Do We All Just Need A Hario V60?

In this episode of my coffee talk, I dive into the world of coffee brewing equipment and explore whether expensive gear is always necessary for a great cup of coffee. I share my recent purchase of two different coffee brewers - a Hario Pegasus dripper ($9.50) and an OXO dripper ($17) - comparing them to the popular Hario V60 ($10-31 depending on material). I discuss my philosophy of starting with affordable options to understand your preferences before investing in pricier gear, drawing parallels to my recent fitness tracking journey. I explain why the V60 has become the standard against which other brewers are measured and preview my upcoming three-part series testing if these alternative brewers can match its performance.

Listeners will learn about the different considerations when choosing brewing equipment, how to approach the "gear rabbit hole" of coffee, and why sometimes the journey of discovering what works best for your taste preferences is more valuable than constantly chasing the next trending product. Whether you're new to specialty coffee or looking to enhance your brewing setup, this episode offers practical insights into making informed decisions about coffee gear.

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Chapters

• 0:00 Intro
• 0:45 Unboxing the Hario Pegasus Dripper
• 1:30 Examining the OXO Dripper
• 2:20 Why Try Different Coffee Brewers?
• 3:15 The True Cost of Hario V60 Options
• 4:30 The "Start Affordable" Philosophy
• 5:45 My Fitness Tracker Comparison Story
• 7:00 Analyzing the Pegasus Dripper Design
• 8:15 Why the OXO Might Be Better for Beginners
• 9:30 The V60 as the Gold Standard
• 10:45 Previewing the Three-Part Comparison Series
• 12:00 Final Thoughts on the Coffee Gear Journey

Transcript

[00:00] What's up, I hope all is well. We're live right now.

[00:15] So we're gonna be talking about today. This is a coffee talk. Whatever you want to make it, I just want to come on here and talk about coffee. I guess mostly about gear and how it relates to us and all that stuff. I have in front of me two boxes. I just actually ordered some coffee brewers and I'm sure you're wondering why would I order coffee brewers not for me. I probably give these away, who knows, but I wanted to see what is out there for coffee gear and how it relates to things that we're using right now.

[00:45] This right here is a Hario Pegasus dripper. It's not big. It seems like it's comparable to the size of a Hario V60 size. I was actually trying to get a size 3 but for some odd reason it was gonna be a couple weeks wait, and this is what I got. This is nine dollars and fifty cents.

[01:10] And then this one right here is an OXO dripper you can see on the screen. And we're gonna do like a soft opening unboxing or whatever you want to call it.

[01:30] Oh, we got some filters. Cool. I was gonna use the bigger filters. They give you a brew guide and all that stuff. And this is a canister of it. It's more so what it looks like - it's a focal type of brewer. So it looks like the same type of filter that you can use, paper filter that you can use for this one with that one, which makes it easier.

[02:20] Okay, so why did I get this? I know some people may say for content, sure, yeah, that's kind of true. But I guess one of the biggest things is like I'm always wondering about brewers now. When it comes to coffee a lot of times, I just grabbed the Hario V60, either the V60 or the V60 Switch. The V60 Switch is about 35-40 bucks. The Hario V60, I believe it's about 25 bucks.

[02:50] Let's check it real quick. Hario V60 pour over dripper reusable, the actual one this brand makes is $31. Let's go to plastic because I think that's the better bang for the buck. It's $10.

[03:15] So this one's $10, this is $17. This was more a little bit more unique in a way where you can just pour water up top. You don't have to think about the brewing aspect of the coffee. At the end of the day, you just want a good cup of coffee.

[03:35] The reason why I got these is because I just wanted to see if it's worth getting for you. Why would you get this if you have so many brewers or you already have the Hario V60? Or it could be for beginners just trying to get into the coffee game, realizing that it's not as expensive as it may seem and I think it's part of all of that.

[04:00] I'll tell you a little quick story as it kind of relates to everything or buying things in general. I've been trying to get back into fitness. I mean I work out every day, that's not what I mean by that. I guess what I mean is that I'm trying to pick up my walking.

[04:30] Initially a couple of weeks ago, I went ahead and looked online and I saw what that was out there and I was wondering why would anybody spend so much money for these gadgets. So I went ahead and picked up a smaller pedometer. It was about fifteen-seventeen dollars. It worked fine, no problems with it. It had a couple issues here and there, but I wanted to get something that will get me in a ballgame of just moving a little bit more. I know you can use your phone, but sometimes I don't want to take my phone with me all the time in order to just go for a walk.

[05:15] So I use it for a couple of weeks and after I use it for a couple of weeks I started to understand the things that I liked about it, things I didn't like about it, and things that will probably more so solve the situation.

[05:30] So I ended up with this one right here. This is a Fitbit Inspire 3. It's literally probably the cheapest Fitbit that you can buy. There are some other ones that are out there, but back in the day, I used to have a Fitbit, very small one, and so far this one works really great. I can check the time, it's telling me time, telling me my steps, heart rate and all that good stuff.

[05:55] I guess what I'm saying is that sometimes it's best that we go ahead and get a cheaper option, see what we like about it, see what we don't like about it. And then from there, that's when we can decide what will be the best thing to get to solve all our problems for the situation that we're in.

[06:15] And that's the case with this because for instance, I can look at this Pegasus right now and I'm really wondering what is it for. It is essentially a clever dripper without the immersion part of it, so you're gonna still have difficulties especially a beginning brewer, person coming into specialty coffee or just wanting your coffee to taste better in general because at the end of the day, that's what we want - we want our coffee to taste better.

[06:45] This one will require you to have like a gooseneck, be more precise and precision when it comes to brewing. So there's gonna be some takeaways, things that you need to do in order for you to really get the best out of the brewer and I'm gonna put it through its paces.

[07:05] I'm gonna see how worth it it really is and if it's probably best just to get a Hario V60 because that's really what we're basing everything on. Hario V60 just works. It does exactly what you need it to do. It does it in a way to where you can truly really get the best out of the coffee and then once you do that you can move on with your day.

[07:30] But this one right here is a little bit more intriguing because it's an OXO brewer pour over coffee maker. The reason why I think this one will probably be what people should get, this is just my hypothesis just looking at the brewer, kind of seeing the way it works, is that you can use water from the microwave. You can pour in however much water you want.

[08:00] I'm sure there's little techniques and things that we can do out of this thing but for the most part, the cool thing is that you can create a great cup of coffee initially for you and there's less guesswork. And I think that's the biggest thing - what comfort level do you really want to be in? What kind of things are you thinking about when you're actually brewing your cup of coffee? What is the most important thing for you? Because I can see this being the only brewer that you would need just by me kind of thinking about it out loud and seeing how it does work.

[08:45] This one I probably wasted my money just by buying because it is literally a Hario V60 that has a different type of shape. We'll see. They do have other things that you can do to it in order to enhance the experience, but we'll see how well or good the coffee is and if we can really taste the difference of what is coming out of your coffee. Because that's all it's really about - what do you care about, why you like things and why do you do things?

[09:20] So I do want to pick up something else, one more thing in order for us to base, judge, put against everything against the Hario V60, because I think that's the brewer that everybody needs. That's the thing that people will aspire to where they will get the most out of their coffee and it's really readily available.

[09:40] You can use essentially any filter that you want to with the Hario V60 just because of the innate form and shape of and the popularity of the actual brewer. There's different techniques and brewers and people talking about recipes and all that good stuff. So you wouldn't be starting from zero, you'll be in a good place to where all of this will make sense to you relatively quickly.

[10:10] But again sometimes you like playing around with different things in order to see if something's better for you. And this coffee maker may not produce better coffee for you, but it may just work because of the way that you like your coffee. You may not notice or taste the difference of what's out there, I don't know.

[10:30] So I'm just trying to give you as much information as possible for you to make an informed decision on gear, whether it's actually worth it to do so. I think we're gonna do a three-part series is gonna be is this better than a Hario V60 and which one's worth getting, and the reasons why, the do's and don'ts, the positive negatives of these brewers and that's gonna be it.

[11:00] Because at the end of day if you're fine with your brewer, you don't have to keep going down this rabbit hole. I went down that rabbit hole a long time ago. I've given away more brewers than what you see that's here. I've played around with different brewers just because, you know, it's kind of part of the journey - gear, understanding your coffee, understanding the brewer, the inconsistencies, the pros and cons of the brewer and what it does to coffee.

[11:30] Because I believe these type of mechanisms really do bring out the best for you, especially if you're doing like a drip or pour over type of situation. That's just where I'm thinking.

[11:45] Let me know if you have any more comments or ideas or things that you're thinking about when it comes to coffee brewing because I don't want this to be a coffee brewing, gear type of channel. I think it's good to get into that game, but I think for the most part we're beyond that, we're past that, we're like in a place to where it's more than the gear, it's more about what you like, it's more about the chase for that next coffee.

[12:15] And if you're in a place to where you're just constantly like buying the next greatest thing, then you're kind of losing sight of the whole journey part of it because to me at least it's about the taste, it's about the uniqueness of that being, it's the uniqueness of trying a different brewing style just because of the coffee's not jelling with you.

[12:40] And I think that's where kind of having multiple different type of gears do come into play, because it'll give you probably a different perspective if there is one of a difference of what taste is in a cup of coffee. But then again, it could just taste essentially the same. So that's what we're gonna be figuring out together and I hope that this is of help to you.

[13:00] Provide any questions or anything like that that you may have as we go through this whole challenge of exploration. Sometimes I don't make any sense, but this is OKIA everyday beans. Talk to you later. Bye.