How to Brew a Great Cup of Coffee

September 10, 2018

Restaurants, convenience stores, hotels and other foodservice operators rely on their hot beverage service to complement their menus and provide customers with a reason to come in and purchase food and drink. Coffee is a core component of any beverage service, and brewing a great cup of coffee for your customers seems like it should be easy. But in a busy restaurant or convenience store, it can be challenging to make sure your coffee is consistently the best quality possible. Here are a few basics to help you produce that dark, rich flavor that will keep your customers coming back for more.

Water is Key – Pure, filtered water aids in producing the best tasting and smelling coffee every time you brew.
CClean Water is Key to Brewing Coffeelean water is key in the process because water makes up more than 98% of the coffee in your cup.
When the water in coffee has a high mineral deposit content (like tap water can have), it can negatively affect the taste of your coffee.
If your tap water is high in mineral content, consider installing a water filter on your line going into your brewer.
Also, be sure you’re doing regular maintenance and cleaning of your coffee brewing equipment to keep it brewing at optimal levels.

Quality Coffee is a Must – Of course, you want fresh coffee.
Fresh Coffee is KeyMany roasters will use a one-way, degassing valve to help ensure the coffee you buy maintains its freshness.
Use the right amount of coffee grounds. Many leading national restaurant chains know that consumers prefer a richer cup of coffee and are using portion packs of 2.5, 2.75 and 3.0 ounces.
Make sure your coffee grind texture is right for your brewing method. Different grinds work best with specific brewing methods (drip, french press, espresso machines, etc.) A medium grind works well for most commercial brewers that use a flat bottom filter.

Know your Water Temperature – Water temperature can affect the flavor and extraction of each cup of coffee you drink.

Temperature is Important When Brewing CoffeeIdeal water temperature is within the range of 195º Fahrenheit to 205º Fahrenheit.
Make sure your coffee service provider checks your equipment periodically to adjust the water temperature, if needed.
Colder water will result in flat, under-extracted coffee, while water that is too hot will also cause a loss of quality in the taste of the coffee.


Don’t Scrimp on Your Coffee Filter – Paper filters can provide the best tasting, clearest cup of coffee available.

Use Quality Coffee FiltersChoose a paper filter that is porous enough to allow coffee grains to flow freely during extraction and is strong enough to prevent collapsing, yet gentle enough to strain particles without taking away the flavor.
Read the details before choosing the paper filter for your brewing equipment.
Be sure to choose the correct size and shape filter to fit your brewing equipment.


Cleanliness is Critical – It’s important to regularly clean and inspect your coffee brewing equipment. 

Clean Your Coffee Brewer RegularlyIt might seem like running hot water through your brewing equipment is enough to keep it clean. But, oils from the coffee can impact future brews.
Be sure your coffee service provider checks your equipment and cleans the sprayhead(s) on a regular basis.
Don’t ignore the coffee decanter, check it daily to make sure there is no coffee residue or burned coffee that could affect the taste of your freshly brewed coffee.

A quality coffee service provider will help you maintain your equipment, calibrate the brewing settings and troubleshoot if you have any issues with the taste or appearance of your brewed coffee.

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19 Responses to “How to Brew a Great Cup of Coffee”

  1. NAME Candy Schroeder

    Please bring back your coffee to Wisconsin’s Original Pancake House. It is the only coffee I and my family like. My parents come from Florida to drink coffee at the Brookfield, Wisconsin Original Pancake House. The manager explained how there were several offices closed in Wisconsin and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. I am not sure why but we would love for you to come back. I spoke to the general manager at the pancake house and he mentioned trying to contact your Houston plant several times, but have not had calls returned. Is there any way to purchase that particular blend online? The sales person on that route has left and I believe took the recipe blend with him. Thank you in advance for your suggestions/help in this matter.

    • desireewhitten

      Thanks for your comment. We are consolidating a limited number of branches in the area – however, that should not affect our service to our customers. The Original Pancake House is a valued business partner; and we will reach out to them to identify any concerns or requests they may have.
      Have a great day!

  2. Carol Gorman

    Hey, I am a big fan of coffee. So, This one is super helpful to me. You explain it like an expert. Now I understand how to brew a great cup of coffee. Thanks for the sharing this.

  3. David Walls

    You described perfectly about the coffee making process. Thanks for sharing this article. It will help me a lot for making coffee correctly. Keep posting like this type of post for us… 🙂

  4. Kerry

    Informative & valuable. So lovely also. Thanks for sharing this brilliant article. Happy blogging.

  5. Arvis

    Hey,
    this was a great read, nice to see all of the important aspects rounded up like this! 🙂
    I also have some brewing guides for a more hands-on approach, in case you are interested in something like this ( for example a guide for espresso brewing like this one – https://coffeforus.com/espresso-brewing-guide-making-espresso/).
    Cheers!

  6. Kate Welling

    Thanks for your tips about how to brew a great cup of coffee. I am just starting to get into drinking more coffee, and I absolutely love it! You mentioned that we should make sure our coffee grind texture is right for your brewing method. Id imagine that it would be easier to find an automatic coffee machine to use!

  7. Coffee cup

    Well written post. Thanks so much.

    • desireewhitten

      Thanks, let us know any trends or other info that would be useful. Happy holidays!

  8. LINDA FERNANDEZ

    Hello. We absolutely love your coffee (have for years) and would like to use it at home. We know in a restaurant when its YOUR coffee 🙂 What is the blend most commonly used in restaurants and can we buy it from you…or where? Do you carry K Cups? We recently purchased a Keurig and love it. We do have the refillable K Cup pod.

    • desireewhitten

      Thanks for your question. The most frequently used blend is our 100% Arabica medium roast. Currently, we do not offer that blend in k-cups. But we do have one of our other brands, Boyd’s coffee, available in k-cup. You can find it online at: http://www.boydscoffeestore.com

  9. Rayyan

    Hi dear, thanks for this useful article. I agree all your information about brew a cup of great coffee. here I want to add a little, to get a cup of perfect tasted coffee, you need the proper roasted, fine blends, freshly grounds beans to brewed by a high-end espresso machine. Then you’ll get the refreshing aroma with bold flavor.

    • desireewhitten

      So true, you always want to make sure your coffee beans are great quality and fresh.

  10. Jenifer

    I absolutely love coffee. Thanks for sharing this article. It’s very helpful to me

    • desireewhitten

      Thanks! We’re working on more interesting and informative articles.

  11. pick my brewer

    hi thanks for the post

  12. Hazel Owens

    That’s good to know that if you want to maintain the freshness of your coffee you should get coffee that uses a one-way, degassing valve. This is helpful since my husband and I want to start making coffee at our house but we’re trying to figure out how to get a quality roast. We’ll have to see if there’s a coffee service that can send us a nice dark roast with one of the valves so we can keep our coffee fresh for a while.

  13. Penelope Smith

    Making a good cup of coffee does seem difficult. It is good to know that the water temperature will be a big thing to focus on. I had no idea that the best temperature for coffee making is between 195 and 205 degrees.

  14. Herry

    I’m a coffee lover,,Thanks for sharing this article. It’s very useful to me

Comments are closed.