Why coffee tastes bitter

Try not to be a coffee hoarder and always store your beans properly. And remember to look for a roast date instead of an expiration date on your coffee label. When we say fresh, we mean between four days and two weeks old. Roasting is a finicky process that requires consistent heat applied throughout the roast time.

But sometimes the quality of your roast is out of your control. Yeah, you read that right. An analysis of 15 store brands found their protein and sugar contents to be wildly inconsistent across brands and roasts. Essentially, even industrial coffee roasters have trouble roasting beans consistently. How to Fix It: If your home roast is bad, consider finding a new recipe or checking good equipment substitutes.

If your bought beans are bad, try a different batch of the same bean or switch coffee types altogether. Remember, coffee is all about personal taste. We all love a good deal, but short-changing your coffee bean budget can bite you in the you-know-what. Generally, robusta coffee beans are considered to be lower quality, but that designation is more about flavor than the actual quality of the bean.

How to Fix It: It helps to know how to buy the best coffee beans. The grind of your beans can make a huge difference in the flavor of your coffee. Well, coffee grounds need to be soluble enough to impart good flavor but insoluble enough to stay out of your filter system. If your coffee tastes weak or sour, your drink may be under-extracted. The bad taste comes from the acids in the bean dissolving early in the brewing process. If your coffee tastes super bitter, your drink may be over-extracted.

This happens most often with too fine of a grind. How you grind coffee beans for espresso is different from your regular drip coffee. How to Fix It: First things first, you have to know which grind goes with what brewing method. On the opposite end of the spectrum, Turkish coffee requires beans ground as fine as powdered sugar. Remember, grinding your own beans is the best way to ensure a great-tasting cup of joe. After the beans, your water could be the big reason why your coffee tastes bad.

Even if you regularly drink water straight from the tap and it tastes fine to you, it may still be the problem.

You want your water hot but not boiling. Too hot and you could destroy volatile oils and the subtler flavors of your beans. Too cool and your coffee will come out under-extracted… which is weak and not a great way to start your day. How to Fix It : This one is an easy fix.

Invest in a thermometer. It can be a traditional thermometer or a fancy laser one. And if you ever find yourself without a thermometer again? Simply bring your water to a boil and remove from heat for around 30 seconds before brewing.

It might taste fine to you, but particles in your tap water can have a huge impact on the flavor of your coffee. Brewing coffee is like a chemistry problem. You can throw off your equation when you introduce unknown elements. How to Fix It: This one is another easy fix. Filter the water you use to brew your coffee. Remember, many tap water filters need to run cold for proper use. It might not feel like you need to clean it out every time—after all, you only made coffee.

Well, no. So, to remedy over extraction and brew a more balanced cup free of bitter notes, grind coarser for larger coffee particles. This slows extraction so your final cup is less extracted. This is another reason why we recommend grinding coarser. The finer the grounds, the longer it will take for water to drain through them.

By increasing the grind size, you effectively reduce the brew time, too. Remember, the goal is to hit that sweet spot where all the acids, sugars, oils, and other organic compounds combine to create a memorable cup of coffee.

For French Press fanatics, this means plunging the coffee earlier it might be the easiest way to solve bitter coffe e. Instead of using water right from the tap, opt for filtered water or spring water. Water filters such as the Brita filter can be purchased as a pitcher or faucet attachment. Bottled spring water is also readily available at grocery and convenience stores. You can use a product such as Third Wave Water in a gallon of distilled water to optimize your brew quality, too.

If boiling water with a traditional tea kettle, you can achieve this temperature range by letting it rest for about a minute after boiling. Even Alton Brown recommends it, so it must be true— right? While salt does scientifically work to reduce bitterness in coffee, it comes at a price.

And, who wants to drink a salty cup of coffee? Bitter coffee is bad enough. We strongly suggest you try fixing bitter coffee by grinding coarser, brewing shorter, and using top quality water first.

Remember our quick lesson about over roasted, dark roast coffee beans being bitter? Certain coffee producing regions are also known for their bitter coffee notes.

Coffees from Sumatra, Papua New Guinea, and Vietnam tend to have more bitter and earthy flavors in comparison to the sweet and fruity coffees from countries like Colombia, Ethiopia, or Costa Rica. Start with light and medium-roasted specialty coffee from Central America, South America, or East Africa with tasting notes such as chocolate, nuts, berry fruits, and sweet sugars like maple syrup, honey, or sugarcane.

You can always ask your local coffee roaster or your favorite barista what coffee beans and blends they recommend. Ultralight vs. While there are some concrete differences, What is Q Grading? This is another way that coffee gets over-cooked. The problem with cheap coffee? When coffee is over-roasted, it tastes bitter and burnt, more like ash than the fruit it comes from.

Adding too much coffee relative to the amount of water you use is an easy way to make your coffee taste too strong and in many cases bitter.