If you are used to brewing coffee using coffee grounds, you know it’s the best way to make coffee.
But sometimes, your coffee bean grinder may get broken, or you may feel too tired to grind coffee beans. What do you do then?
Well, you can brew coffee with whole coffee beans. Although people think you must grind coffee beans to brew coffee, it’s a myth.
Reasons for Brewing Coffee Using Whole Beans
While you may like making coffee with grounds, you may not always have a grinder with you. For example, you could be in a place with minimal resources. Few people remember to carry a coffee grinder from home on those busy days when you decide to make coffee at the workplace.
Your grinder could also break down, leaving you with no option but to make coffee with whole beans. Or you could accidentally buy whole coffee beans that you can’t return to the store.
There are also those hectic mornings when many of us have no time to brew coffee from scratch using fresh coffee grounds.
Knowing how to brew coffee using whole beans can save you time, energy, and stress in all these scenarios.
Benefits of Brewing Coffee Using Whole Beans
Brewing coffee using whole beans is one of the best ways to extract flavor from coffee beans without degrading them.
Although you may think grinding coffee beans is essential in making good coffee, it’s not! Grinding coffee beans just increases the surface area for hot water to extract flavors from coffee beans. It doesn’t mean that you’ll get the best taste from them.
And according to some baristas, grinding coffee beans degrades them because grounds get oxidized fast, reducing their flavor and aroma.
The oxidation process starts after you break apart the coffee beans and air comes into contact with coffee compounds in the beans.
You can only take full advantage of these compounds, such as oils and antioxidants if you brew coffee with the coffee grounds immediately after grinding them. Otherwise, the longer the coffee grounds remain in contact with air, the more their beneficial compounds degrade.
Therefore, it may be better to brew coffee using whole beans because you avoid destroying their essential oils and nutrients.
Ground coffee beans also lose many of their oils when you grind them. That’s due to the loss of carbon dioxide molecules that aid in extracting the coffee oils during brewing.
The combination of the oils and carbon dioxide is what makes up the crema you see on coffee brews. Therefore, if you lose any carbon dioxide, you lose a component that can add to the flavor of your coffee.
We also can’t forget the effect of moisture in the air on coffee grounds. No matter how small you think it is, moisture in air can dissolve oils in coffee grounds reducing their flavor. It may also change their aroma because coffee grounds absorb the smells around them. That’s why they are used as deodorizers in homes.
With these facts in mind, you can see that brewing coffee using whole coffee beans is not so bad. Once you learn how to brew coffee using whole beans, you can enjoy coffee whether you have a grinder at hand or not. It will give you a less bitter or acidic brew than regular coffee brewed using coffee grounds.
3 Simple Recipes for Brewing Coffee Without Grinding Coffee Beans
You can make coffee with coffee beans using three methods. These are double boiling, steeping, and gentle simmering. Here are recipes for each process.
The Double Boiler Coffee Brewing Method
Requirements
100 % Arabica coffee beans
A Mason jar
A large cooking pot
A strainer
500 ml water
Procedure
- Boil the water to 195 degrees Fahrenheit.
- Fill a third of the mason jar with the coffee beans.
- Pour hot water into the jar until the coffee beans are submerged
- Put the mason jar in the cooking pot and fill it with water to the same level of water in the mason jar.
- Place the cooking pot on the stove and let it simmer on medium heat for about 45 minutes. You may simmer it for longer but keep checking on the water in the cooking pot to ensure it doesn’t dry up.
- Once the brewing time is over, remove the mason jar from the pot using oven gloves or a kitchen towel and strain the coffee into a cup. Leave the coffee beans in the mason jar.
- Enjoy your brew.
Steeping Coffee Brewing Method
Ingredients
Whole Arabica coffee beans
An insulated coffee mug with a tight lid/thermos
Boiled water
Procedure
- Scoop coffee beans to a third of the insulated coffee mug.
- Add boiling water to two-thirds of the container, ensuring the coffee beans are well-covered.
- Allow the water temperature to drop for about 45 seconds.
- Cover the container and gently shake the beans to enable them to soak in water.
- Set the insulated container or thermos aside for 30 minutes to an hour, shaking it regularly to ensure the extraction process is successful.
- Once the brewing period is over, strain the coffee into a mug and enjoy your coffee.
Gentle Simmer Coffee Brewing Method
Ingredients
A saucepan
Whole Arabica coffee beans
Hot water
Strainer
Procedure
- Pour 2 cups of water into the saucepan and boil it.
- Add 2 Tbsps of whole coffee beans to the hot water, reduce the heat, and let the pot simmer.
- Once the brew has simmered for 30 minutes, remove it from the stove, strain the coffee beans out and enjoy your brew.
Conclusion
You can make a clean and flavorful brew using these three methods without grinding coffee beans. You may also make a cold brew by soaking whole coffee beans in a mason jar overnight.
Coffee made with whole coffee beans is evenly extracted. It also doesn’t have residue like you find in coffee made using grounds.
You’ll find it’s quite different from the somewhat bitter brew you get from preparing coffee using grounds, especially when using machines such as a Percolator or Espresso maker.
Therefore, brewing whole coffee beans is something you should try once in a while. It is a simple way of brewing coffee that will save you time and energy.
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