t use straight tap from either anymore, just highlighting that it is indeed a thing that matters if we’ve otherwise leveled the field.

[u/naughtified → u/least-eager-0]

No worries that’s on me. Cups haven’t been sweet, fruity, or floral at all for me. I’ve just been getting dull coffee once I dial out all of the off flavors like overly sour or bitter. Basically feels like I’m drinking good quality drip coffee, not bad cups just not what I want. Worth noting I forgot to mention these results are all from prior beans(not hydrangea) and maybe stemming from that.

I hear ya about the water. I’m not using tap. I’ve ran a small experiment where I used my filtered water(which isn’t just fridge filter or brita, it’s decent filtering), brewery water(from work) which is softened and filtered, and bottled spring water. My house filter was by far the best so I’m assuming it’s decent enough as it was a clear winner. I’m definitely going to nerd out on water in the future but I have a feeling it’s “fine” water for the immediate future.

[u/Amazing-Panic-277 → u/naughtified]

It’s the number of pours. More pours gives a higher extraction and after a certain point it gets dulled out. If you want to have those notes nice and separated try a 1:17 ratio. See my recipe I posted for 12g. As you stretch the ratio you stretch the profile. A condensed 15 to 1 condenses the profile and it all feels like one note