Why Every Recipe Is a Starting Point

I've never met a coffee lesson I could skip. Every recipe, every ratio, every borrowed technique had to be lived through before it meant anything. In this episode, I make the case for structure in coffee, and the case against clinging to it too long. I walk through how I leaned on other people's recipes when I started, from bloom timing to pour weights, and how that structure gave me a sense that I was doing it right even before I understood why. I also tell the story of my first attempt at brisket, following a top restaurant's method step by step, only to end up with something that tasted nothing like theirs, and what that taught me about the invisible variables experts never mention.

By the end of this one, you'll understand why structure is a starting place and not a destination, why the guru who taught you a ratio was never wrong, and why the goal is to eventually build your own guardrails instead of living inside someone else's. I share what happened when I asked my audience how they actually brew their coffee, and why the wild variety of answers was the most reassuring thing I've heard in a while. If you've ever felt guilty for deviating from a recipe, or frustrated that you can't replicate someone else's cup, this episode is for you.

Transcript

00:00
I said you have to go through it. The good, the bad. You can't really skip steps in this whole coffee game. But there are some things that are my shining light, the things that I just do, and to an extent, for you too. This is more so a case for structure, when it's good, and also when it doesn't really work for you.

00:30
There's been many times in the walk of coffee that I constantly think about, when I'm doing something that's outside the norm or that is the norm. It's one of those things where I have to always kind of second guess myself. The way I look at things is that structure is extremely important in the way that we do things, with coffee, with life, with routines and all that. And especially when we start to learn new things, things that we're not accustomed to, things that we're not, at least for now, experts in, we tend to lean on others, we tend to lean on books, and we let that be our shining, guiding, and at times, our crippling light.

01:31
I'm no different than you. When I first started drinking coffee, I just wanted a simple recipe. Something that gave me a sense that I was doing this right. And I had that recipe, and I started to use it. Then I started to listen to different people, get their opinions on things. And I've talked about this many times: what you don't know about a particular recipe is probably the detriment of what you're really trying to do and understand. A lot of times we still don't know who we are in this whole coffee thing.

02:05
One of the things I try to do whenever I get into something new is listen to people. For instance, when I first started to barbecue, I went to one of the top 50 restaurants. They had a YouTube channel, and they were talking about how you'd make this brisket. So I wrote everything down, watched the video a couple of times, went to the store, selected the brisket, trimmed it the way they did, for the most part. I'm sure I messed up plenty. I did everything the same. And when I had that bite of brisket, it was okay. It was fine. Did it look like theirs? Probably not. Was it theirs? No, not at all.

03:14
Those are some of the things I started to realize a little later. They were using prime grade brisket. They were using a different type of smoker. They had so much experience that there were things they hadn't purposely left out, they just didn't think to mention them. It took me going through that whole journey to realize I couldn't do exactly the same thing they were doing. It's no different than coffee. I'd listen to someone talk about a particular ratio, do exactly that, and then get mad at them, or the coffee, or myself, when I couldn't get the same taste and flavor they described. Realizing this later, which should've been obvious: they were using a different coffee, a different point of view, different water chemistry, different things they liked and didn't like. And I didn't realize I was taking all of that in along with the recipe.

04:39
So as we go through this journey, we realize we have guardrails, and guardrails are good. We need structure. It's one of those things where we know we have structure in life, but sometimes, especially when we start a new or different hobby, something we're not too accustomed to, we forget that we already have those guardrails. I'm not saying you don't need information from other people. It's a starting place. In the beginning, you do the swirl, you do the 30, 45 second blooms, before you really understand why you're doing them. But it gives you a sense of understanding, a sense that you're doing something right.

05:37
After a while, you start to figure out what you actually like, what you don't do even though the experts say not to do it. You start to realize which coffees really gravitate to you. You come to the realization that it's okay to do things differently, or you got a piece of gear that's actually helped your coffee more than what you were told to use.

06:20
And now your structure, your scaffold, your skeleton, is built through your own inputs, but also through others. That's the case for structure. It centers you. It gets you prepared to do this thing every day. It gets you out of your head, to an extent. You're just doing that recipe, doing that technique, trying to see if you can replicate something magical, something drinkable, something you know you can actually do every time.

06:47
But I'll tell you this for free: it's going to get to the point where you want to break free, whether you realize it or not. You're going to start wanting to do things a little differently. Try a different recipe, a different technique, different structure, different water chemistry, different temperature in the kettle, different beans. And then you're going to start second guessing yourself, because that guru told you this is the way they do things. You're going to wonder if you should step out of your comfort zone and try something different.

07:52
You should. You shouldn't force coffee to be what others think it is. You should just let coffee be what it is. And I think that's the biggest thing in all of this. We need to define our own guardrails, define what we like and don't like. Eventually, I think we're going to start coming up with our own recipes, our own way of doing things.

08:28
I want to leave you with this. I made a particular coffee last week. I was doing a little experiment for myself, and eventually for you too. I don't remember the actual recipe, but I told people what it was, and then I asked the question: how do you actually make your coffee? People flooded in with answers. They told me they do a cold bloom to get more sweetness out of the coffee. One person does a 30 gram bloom, gets to 100 grams, then adds about 50 grams at a time until they hit 250 grams of water.

09:38
It's fascinating. It's all different. And I'm sure that throughout the time they were coming up with these recipes, they followed somebody else first, got an idea from someone else to try this way or that way. But the way they talked about it, they were owning the whole situation. Their protocol, for this coffee, for a new bag, and what they wanted to get out of it.

10:20
It was fascinating, because what it taught me is that we're all different. We have our own ways and structures of doing things. And throughout time, through our experience of getting better, not getting better, getting frustrated, we're building this skeleton and filling it up with meat, for lack of a better analogy. Yes, at times it might get a little rigid, we might get set in our ways, but the real point is that we're developing our own recipes, our own ways of doing things, because of how we like to do it. That's what structure does for us.

11:15
When we get away from following, and constantly wondering why this person did something, and just take it as gospel, that's where we fall flat. That's where we have issues, not necessarily because the recipe is bad, but because we're not trusting ourselves. We're not seeing it for what it is.

11:55
As long as we start to come out of that shell and be more of who we are, and figure out the reasons why we do what we do, our structure is going to be solid. Our walk, our foundation, our journey with coffee, will be our own. That's the beauty of all of this.

12:30
The thing about structure is that it's shaped by your own experience and others, but don't let others take over your structure. Those are the things we have to realize, and have as a cautionary tale. We can do this. We have to do it our way.

12:58
Let me know what you think. What's your recipe? What's your go-to, and why? Did you develop it over time, or as a modification from someone you listened to? Do you ever question it? Do you try to get out of the box and try a different coffee, for whatever reason? What is it? Talk to you later. Bye.