The French press deserves better than it gets

A paper filter removes oils and the finest particles. A metal mesh removes neither — it is a strainer holding back the grounds while everything else goes through. That is why a French press has a weight and a texture no cone can produce, and it is also why a careless one tastes like silt.

The oils are the point. They carry aroma compounds that paper absorbs, which is why the same coffee smells richer from a press and cleaner from a V60. Neither is more correct.

During a four-minute steep, most of the fine particles settle out on their own. Then the plunger goes down, stirs the whole vessel, and lifts them straight back into suspension — the sediment in the cup was mostly created in the last three seconds of brewing.

The fix is to stop treating the plunger as a press. Break the crust, skim the foam, wait, and then push the plunger down just to the surface rather than to the bottom. Pour gently and leave the last centimetre behind.

Immersion for four minutes at a coarse grind extracts evenly, but only if the grind actually is coarse. Cheap grinders produce a wide spread of particle sizes, and the dust in that spread over-extracts badly at this contact time.

If your press tastes bitter no matter what you do, the grinder is the likeliest culprit — not the method, and not the coffee.

A litre press makes four cups without anyone standing over a kettle, which no pour-over does. For a table of people, or a morning where the coffee is not the event, that is worth more than the last five percent of clarity.

Decant into a warmed jug once brewed. Coffee left sitting on its grounds keeps extracting, and the second cup out of an undecanted press is always worse than the first.