h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Great and thorough article. The Arabic Coffee that I had was roasted only to a pale yellow roast and looked like thin pea soup after brewing - I believe that Turkish coffee is roasted to a much darker roast. The Arabs tend to put cardamom in the coffee which gives it a faintly lemony scent, but it still tastes pretty much like wet cardboard.

I have read, and I believe it from personal experience - and the researcher touches on this several times - that boiling water applied to coffee - including boiling after the brew, alters the taste noticeably. Not only is it bitter as the researcher mentions, but it steals away the 'bouquet' that comes with really good coffee. Thus, unless you have developed a taste for it, percolated coffee is dreadful. If you are going to perc coffee, do not bother to buy the expensive 'locality named' special coffees in coffee stores.

I once got into really doing coffee right for a spell and the difference between machine brewed and properly brewed coffee is astounding. So is the difference between the coffee sold in cans already ground and buying 'specialty' beans and grinding them as needed.

Like wine, coffee varies in flavor depending on where it is grown. If you think this is nonsense, I challenge you to get any coffee grown in Sumatra (my favorite!) and any other coffee - say, Columbian or Guatemalan. Grind the same amount of each. Brew them similarly - a time consuming process (which is why I don''t do it much anymore).
At the risk of repeating some of what the researcher already said, use a paper cone with a cup or pot - you can use the Chemex style pot. Dampen (don't soak) grounds first with COLD water. When you pour the hot - NOT boiling - water in, pour it slowly so that it does not float the grounds to the top of the cone, but just keeps everything wet and in the bottom of the cone. I am not sure if I am clear here, but the idea is not to pour a cone full and let it subside, but to keep pouring small amounts in so the coffee plus water never rises more than an inch up the cone. If you do not see a difference in the taste of the two cups of coffee, then you are better off just buying canned coffee with a machine to brew it. I used to make coffee this way when I had guests and never did I have a dinner that at least one person did not comment on the coffee. One restaurateur (sp?) even asked for my 'secret' (I just did what I read in the Melitta Filters package!). This sounds like a bit much - but if you and a couple of friends like coffee - try it together sometime and see if you don't get an amazing cup of coffee!

A major consideration is the quality of the coffee. There are two kinds of beans: 'Arabica' and 'Robusta'. Arabica is (are?) high quality beans and will usually be the kind sold at coffee stores under such individual names such as Mocha Harrar (from Ethiopia), Sumatra, Kenya AAA, Guatamala Antigua, etc. It usually runs about $10 - $12 per pound (Jamaican Blue Mountain can be $30 - I have never tried it), and usually will be not be bagged until you buy it. Robusta is the 'junk' coffee and accounts for 90% of commercial coffee. It can be compared to wine that comes in a screw-top jug. I have heard that there is no point getting Kona coffee outside of Hawaii, because they keep the really good stuff there. I don't know if this is true. You DO want to go to a coffee seller that moves its product fairly quickly - even unground beans can get stale after roasting. I have heard that keeping unground beans in the freezer keeps them fresher - I do this - it sure doesn't hurt.

As to the 'best' coffee, that is a matter of taste. Some like the milder Colombian, some the heartier Mocha Harrar or Sumatran. You are the only judge of what is best for you. Coffee from Yemen is excellent.

French roasted coffee, in my opinion, destroys the subtleties in the taste of the finer coffees, so when I want French roasted, I don't bother with something high-priced. I like French Roast sometimes, but I can't tell 'good' from 'bad' - could be that is just me. Sumatra coffee has the closest flavor to that of French roasted coffee, when it is only medium roasted.