Tiny Press Pot Instructions
Last week, I left a French Press — coffee maker — with my wee mum in Santa Fe. Any number of reasons spring to mind, some because it was an inexpensive coffee maker, maybe it was cute, and maybe, most mornings, I tend to enjoy my first cup of joe from just such a coffee maker.
My wee Scorpio mum quizzed me, time and again, about how to make coffee in one of those. There are instructions, but that wasn’t good enough.
Late one recent afternoon, I strongly desired a single cup of coffee — it’s Texas; it’s summer; it’s hot — just a single cup of coffee to pour over a fresh cup of ice that previously held a morning drink of ice and espresso.
Here’s how I made the coffee in that identical little French Press. I pulled out my iPhone, and opened up the timer app thing, usually set for 20 minutes, for meditations.
I rolled the timer down to 4 minutes.
Turned the stove on, with water in a whistling tea kettle, and waited until the water was about to boil; the tea kettle was ticking; and the water started its roiling noises.
I poured two tablespoons of coarse, fresh–ground coffee into the bottom of the carafe, then, as the water boiled, I shut off the stove, and added the water. Flipped the timer on.
Four minutes later, I fitted the top on the coffee maker, and I plunged the plunger down.
Really easy. Perhaps one of the most expedient ways to extract coffee.
The biggest secret? Fresh, burr–ground coffee beans. Coarsest grind possbile.
Not like any of this is secret — I’ve included this process in my horoscopes several times.
