Every so often, friends who are new to coffee leave comments on the Best Coffee back end, asking about the problems that often come up during the beginner phase. Just yesterday, for example, Best Coffee received a comment saying: if you want to teach yourself pour-over coffee at home, what basic equipment do you need?

To help all you beginner friends successfully get sucked into the rabbit hole, Best Coffee is here today to talk about a beginner-phase equipment selection guide.

If you often go out for coffee, you have probably noticed that the equipment baristas use can be described as endlessly varied, with all kinds of styles put out by all kinds of brands, whether flashy or minimalist, and many setups look so professional at first glance that when you search for them online you find: can't afford it! Simply can't afford it!

In Best Coffee's view, although pour-over may seem like a complex and professional process, at its core it is very simple. A complete set of pour-over coffee gear consists of nothing more than a pour-over kettle and thermometer, a dripper and filter paper, a digital scale, a grinder, a server (optional), these few major elements, plus one key raw material, coffee beans. So as long as we find satisfactory budget versions according to our own budget and needs, we can easily enjoy playing with pour-over at home.

1. Coffee Grinder

If you are after coffee's flavor and aroma, then a good, easy-to-use grinder is naturally indispensable. Although you get what you pay for, that does not mean the more expensive something is, the better it is; we should always still choose based on our own needs.

As for what grinder a beginner should buy, this question seems to offer quite a few choices, yet it may come with certain limits for different groups of people. If you are still a cash-strapped student, or a worker with not much of a budget, then Best Coffee suggests starting with a 200-500 yuan hand grinder, which can slightly adjust the coffee's grind particle size, and later you can move up depending on your needs; if you are an office worker with a somewhat larger budget and you brew coffee fairly often, you might choose the 500-800 yuan advanced version, which will save us quite a bit of effort in grinding;

When you have ample budget in this area, that also means there will be more types to choose from; at the thousand-yuan tier you can buy a hand grinder with your eyes closed, because at the same price its grind quality will be better than an electric grinder; if your plan is several thousand yuan, then you can go straight to an electric grinder with better precision and quality.

When learning to make pour-over coffee at home, a digital scale with a timer and a gooseneck pouring kettle are equally indispensable. The good news is that the domestic market is competitive enough that you can find a suitable option for any budget.

2. Digital scale

Many people skip the digital scale at first, ignoring gram weight and not bothering with ratios, pouring water entirely by feel, so the coffee they brew is always like opening a blind box: sometimes fragrant, sometimes bitter, sometimes strong, sometimes weak. During extraction, a digital scale not only ensures an accurate dose of grounds and ratio, but also lets us judge the extraction by time and make corresponding adjustments.

There are many digital scales with a timer function on the market. If you are not particular about appearance, they will not cost you much. Take the "black scale" that Qianjie uses most often day to day: not only is it easy to use and drop-resistant, the key point is that it is also cheap (within 30 yuan).

3. Pour-over kettle

In theory, you can also make a cup of pour-over coffee with an ordinary kettle, but since factors such as the size and stability of the water stream, the pouring speed and the landing position all affect extraction, if we want to consistently brew delicious coffee, we prefer to use a dedicated pour-over kettle.

As a pouring device, a pour-over kettle's ease of control is crucial for beginners, mainly reflected in the spout shape, capacity, and the kettle's own weight. The spout design affects how easy it is to pour and the shape of the water stream. Qianjie recommends using a gooseneck fine-spout kettle, which is more helpful for beginners to control the flow. The size of the pour-over kettle determines the center of gravity when pouring. A kettle body that is too small or too light will shift the center of gravity forward and make the flow unstable, while a kettle that is too heavy is not handy to use. For daily use, you can refer to Qianjie's pour-over kettle, with a capacity of 500-600ml.

In terms of function, pour-over kettles are divided into two types: temperature-controlled and non-temperature-controlled. If you have a way to boil water at home, choosing a pour-over kettle without a heating function can reduce part of the cost, and you just need to equip it with a fast-read thermometer for measuring temperature. Taking the most common B kettle as an example, the non-temperature-controlled version can be had for under 300, while a fast-read thermometer costs within 100 yuan.

4. Dripper and Filter Paper

As we all know, a practical dripper allows each brew of coffee to consistently present its flavors. Taking the most common drippers on the market as examples, coffee brewed with a conical dripper represented by the V60 has richer layers; a flat-bottom cake dripper can express balance; the Kono dripper highlights the coffee's body... Different materials also affect extraction. If practicality is considered, Qianjie recommends a resin V60 dripper.

The structure of the paper filter directly affects the flow rate, which in turn changes the taste of the coffee. A friend once found that their coffee brews often stalled; after ruling out various causes, they discovered it was due to using the thick paper filters that came free with the dripper they bought. Switching filters solved the clogging problem. If you don't want extraction to be interfered with by the paper filter, Best Coffee recommends choosing well-known brands first, such as the Kono filters we use.

5. Server and Coffee Cup

If the goal is to show off when out and about, or to impress friends in daily life, then a good-looking server and coffee cup will certainly look much better in photos, costing around 100-500 yuan. But setting looks aside, if you're drinking alone and aren't too particular, then just grabbing any large-capacity cup will do.

6. Coffee Beans

Best Coffee believes that beginners are still at the stage of just getting familiar with things. Apart from the grinder, which should be chosen a bit better (with more budget invested), the other tools can actually make do for now. Then, with a low-end setup, try different types of coffee beans, and gradually improve both brewing and tasting skills.

Coffee beans intended for pour-over are generally single-origin coffees, from a single origin, usually in specs of half a pound or less. Different regions, different varieties, different processing methods, different grades, and different roast levels all affect the final taste of the coffee. The most common problem for beginners is the tendency to blindly follow the crowd, buying some expensive coffee beans that often carry words like "competition grade," "auction lot," or "rare variety," and then finishing the whole bag before they even figure out what the flavor is.

Based on Qianjie's experience, at the beginner stage it's best to first choose beginner-friendly everyday coffee beans according to your own taste preferences. For one thing, it helps you quickly distinguish regional flavors, and for another, even if you practice several more times you won't feel bad about it. Taking Qianjie's everyday beans as an example, if you can accept acidity, you can first try Qianjie Ethiopia Yirgacheffe;

If you like soft sweetness with acidity, you can choose Qianjie Costa Rica Tarrazu or Qianjie Rwanda Red Bourbon; if you want lower acidity, you can try Yunnan small-bean; if you want no acidity with nutty and chocolate aromas, you can choose Qianjie Brazil Cerrado or Qianjie Colombia Huila; if you're afraid of acidity and love a full-bodied mouthfeel, choose Qianjie Indonesia Mandheling... Once you find an origin that suits you, you can keep "digging deeper" into the more specific sub-regions, estates, and varieties there.

Affordable everyday pour-over coffee bean recommendations: Qianjie Ethiopia Yirgacheffe Gotingding, Qianjie Panama Boquete Hacienda La Esmeralda Green Label Geisha coffee beans

Espresso coffee bean recommendations: Qianjie Classic Blend, Strawberry Candy Espresso Blend

You can now buy the coffee beans above at the Tmall "Qianjie Flagship Store," and you can also find 60 kinds of single-origin pour-over coffee beans and espresso coffee beans from all over the world. Qianjie coffee beans are freshly roasted and ship within 24 hours.

Tmall Qianjie Flagship Store link: https://qianjieshipin.tmall.com

Or you can search "Qianjie Flagship Store" directly on Taobao

Qianjie Coffee store address: No. 315 Donghuadong Road, Yuexiu District, Guangzhou