The holy scale
As you make your coffee, there are many aspects, such as the quality of the coffee, the water, or the grinder, that make your cup of coffee taste really good. But you can also do a lot of things wrong so that it doesn't taste good. We show you how you can improve your coffee experience with the help of a digital scale!
A scale helps you avoid mistakes so you can focus on what's important. If you weigh your beans before each brewing process, you can better regulate other factors. By that I mean the grind and water temperature, among other things. Using a scale might add four seconds of extra effort, save you from wondering why your coffee doesn't taste as good today as it did yesterday. Our four reasons for using a scale are:
1. accuracy
I can be accurate with my coffee spoon too! Unfortunately, this is wrong! One tablespoon of whole coffee beans is not the same as one tablespoon of ground coffee beans. But 19g of whole coffee beans are always 19g of ground coffee beans. Different coffee beans also have different characteristics. One bean is small, another is slightly larger, the next weighs almost nothing, the other is relatively heavy. The age of the beans also plays a role here!
2. consistency and repeatability
All of the above factors can result in your coffee today containing 10g of beans and tomorrow's containing 12g. That may not sound like much, but it's a 16% variance - and you can taste it! Your coffee is not balanced to your taste and may taste too sour or bitter. However, if you weigh out exactly 12g, this will not happen! And your cup of coffee will taste consistently good. It's also important to weigh out the water you use for your brew so that the ratio of water to coffee is always the same. There are a few guidelines you can follow. The most common is that you need 60g of coffee per liter of water. This is also our recommendation of 1g of coffee to 15-17g of water. Of course, this is not set in stone, but it gives you a good starting point. This way, you'll not only (accidentally) have a delicious coffee today, but also tomorrow!
3. get more out of your pack of coffee
Especially with electric grinders, it's easy to end up grinding more than you actually need. If you weigh your beans beforehand, you'll only ever grind the amount you need at any given time. Without any surplus! This will also help you better plan how much coffee you use per month and when it's time for a fresh bag! If you know exactly what your coffee consumption is, you can save yourself a lot of time with a coffee subscription.
4. time to experiment
Once you've found a good brewing ratio, you can experiment better. You can better adjust a new coffee, that is, adjust it to your taste. We do the same thing in our cafes. We even weigh each shot twice here. Once we weigh the ground coffee and once we weigh the resulting espresso shot, also called "yield." The recipe varies from variety to variety, but the scale helps us achieve repeatable results. So that each of our customers, has the best possible experience with their cup of coffee.
Requirements for your coffee scale
Accurate measurement to the gram
There are scales that measure 0.1g-0.5g accurately, but these are quite expensive and not available everywhere. For home use, a scale that measures in 1g increments is sufficient.
Fast display time
If you weigh your water directly during the brewing process, it is important that your scale responds quickly. Otherwise, you may already have 250g of water in the filter, even though you only wanted 200g. We love the scale from Acaia, for example.
Enough space on the measuring field
To put a bigger cup, a jug or a Chemex on it.
Tare function
Your scale needs a tare function so you can subtract the weight of your coffee maker. It should also be able to accurately weigh at least 1000g, better 2000g, in case the big French press is brought out again for the birthday.
Waterproof and easy to wipe clean
This is another thing your scale should be. Sometimes things just go wrong, but that shouldn't affect the capabilities of your scale!
Happy Brewing!
