Coffee & Home Barista Starter Checklist

1. Gather your supplies

• Freshly roasted whole beans from a local or online roaster
• A burr grinder so you grind just before brewing
• One simple brewer to start, such as a pour over cone or French press
• A kettle, a kitchen scale, and clean water

2. Your first project

3. Your first month, step by step

• Week 1: Buy one fresh bag of whole beans and a simple brewer such as a pour over cone or French press. Just make coffee each morning and pay attention to how it tastes. Do not worry about being precise yet.
• Week 2: Add a kitchen scale and start weighing your coffee and water. Try a ratio of about 1 gram of coffee to 16 grams of water, and notice how weighing makes every cup more consistent.
• Week 3: Focus on grind size. If you have a grinder, try one notch finer and one notch coarser and taste the difference. Too coarse tastes weak and sour; too fine tastes bitter. Aim for the sweet spot in between.
• Week 4: Pick one method you enjoyed and refine it. Watch a technique video, tidy your steps, keep your gear clean, and brew the same recipe a few days in a row until it feels easy and reliable.

4. Mistakes to avoid

• Using stale, pre-ground coffee instead of grinding fresh whole beans just before you brew.
• Getting the grind size wrong for your brewer, which leaves the cup weak and sour or harsh and bitter.
• Pouring water that is too hot straight off a rolling boil, which scorches the coffee.
• Not weighing your coffee and water, so every cup comes out different.
• Leaving equipment dirty, so old coffee oils turn rancid and taint the flavor.
• Buying too much coffee at once and letting it go stale before you can drink it.