I'm a Coffee Roaster: Here's What You're Doing Wrong That's Ruining Your Coffee

Snobbery exists, but I think most people are just excited about the subject and perhaps overly eager to share their learnings. To some it seems snobbish, but from the coffee lover’s point of view each thing they’ve learned has made a big difference in their experience and they’d like to share that with others.

Just like any skill, there will be gatekeepers and elitists who think they are better than others. They’re the vocal minority.

The biggest upgrade you can do on your setup is getting a proper coffee grinder with burrs and not blades. There's little sense in buying any fancier beans if you're grinding them in store and drinking it over a period of several weeks. In a matter of hours after grinding, the coffee will be almost as stale as it'll be in two weeks' time.

Hand grinders like Hario Skerton go for like 50 USD and something like Wilfa Svart Aroma for around 100. If you don't need espresso-level fine, then it's more than great.

Great coffee doesn't have to be expensive. If you have a local roaster and they offer single origin coffee at a sane price point, you'll make your money back in a few months time if you're an avid fan of take out coffee.

An Aeropress and electric mill will cost about 140 dollars and for example approx 20 cups of Intelligentsia coffee will cost roughly a dollar per cup. That's top shelf coffee, compared with mediocre Starbucks black coffee which will cost you double that.

I'd much rather pay for some 15 year old single malt whiskey and pay less per portion than buying Jack Daniel's from the local drinkhole.

Source: I'm a hobbyist reviewer of coffee, done some roasting and working on the judgment panel selecting Findland's best coffees.

Why I don't necessarily agree about temperature: coffee beans are already roasted at temperatures far hotter than 100 celcius. Any oils that would get lost due to temperature, have already evaporated at that point. If the water is too cold (like 90C or less), you risk under extracting the coffee. I think boiling is a perfectly acceptable temperature and don't notice any difference between that and 96C.