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Hello and welcome to the On Location special here on Prozis TV with me Rob Riches
You know over the past few years it seems like there is a new coffee house popping up down your local street every other day.
And it’s starting to lose its touch with me for coffee is all about. After all its an experience.
An event, a social gathering. A place to catch up with friends, or read a book.
And for me its just becoming a little bit too autonomous now for my liking.
Today I am at Southern California to meet with Jack at Dermataze, a new type of coffee experience,
Where they go back to their roots in traditional coffee brewing… Quite literally.
So follow me inside and lets meet Jack.
Hi there, Jack?
Are you Jack? yes…..Hi Good to meet you. I am Rob
Tell me more about what it is that you do here… so this is I guess what you would call a specialty coffee shop… Where do you get your beans from then?
All over the world. So Latin America, South and Central America errr Africa…
Sometimes Indonesia… Sometimes Asia, we actually had a bean form India recently last month
The customer when they come in can experience something new as opposed to the same coffee brand day in day out…
Yea we actually have a very progressive program in that every month we rotate through…
We will introduce new coffee beans,
why don’t we have a look at what it is you guys do best and I understand you make coffee a little differently than…
The traditional way… I guess this is the traditional way of making coffee then with what’s called a siphon… Is that correct? Yes.
It’s an elegant brew method. It has been around for a while. Why don’t I take you over to the siphon bar. Sure, ok.
It looks like some science project here with all the… A little bit, a little bit.
So talk me through this process.
What is it we actually do with the coffee?, I take it we still boil the water and then we pour it over the ground coffee beans..
Is that the basis of it? Ok, so in this container right here…
I have actually put in some pre heated water and then this is a helicon bowl so it actually acts as the heating source… Oh wow.
And I am going to place the top chamber in there, just loosely I won’t seal it yet.
There is a cloth filter in here, which is part of the reason why siphon coffee tastes the way it does.
The cloth filter actually has finer pores than a paper filter would so that kind of… this is a paper filter here? Yes.
This is normally and what we might buy and have at home then if we were to make coffee our self.
Right and many, many coffee shops with actually use a paper filter for pour over. That type of technique. Right.
So the difference in quality is in the taste then using a cloth as opposed to the normal paper filter…
A cloth filter will actually eliminate more of the oils and the coffee solids.
Really? So it will feel lighter on the tongue… a smoother blend of coffee... Yeah, it will feel lighter on your tongue and,
The finish will be nice and clean. Not only does it filter the water and remove a lot of hardness. A lot of,
Ions. Things that cause a lot of calcification, things like that.
But they also have their own formula and add back in certain salts actually.
Because salt, you need the salt in the water and that will actually bring out a little bit of flavor.. A bit like cooking.
As made in pastry’s and things like that sugary treats. You want to have a little bit of salt. Ok good, what’s next then?
So this; the siphon brewing method has actually been around since that we know of, since the 17th Century.
The first patent was filed in Germany, I believe in 1835 so, this has been around for a while.
What happens here is the water will heat up in the bottom chamber and then when it comes to a boil,
I will actually seal it and the vapor pressure will actually push out,
you will see the vapor pressure actually push out the water through the cycle tube, through the filter into the top chamber.
And then at that point when all the water is up here in the top chamber I will add in the coffee grounds, which I just grounded up.
And then we have a brew time that is set here. I’ll add in, I’ll mix around the coffee grounds and the water,
And then at a certain point the brew time will end and the heat source will turn off. At that point,
A vacuum will be created in the bottom chamber as it starts to cool.
Will it cool the coffee back down? Yea, so the cooling effect actually acts as a vacuum
And then it draws the coffee from the top chamber, through the filter into the bottom chamber.
Hence the name Siphon. Yes right. Well this really is a science and an art,
What you do here isn’t it… Pretty much. So the water is at a boil, now I have sealed the two chambers together
Ok so now you can see the vapor pressure is pushing the water. The boiling water into the top chamber.
The thing that makes this unique in that as a brew method, in addition to the cloth filter is the fact that,
At boiling temperature down here it is about two hundred and twelve degrees Fahrenheit.
Right, which is not ideal for making coffee
when it gets into the top chamber because it is a certain distance away from the heating source… It cools back down?
It drops down a few degrees which is ideal for actually brewing coffee, so now I am going to add the grounds,
Now if we are making one cup,large cup of coffee how much grind should we add?
I always used to add too much, or not enough. Is there a measurement we should keep in mind when making coffee?
It’s all about ratios and in our case we actually, we go with…
350g of water to 25g of coffee. 350:25 ok. Yea.
So now the heat source is off and this bottom chamber will cool,
and that will actually cause a vacuum and will pull as you can see the coffee…
I have not seen coffee ever made like this before.
This obviously takes a little bit more time and preparation than simply boiling a kettle and
putting it in with some instant freeze coffee or even making it with the paper filter. But,
Is there such a difference in taste between coffee like this
and coffee that we would just like I said just pour hot water over into a cup?
Its sort of asking the question is there a difference between
fast food and going into a sit down restaurant and having a nice meal. Absolutely, so that’s
Pretty much the difference. You likened it to fast food, for instant coffee…
To healthy make your own food at home coffee from the siphon like this. Right.
I mean, the way that I see it is if you are going to put something into your body,
It might as well be the best possible, raw materials.
I couldn't agree more, and that makes so much sense, I mean we I drink coffee everyday and within moderation you know maybe,
We talk about numbers so no more than 3-5mg per kg of bodyweight which equates to about 3 espresso’s a day for the average human,
If we are putting coffee into our body, like you said we want to get the best ingredients from that, the best taste, the best experience.
Because I think that is, what’s really you offer here. An experience with coffee. Yes, yes exactly. I love that.
I mean fortunately coffee is an underrated commodity, I mean there is so many hands that touch the product before it reaches us.
And because we drink it, most people drink it everyday, we sort of take it for granted and
You know it’s probably something that is undervalued. Actually no it is definitely undervalued. Because you keep that chain of,
Distribution so much shorter I guess it has less hands so to speak to be touched by, therefore we are getting a purer product at the end.
Well so then more of the revenue will actually go towards the farmers
to help to keep them sustained and keep the economy link. Right. Fantastic.
Because if they don’t want to produce great coffee then we will lose out on our resources
because we don’t actually, other than Hawaii the US does not actually produce coffee.
So not something that we can really grow in our backyard….
Unless we live on the equator… That’s correct.
Well this looks like it is pretty much done.
What is the next step after it is done and siphoned and it has been brought back down?
So I just remove the top chamber
And at this point it is just,
Is there a certain way to best serve coffee? I see you are serving it into this kind of double edged glass…
Large shot glass there. Does it make a difference how you serve it?
Er no, I mean it is a lot of things.
We are talking about the experience and
its more of an entire experience if you have an elegant coffee and you sort of serve it in an elegant manner.
I feel like Sherlock Holmes here with his science tools here.
Also when I came in I couldn’t help but notice you have a selection of treats over there. Candies, cakes…
They are I guess compliments with the coffee?
Yeah so. bite size snacks. We can’t produce in house, we try to source out the best.
Not just the best coffee, but the best pastries, cakes and things like that.
We can have a small glass of carbonated water
that will help just kind of take that coffee taste away and allow us to enjoy every sip to its max. Right, its to cleanse the pallet.
Sort of like if you were having sushi and you take a bite of ginger in between each sample of fish.
I guess there is only one thing left to do and this is to taste the experience. It will be really, really hot for about the first five minutes.
That’s also unique to the siphon brewing method.
And then as it cools down it will actually start to taste, ah yeah I can taste the after taste here.
For me I think if you are going to sweeten something,
You might as well use the real thing.
You know I actually agree with you on that one.
It’s an experience, you don’t have that much and with half a teaspoon of sugar, natural cane sugar…
Its sugar that at least our bodies can at least absorb that and deal with that as opposed to the artificial sucralose.
I can really taste it now it is starting to cool. Yes. Remind us now of that ratio again for water and coffee…
Its basically 1:14. 1 unit of coffee to 14 units of water.
The best way is really by weight,
so you know its best you could invest in a scale but if you cant then a teaspoon volume that would be fine as well.
I love that analogy you used earlier about fast food and eating in the comfort of your own home and it pays to wait.
How’s that for a slogan. Yeah.
Well there we have it. Join me next time on more Prozis special.
I am Rob riches and we will be back here in Los Angeles or around the rest of the world for more of Prozis TV. Cheers.