How to Brew with the Kalita Wave

Subtext Coffee's head roaster breaks down brewing with the coffee industry's flat bottom benchmark: the Kalita Wave.
We're working with a smaller recipe (14g of dry coffee producing ~200ml of liquid coffee). You can scale this recipe up, though we recommend going no higher than 16g with the Kalita 155 (opposed to its bigger brother, the 185).

[@jeremy3249]

Awesome review! Simple and straight forward! I have the exact same kalita wave 155, I have been using it for the past month over my v60 and I prefer it more as it really is forgiving and easy to use in terms of pour techniques. I love it so much so that I just bought the tsubame version of the 155 today. I was originally looking for a review of the kalita tsubame wave 155 here on youtube and stumbled upon your channel! Great content! Looking forward to your future videos! New subs!

[@chbctaiwan2022]

Very good

[@ggivensjr]

Wish you'd show the grind size (actually show the ground coffee).

[@discoRyne]

Showing the ground coffee wouldn't help much given the size of the particles, hence the "Medium" recommendation. Instead you can gauge this based on brewing trial and error. It should only take 2.5 to 3.5 minutes total to clear out the water when brewing ~14g in the 155. Make sure you pour the water in a similar steady matter as in the video so you don't disturb the coffee bed at all. If you find your Kalita retaining a pool of water around the ~3.5 minute mark without revealing the bed, you need to grind your coffee more coarsely so it's able to fall through faster. If you find your Kalita revealing the bed prematurely, and not expanding the ground coffee into a muddy texture, you need to grind your coffee more finely to slow it down. I'd recommend investing in an electric conical grinder as they typically have a grind size dial ranging from Coarse->Medium->Fine->Extra Fine. Anywhere within the "Medium" section works best here, as recommended by the video and in my experience. Good luck.

[@cherylspringtime]

Agree! I'd like to know what number setting the grinder was on. Ooops he does tell us, it's 15.

[@yunboliang]

Would love to hear how you comment on other flat bottom brewer like Fellow Stagg X

[@gbecket1679]

Anything lower than 23 on my baratza encore makes for a really long extraction time on my Kalita. Talking 5:30-6 minutes. The flavor becomes bitter and astringent and the bed sure is muddy. Right now I do a bloom and two pour brew. I see a lot of folks suggest a notably lower setting for pourover in the Kalita. Any idea what accounts for the discrepancy I’m seeing?

[@cherylspringtime]

Can you share the brand name of the carafe? My mug is too wide for the kalita to sit on. (Oh nvm, I found the Kalita 17 ounce on Amazon)

[@davidkarpenko9564]

Hey, thanks for the video! What would you recommend in terms of coffee weight: how much up can I go with Kalita 155? Would 20 be too much already? And if I adjust the coffee weight and water - the brew in time should be the same, or should it differ?

[@subtextcoffeeroasters652]

Hey David - all great questions. We prefer not to go higher than 16g. You can get away with close to 18 but anything higher we would look to other brewers: V60, Kalita 185, Fellow Stagg X. The time is going increase for sure as you up your ratio, that's totally normal. As long as your brew doesn't choke you can expect brew times to increase from 2:30 - 3:30 on the lower dose, to 3:30-4:30 with a higher dose, as a rough example

[@flipper2gv]

Classic case of having a more expensive scale than the grinder.

[@drumslut]

This video was likely made for people brewing at home. If you’re just getting into pour over there’s a good chance you’re using a barazta encore as it’s a highly recommended entry level burr grinder. You can clearly see two other higher level grinders in this video.

[@ggivensjr]

The 155 is such a small amount of coffee why bother?

[@subtextcoffeeroasters652]

Hey George. It may seem like a small amount of coffee but it's more than sufficient for 1 cup. While we don't recommend putting more than 16g of coffee in the brewer, that's still more coffee than what's in a traditional double espresso. At higher, modern extraction percentages and average coffee strength (1.3%), that's almost a full 8oz of liquid. Not for people that want to throw a pot of coffee on, definitely for people that want to brew a single cup of coffee and have the iterative process of fine tuning their coffee with each brew.

[@ggivensjr]

@@subtextcoffeeroasters652 thanks for taking time to respond. We have different point of views. I typically drink a 14-16 oz (420-480ml) cup per day. So for me it's not worth the effort brewing such a small amount.

[@subtextcoffeeroasters652]

@@ggivensjr totally makes sense and the 185, large Chemex, or Fellow Stagg x are better choices for that quantity. Re grind size, that's great feedback. We'll definitely show the grind in more detail in future videos