Clever Dripper
The easiest pour-over to get right: a Clever Dripper recipe (20 g coffee, 320 g water, two minutes of steeping), step by step, with how to adjust it.
What it does well
The Clever Dripper is a plastic cone with a valve at the bottom that stays shut while it sits on the counter. Set it on a mug or carafe and the valve opens, so the coffee drains through the paper filter. You get the full body and sweetness of a French press with the clean cup of a paper filter, and almost nothing to get wrong.
It uses standard #4 cone filters, which are sold in most grocery stores. The large size holds enough for one big mug or two small ones.
Starting recipe
- Coffee
- 20 g, ground medium to medium-coarse.
- Water
- 320 g just off the boil.
- Ratio
- 1:16.
- Time
- 2 minutes of steeping, then about a minute to drain.
Step by step
- 1. Rinse
- Fold the filter's seams, put it in the dripper and rinse it with hot water. Set the dripper on a mug to drain the rinse water, then pour it away.
- 2. Water first
- With the dripper back on the counter, start a timer and pour in all the water, then add the coffee. Adding water first keeps grounds from settling into the filter and slowing the drain.
- 3. Stir and steep
- Stir gently so all the grounds are wet, put the lid on and wait. At 2:00, give it one more gentle stir.
- 4. Drain
- Set the dripper on your mug. It should drain in about a minute.
Adjusting
Sour or thin: grind finer or steep longer (up to 4 minutes is fine). Bitter or dry: grind coarser or steep less. For a stronger cup, use more coffee rather than steeping longer. More in Ratio, grind and time.
It flatters almost any coffee, and natural-process coffees are especially good in it. Compare it with the other brewers in Pour-over brewers.