Hario V60 for Two

What You’ll Need

  • 36 grams of specialty-grade whole bean coffee

  • Filtered water (210-211 degrees F)

  • Gooseneck kettle

  • Scale

  • Timer

  • V60 cone & filter

  • Mug or carafe

  • Burr grinder

1.

Fold V60 filter and insert into cone, rinse and pre-wet filter with hot water into serving carafe or cup, discard hot papery water.

2.

Grind size: Table salt (about "medium-fine"), perhaps just slightly coarser than the grind size you’d use for a single cup V60. Flatten coffee bed. Zero scale.

3.

Start timer. At 0:00, pour 90-110 grams spiraling all over the grounds quite quickly (15+ grams/second). If you do not get all the grounds saturated with your pour alone, gently excavate/flip over the grounds with a spoon and/or chop up any dry clumps. If you do get all the grounds saturated with your pour alone, just leave it alone.

4.

At 0:45, begin the first main pour. Aim to reach 400g total water in the brewer by 1:45. Pour in circles/spirals. Flow rate here is 300ish grams in 60ish seconds so about 5g/sec–this is relatively slow but probably not as slow as you can possibly pour without the stream breaking up. If you really want to fine tune this process, your first 2-3 seconds of this pour should be at more like 6-8g/s to really make sure the bed is evenly saturated and the rest of the water will flow through evenly, and then you want to slow down.

5.

At 2:30 (or earlier if you have a very fast-draining coffee–you don't want the bed to become exposed to the air), begin the second and final pour. Aim to reach 660g total water in the brewer by about 3:30. Flow rate here is 260 grams in 60 seconds so more like 4g/sec (slower than first pour). We haven't found much difference with top-tier commercial grinders if we slow it down to 3g/sec or keep it up at 5g/sec, just that getting the first pour water in quickly seems to be far more important. With a cheaper grinder, keep your flow rate slower on this pour.

6.

Swirl entire brewer to wash any grounds that have gotten stuck to the filter back into the wet coffee bed. 

Quick Tip: With a great grinder (very little fines), we'd expect a washed Central/South American to finish brewing around 4:45-5:00, and a washed Ethiopian to be more like 5:00-5:30. As always, time isn't that important. Being consistent with your excavation and pouring is the important thing, and then dial in grind size to suit your tastes.

With a relatively cheap grinder that produces more fines, you have to keep the agitation down a little (don't pour as quickly), and even then, you'll likely need a much longer brew time to get an appropriate extraction (brew time will be longer because the fines will clog the filter and reduce flow rate).