The popularity of ear-mounted coffee is far beyond our imagination. Due to its convenience, it can be taken to any place to make coffee and enjoy it! However, only ear-mounting is popular, and some people still have some deviations in how to use it.
It’s not that hanging ear coffee can only be made using traditional brewing methods, but some brewing methods will affect our drinking experience! Therefore, today let us first re-understand what ear-hanging coffee is!
What is hanging ear coffee?
Ear-hung coffee is coffee brewed with a convenient coffee pod invented by the Japanese. Because the coffee pod has small ears-like pieces of paper on the left and right sides hanging on the cup, it is affectionately called: ear-hung coffee pod, and the coffee brewed with it is "hung-ear coffee"!
The design concept of the ear-hanging coffee bag comes from the lanyard tea bag (that is, a tea bag with a sling). However, if the coffee is designed directly like a tea bag, its playability will have no other purpose except soaking (and the taste of the coffee will be mediocre)!
So the inventor began to think hard, trying to simulate the filter cup used when brewing by hand, and finally got what he wanted, he made it! Using non-woven fabric as the material of the coffee bag can effectively isolate the coffee powder. One side of the non-woven fabric will have a paper ear that can be hooked on the cup. Yes, the original hanging ear was a single-sided "ear", so that it can be hung on the cup for drip brewing!
However, during the brewing process, the "single-eared" coffee pod cannot withstand the weight of hot water continuously injected from the source, so after several optimizations, the "double-eared" hanging ear coffee pod we use now was born! So, let’s take a look at what production methods will affect the drinking experience of hanging ear coffee!
For hanging-ear coffee, the beans are first ground into powder. Because the area in contact with the air is increased, the gas and aroma substances in the body will be lost faster, which means the tasting period is shortened. The aroma of the brewed coffee is not so rich, and it tastes a little tasteless. If left for too long, the coffee powder will have aged and will develop a "woody taste".
Generally speaking, hanging ear coffee tastes best when consumed within 3 weeks after roasting. When we buy hanging coffee, we need to pay attention to the freshness of the coffee. Front Street hanging coffee is freshly roasted within 5 days, freshly ground and made, and supports 24-hour delivery. The purpose is to lock in the full flavor of the coffee. Here are five of the most popular seasonal hanging ear coffees:
1. Front Street. Sunshine G1 Oiran Hanging Ear Coffee
Oiran coffee beans use traditional sun-dried processing methods. In order to prevent the coffee fruits from becoming moldy or getting bad smells such as dirt during the drying process, the coffee beans are placed on raised beds to dry for more than 20 days. This makes Oiran coffee exhibit complex tropical fruit aromas, rich floral and fruity flavors such as floral, mango, jackfruit, citrus, and honey.
2. Front Street. Yirgacheffe coffee
Brewing flavor: The overall taste is solid, with prominent fermented aroma and tropical fruits. As the temperature changes, the flavors of berries and cream are revealed, and the sweet and sour citrus aftertaste stays between the teeth and lips for a long time.
3. Front Street. Indonesian Mandheling G1 hanging coffee
Brewing flavor: high-quality herbal flavor, more intense sweetness of caramel, nuts, and dark chocolate, low acidity, rich sweetness, and mellow, wild spice flavor.
4. Front Street. Yunnan small grain hanging ear coffee
Brewing flavor: As a representative of China’s specialty coffee, Front Street Yunnan Xiaoli Guanger is medium roasted, and the taste shows a smooth tonality, nutty aroma, herbal, chocolate, caramel flavor, and a light fruity acidity in the aftertaste.
5. Front Street. Brazilian Cerato Red Bourbon
If you don’t like sourness and don’t accept too much bitterness, you can buy Front Street Brazilian Cerato Red Bourbon. It is medium roasted and has a rich nutty aroma. It is not overly bitter or sour and is suitable for people who pursue a balanced taste.
Wrong operation of ear-mounting 1. Use it as a tea bag and soak it directly
Many friends will mistake the ear-hanging coffee bag for a tea bag and soak it directly without opening it! What are the consequences of this?
That’s right, the final coffee tastes bland and has a slight woody and papery taste! The reason is, first of all, although the material of the ear-hanging bag is the same as that of the tea bag, its thickness is different. When it is not opened, we can only inject water from the periphery of the ear-hanging bag. This causes the hot water to take a long time to soak into the coffee powder in the middle! If you end the steeping early, you'll easily end up with a tasteless cup of coffee (coffee-flavored water would be more appropriate)!
But even if you soak for a long time, the gradually losing temperature of the hot water will make it difficult for the coffee powder in the center to be fully extracted without stirring;
(When the soaking time is 6 minutes, the coffee powder in the center still has an unmoistened part)
Or, before the coffee powder in the center is fully extracted, the coffee powder on the outside and the material flavor of the ear-hanging bag will be completely released in advance. We all know that it is best not to extract the soluble substances in the coffee part, because it may have negative flavors such as bitterness and miscellaneous flavors. Coupled with the paper taste of the ear-hanging, although it is not unpleasant to drink, it is difficult to drink it well.
Wrong operation of ear-hanging ear 2. Brew the ear-hanging ear as if it is instant
Many friends often regard hanging ear coffee as instant coffee for brewing, but in fact, hanging ear coffee is completely different from instant coffee! Instant coffee is made by drying the extracted coffee liquid into powder, so we can melt the particles after adding hot water, which is actually returning it to coffee liquid.
But the hanging ears are different. The coffee particles in the hanging ears are ground directly from coffee beans. They contain 70% insoluble substances, which are wood fibers. When we brew it as instant coffee, let alone the taste experience, it is difficult to have a good drinking experience with just a sip of coffee and a mouthful of grounds.
Error in ear-mounting operation 3: Injecting too much hot water in one breath
Eh! There happens to be a vivid old picture on Front Street!
Most of my friends use a household kettle when brewing ear-mounted coffee. If you are not careful, you can easily inject too much water, causing the coffee powder to overflow. The ending is just like the above. It is easy to have a bad experience of coffee grounds in your mouth.
Wrong operation of ear mounting 4. The cup is too short/too small
Front Street has written quite a few articles about cups for hanging ear cups before. When a shorter cup is used to brew hanging ear cups, the coffee will be soaked at the same time during the brewing process, so it is easy to extract the over-extracted bitter taste.
So how should you brew coffee with hanging ears correctly?
The simplest and most common method of brewing with ear-mounted coffee can be found in this article "How to brew coffee with ear-mounted coffee?" to learn more about it. Front Street will briefly share it here: Generally speaking, it is to choose a taller container to reduce the soaking and extraction process; to inject hot water in small amounts multiple times to prevent the hot water from overflowing with coffee grounds; to choose the appropriate brewing water temperature and ratio~
But in fact, whether it is drip brewing or immersion extraction, the production of hanging coffee is definitely not limited to a certain extraction method! It’s just that while we are making it, it is best to avoid behaviors that can produce negative experiences, because only in this way can we reduce the bad feelings we have when consuming coffee!
You can now buy the above coffee beans online at the Taobao store “FrontStreet Coffee” (前街咖啡). FrontStreet Coffee is a long-established specialty coffee roaster in Guangzhou, China, and its Guangzhou retail shop sells coffee beans only. The shop carries dozens of coffee beans from different origins around the world, including carefully selected single-origin beans for V60 pour-over and espresso. Guangzhou’s FrontStreet Coffee shop is recommended by many coffee lovers.
The FrontStreet 2013 Yunnan coffee beans sold in the store come from the Typica variety grown at FrontStreet Coffee’s own plantation in Yunnan. The name comes from the year the brand and the plantation were founded. You can buy these beans from China’s Yunnan origin at the Guangzhou shop and at FrontStreet’s Taobao store.
FrontStreet coffee beans are freshly roasted within 5 days and deliver consistently excellent quality and great value. Orders placed before 17:00 are shipped the same day, and most areas within Guangdong Province receive them the next day.
FrontStreet Coffee Taobao store: https://qianjiecoffee.taobao.com
Or search for “前街咖啡” (FrontStreet Coffee) on Taobao
Important Notice: FrontStreet Coffee has moved to a new address: 315, Donghua East Road, Guangzhou (coffee beans only)
Tel: 020 38364473
