The Chemex coffee maker was designed in 1941 by a German named Peter Schlumbohm, and It is still a very popular way of brewing coffee today. The cup that a chemex produces is very similar to that or a drip / pour over brew. However, there is slightly more margin for error when brewing with a Chemex.
You will need
- Good quality coffee beans
- Grinder
- Kettle
- Scales
- Chemex
- Chemex Filter
- Stopwatch/ Timer
Brew Ratio
I would recommend starting with a 1: 17 coffee to water ratio. This means for every 1g of coffee you use you need to add 17g’s of water.
Brewing Stages
- Make sure all equipment is clean and work out the correct amount of coffee using the brew ratio.
- Start heating your water. Heat about 300ml more than you will need so you can rinse the filter and heat the chemex.
- While the water is heating grind your coffee. The grind should be slightly coarser than filter and resemble kosher salt.
- Unfold your paper filter and insert it into the chemex.
- Fully rinse your filter with the extra water you heated. Leave the water in the chemex for 1 minute to get up to temperature and then discard.
- Add your ground coffee and make sure it is level.
- Start pouring a small amount of water to wet all the coffee grounds. You want to pour about twice as much water as there is coffee in the chemex.
- Wait for another 30-45 seconds and then slowly add the rest of the water. The total brew process should take about 4 minutes.
- Remove and discard the filter and coffee.
- Pour and enjoy your coffee.