TIL why my morning pour-over was always inconsistent at the cafe

I've been doing pour-overs at Blue Bottle in SoHo for about a year now. Last Tuesday, one of the baristas asked me how I was stirring the bloom phase and I showed her. She said I was only stirring one direction. Turns out, stirring just clockwise was creating a channel in the grounds every single time. So the water was bypassing half the coffee bed and pulling unevenly. Now I alternate directions with each pour and my drawdown time dropped from 4 minutes to 3 minutes flat. Has anyone else found that their brew improved after changing just one little habit like that?

1 comments

1 Comment

the_ryan29m ago

Took me six months to realize I was pushing down on my scale with my elbow the whole time, so every single measurement was off by like 5 grams. Little embarrassing to figure out I was basically sabotaging myself with my own arm. Glad you caught your stir habit before you hit the year mark like me.