Unknown to both my wife and I, our coffee grinder was losing its edge.

Nearly four years ago, Anna bought me a Bodum Bistro Grinder for my birthday. It was an awesome little grinder for a great price.

I used it every single day. Until one day, it broke.

We replaced it with the king of the hill: a Baratza Virtuoso.

And wow. The first cup of coffee using our new grinder was a revelation.

Who knew a great coffee grinder was so important? I mean, I knew they were important, but seriously the difference was huge.

In addition to the new grinder, the other (somewhat recent) addition to my coffee arsenal is the Kalita Wave. We’ll get to it in a minute. But I have to say that the Wave has officially replaced the AeroPress as my daily brewer. What a time to be alive.

All that said, this week you get to peek into the four key components of my daily coffee. (Since I keep the list to just four things, one thing had to leave out was my kitchen scale.)

 

1. Crema.co

It all starts with beans. Freshly roasted coffee beans make all the difference.

Here in Kansas City, we have local coffee roasters coming out our ears. Such as PT’s, Broadway, Oddly Correct, Messenger Coffee, Roasterie, Thou Mayest, Parisi, Post, and Second Best. To name a few.

However, you may prefer to have freshly roasted beans delivered to your door. This is great for folks who don’t like going outside or for those who don’t have a great coffee roaster nearby where you can easily get access to freshly roasted coffee.

If you’re searching for a coffee delivery service, I highly recommend Crema.co.

Crema.co is like Netflix but for coffee. You add the coffees that you want to your list, and then you select how often you want a bag of coffee shipped to you.

This differs from coffee subscription services like Blue Bottle, because Crema lets you pick what you get. Where as with Blue Bottle, you get what they’re roasting.

I’ve gotten beans from Crema and I was very impressed. Great service, great pricing, great coffee.

2. Baratza Virtuoso Grinder

This is the grinder we went with, and it’s fantastic. Here at the Blanc household, we like to buy things for life. So we went with a grinder that is excellent at its job, but also should last us for quite a while.

3. Kalita Wave, Pour-over Coffee Maker

As I mentioned last week, this pour-over coffee maker has become my new favorite.

What I like about the Wave is that it can make a larger cup of coffee than my AeroPress (350g+ versus 250g), and I think the coffee it makes is much better than what you get from the v60.

I know everyone says that the AeroPress is super duper easy to clean. And it is, but I think a pour-over contraption like this is even easier to clean. You just dump the filter into the trash and rinse out the dripper itself. There are no moving parts, no lids, etc.

 

4. Double-Walled Glass Bottle

There are about 150 different variations of this glass bottle on Amazon. I’m pretty sure they’re all made at the same place, and everyone gets a turn putting their logo on the front.

What I like about my double-walled glass compared to my stainless-steel thermos is that the bottle is easier to clean in the dishwasher and it doesn’t fiddle with the flavor of my coffee.

Of course, the tradeoff is that the glass bottle doesn’t keep my coffee as hot for as long.

The glass bottle is also great for cold drinks, since the outside of it won’t sweat onto your desk.

 

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What better to go with awesome coffee than something to read? I’ll be sharing some great quotes and articles in next week’s edition of Fantastic Friday.