Can You Master Coffee in One Year?

I recently started questioning whether mastering coffee in a year is even possible, but I've decided to push forward with this ambitious challenge anyway. In this episode, I open up about my goal to reach a level where I can grab any bag of coffee—light, medium, or dark roast, washed, natural, or anaerobic—and nail the perfect brew within two or three tries. I'm talking about understanding water chemistry, exploring the science behind cold brew, testing the limits of AeroPress, trusting my palate over refractometers, and diving deep into questions that most coffee enthusiasts gloss over.

But this isn't just about technical mastery. I'm documenting my struggles, victories, and aha moments throughout this journey because I want to share what truly works—not just for me, but for you too. I'll be challenging conventional wisdom, questioning why we follow certain brewing methods, and pushing past my comfort zone to extract the absolute best from every cup of coffee. You'll learn about my approach to deliberate experimentation, how I'm simplifying my setup to focus on the coffee itself rather than gear accumulation, and why I believe slowing down and staying present with each brew is the key to real improvement. This is about going deeper than surface-level knowledge and discovering what mastery really means in the world of coffee.

Chapters

• 0:00 Intro
• 1:31 Defining My Coffee Mastery Goal
• 2:53 The Human Side of Pursuing Excellence
• 4:31 Trusting My Palate and Questioning Tools
• 5:46 Documenting Struggles and Victories
• 7:07 Slowing Down and Staying Present
• 8:37 Pushing Past Comfort Zones
• 10:10 Why Coffee Still Excites Me
• 11:33 Focusing on the Coffee Itself
• 12:09 Leaving No Stone Unturned
• 13:11 Questioning Conventional Methods
• 14:07 Setting Myself Up for Failure?

Transcript

[0:00:00]
Mastery. What do I mean by mastery? Like, master coffee. I've been thinking about that for the past couple of days. And then I started to second guess myself right before I was going to do this. Can you really master coffee?

[0:00:27]
I don't know if you can. I don't know if people have actually done that. I'm sure if you ask multiple mini experts, if they've mastered coffee and they've been doing it for X amount of years and I'm telling you that I want to do it in a year, I'm sure they'll say no. That's dumb. You're always learning something about coffee.

[0:00:55]
Now I'm thinking if I'm second guessing myself about this whole challenge, if this even makes sense. But I'm going to try. I'm going to go through this. I'm going to see what happens when I have a crazy goal I'm telling you that I'm going to do.

[0:01:23]
But let's get back to the question and we'll worry about anxiety and second guessing later. What did I mean by mastery? I guess my biggest thing is that I want to be able to grab a bag of coffee, look at it, analyze it, and then just make a cup of coffee, whichever way I want to. And after two to three tries, probably on the first try because I'll be the best, right?

[0:02:07]
It'll taste spectacular. I know exactly what to change, what to do. No matter if it's a light, medium, or dark roast. No matter if it's an anaerobic or a washed coffee or natural, whatever it may be or Brazilian coffee.

[0:02:28]
I don't know why that is something that I'm trying to gravitate to. It's just something that I'm thinking about right now. And as I think about this stuff and kind of go through this whole process and challenge, I think this is going to trip me up in a way that I didn't know that was even possible.

[0:02:52]
What I mean by that is that I'm just a human being, just like you are too. We are just trying to figure things out as we go along in life. Some things we get really good at, like if you have a day job, we try to get really good at that because that pays the bills, right?

[0:03:16]
But when we're talking about like a hobby, a passion, something that we do each and every day and taking it up a notch, a big notch, what does that do for us? What does that do for you?

[0:03:34]
Is that too much logic, too much thinking? Is that just too many things that we're trying to see what makes sense in our lives? Are we that bored that we have to do these New Year resolutions? Those are some of the things that I think about a lot.

[0:03:50]
But mastery, like water chemistry, like what does that really mean? What are actually in the third wave water packages? Why do people make their own waters? How does that relate to a light, medium, and dark roast?

[0:04:07]
What about the AeroPress? Is there that much pressure? Does it really make that big of a difference? Can you use a coarse ground on it compared to a finer grind?

[0:04:20]
How well does the refractometer really translate to flavor? Do I tend to lean on it too much? Or do I not lean on it enough? Or do I not trust my palate enough? I know that's one of the things I want to work on is trusting my palate even more so. No matter what I'm set against.

[0:04:45]
What's the structure and the science and the logic of cold brew? One thing that I've noticed is that a lot of people don't really care for it. They have an old bag of coffee or coffee that they got from somebody else and just throw it in cold brew, which is interesting. They don't care about cold brew just like I don't. But can I make a tasty cold brew that works well for everybody?

[0:05:15]
I know not everything's going to work for everybody. I know there's going to be things that I do that I go through and realize to the point that it's just not going to work. But I just want to document that. I just want to talk about my struggles, my victories, my aha moments, my moments to where it's going to be truly helpful for you. Not just me.

[0:05:46]
What good is it if I just keep this to myself? And throughout the journey, throughout the whole thing, I know I'm going to get comments. I know I'm going to get insights. I know I'm going to get criticism to the point to where I'm going to be constantly second guessing myself. And I think that's the struggle. That's the thing that I'm going to be going on in this journey. A lot of things in life I just do.

[0:06:17]
And this one's a little different because I'm putting myself out there. And I didn't think that was that big of a deal as people will say that they do that all the time. But at the end of the day, it's one of those things to where I'm like, wow, I said I'm going to do this. Let's get it on. Let's push ourselves.

[0:06:39]
Let's see what clarity really is. Does that really matter? Am I fooling myself when I'm saying that I'm tasting this and that and the layers are actually separating?

[0:06:51]
I think one thing that I know that I have to do for sure is kind of really just slow down. Slow down. Like think things through, stay in the pocket long enough and enjoy that particular ride.

[0:07:10]
That's kind of like where I'm at with this. We all fail. It's like when we try different things and we go about seeing things for what they are. I can see that in my kids all the time. When they fail, they just give up. They don't want to try again because they're not good at it.

[0:07:43]
I'm going to be failing quite a bit. And as I do that and document and share and say all this stuff that I'm trying to do and try to romanticize this whole thing, this is going to be interesting. This is going to push me past the comfort zone that I'm in right now. Don't get me wrong. I think I do a decent job of understanding coffee, learning about coffee, putting my insights out there and learning from others.

[0:08:15]
But this is going to be a totally different type of way of looking at it. And when I look at it that way and kind of understand it a little bit more that way, I think that's going to be the thing that's going to matter the most.

[0:08:30]
So I'm excited. I am anxious. I am scared. I'm all those buzzwords that we throw out when we don't know how things are going to go. It's kind of like life. I think that's part of it too.

[0:08:49]
Because a lot of times in life, we get stuck into these routines, what we want to do and how we want to express ourselves. But then we just kind of do the same thing over and over again. I want to push. I want to extract the most out of me as much as I can.

[0:09:10]
That could be more so the mastery part of it. Like pushing myself past the comfort zone, the levels that I thought that I was really good at and realize where I struggle with. And I don't even know how that looks. I don't even know the experiments, the tries and tribulations that I will go through.

[0:09:35]
I have no clue really what that looks like. And I think that's the part that kind of scares me and excites me at the same time because there's no real direction. There's no textbook to tell me and teach me along the journey if I'm doing this right or wrong. And that scares the shit out of me.

[0:09:58]
All for coffee, right? All for coffee. What coffee does to us, I know at least for me, like that first buzz that I got, I still get excited about coffee. It's one of those things to where I think about it constantly even beyond my morning ritual or two.

[0:10:26]
But something about like conquering, like slaying coffee now, like I get you. That's bizarre. That doesn't make any sense. And if I fail, I fail, I'll let you know if I do. Probably I fail because a year to master coffee is not long enough.

[0:10:51]
Probably I'll need a lifetime, but we're going to give it a go for a year and reassess it then. Like I said, I have no clue where this is going to go. This doesn't make any sense to me, but this is the way that I know that I need to push myself to really kind of get out of any comfort zone that I'm in right now. Because it's interesting because I'm not actually, I have all the grinders that I need. I have all the coffee makers that I play around with. I've gotten rid of, put it in my cupboard somewhere and all the ones that are just taking up space.

[0:11:33]
And now I'm just faced with coffee. The beans, how they're roasted, what the smells and how that translates into flavor and how I can get the best out of every single cup. Even if I don't really care for it, I'm looking to find the best that I can from that particular coffee. And I think it's possible.

[0:12:03]
So yeah, that's what mastery is to me. Like going deep into the rabbit hole, like leaving no stone unturned, analyzing it, asking why we do what we do. Why do we do two pours, three pours, whatever?

[0:12:25]
Is it because somebody was in a competition and this is what they've noticed that makes the best cup of coffee? Or it could be like Test Kitchen, like I tried a recipe and I doctored it. It wasn't the same as it was before. Mainly because Test Kitchen tests everything.

[0:12:49]
Probably that world-class barista or brewer has tested everything and they've come to this conclusion or they're probably doing their things based off the judge's senses and mouths and what they like about coffee and all that. That's cool and all. But it's time for me and a little bit of you to push past the things that we know about coffee.

[0:13:17]
That's all I'm saying. I think that's the biggest thing. Why do we do a four, five minute steep time for French press? Why do people like French press? What's so cool about it?

[0:13:38]
Can you really get the best out of French press? Can you say it right? Can you get that clarity without it being muddy? What grinder do you use? Can you just be perfectly fine with one grinder?

[0:13:56]
I want to test all of that. I want to see if whatever I have or whatever I know is going to be helpful to you. Mastery is like knowing essentially everything about coffee. I'm already setting myself up for failure.

[0:14:18]
But let's give it a go. Let's see what's all about and let's challenge ourselves to stay focused, to stay ready and geared in into all of this. So this is me explaining to you what mastery means to me. I don't even know if I got there. Probably little bits here and there. But let's see.

[0:14:46]
Let me know what you think. Let me know if you think I'm crazy. Let me know if you have any suggestions, experiments, thoughts. It doesn't matter. But I'm here. I'm ready to go. And let's get it. Talk to you later. Bye.