Tips!

Give it a quick stir after brewing, to maximize flavor and aroma.
Don’t let brewed coffee sit on a burner, unplug appliances and if necessary – transfer to a thermal pot to keep warm. Excess heat continues to “cook” coffee and spoil a good brew.
Try adding a pinch of salt to a pot of coffee, especially when using distilled or softened water. The mineral adds lots of flavor!
Try natural sugar (i.e. turbinado or raw). They tend to lend a pleasant fruitiness to the flavor.
Add flavor right into the pot: ½ teaspoon of vanilla and a sprinkle of cinnamon right into a pot of coffee. A natural breakfast delight!
Fresh is the key word for great coffee. Your coffee will be best when it is freshly roasted, freshly ground, and freshly brewed.
Keep it warm – warm coffee cups and mugs with hot water while you wait for the brew. This ensures your coffee will stay hot longer.
Nutty flavor can be interesting, try tossing a few roasted nuts (i.e. hazelnuts, almonds) in the grinder with coffee beans. This may produce a more naturally pleasing flavor.
Ice cubes – instead of watering down your iced coffee drinks with water cubes, make ice cubes out of coffee or milk. Keep handy in zippered freezer bags for your favorite cold coffee drink.
Chocolate lovers enjoy a square of chocolate on their coffee saucer. A bite followed by coffee makes it melt in your mouth. Some people like dipping it first in their cup.
New coffee drinkers if you are just acquiring a taste, adding milk helps neutralize strong flavors, as milk contains lactose (a sugar) and casein (a protein).
Caffeine cutting? Try making your own 50/50 blend. For example, if you drink Sumatra Mandheling, mix it equally with Sumatra Mandheling Decaf before grinding and brewing.
Vanilla sugar can be expensive, but easy to make at home. Simply bury sliced vanilla beans in a jar of sugar for at least a week. Enjoy in your coffee rather than plain sugar.
Spice it up. Cinnamon sticks are commonly used in Italy for stirrers with coffee. Cardamom however is the spice of choice in Arabian states and is often used directly in the brewing process.
Around the world: people enjoy their coffee with different twists, Africa & the Middle East - with cardamom, Ethiopia – with salt, Mexico – with cinnamon and Morocco – with peppercorns!
After dinner treat - try your favorite de-caff or regular coffee with rum, Tia Maria, or Kahlúa. Fruit liqueurs also go well with coffee as does Scotch Irish whiskey or American bourbon.
Substitute ingredient – for a new twist in ordinary recipes, try replacing plain water with cooled, strongly brewed coffee! (i.e. cakes. We’ve even seen an award winning chili recipe suggest this.)
Cleaning coffee pots: for glass carafes, warm soapy water removes residual flavors. Some sticklers say soap taints the flavor of the next brew, they would recommend swirling ice cubes and water in the pot. Manufacturers recommend running vinegar water through the brewer periodically to remove minerals, this definitely ruins the flavor of the next couple of brews! Instead, try a “calcium, lime & rust (CLR)” type remover, directions are on the bottle.
Coffee stains: when coffee spills on your shirt or couch, rule #1 – don’t let it dry. Promptly dab with a clean cold-wet rag. Blot dry, repeat until stain is gone. If cream and sugar complicate the stain, try adding a couple drops of dish soap, dab, blot dry, repeat. If not removed, try in this order small amounts of: all fabric bleach, hydrogen peroxide, vinegar and lastly bleach solution. Do not dry garment until you are sure the stain is gone, or it will be set for life.
Used coffee grounds – save $$ on your garbage bill, don’t weigh down your trash with heavy, wet coffee grounds. Instead, the easiest thing to do is to keep a ice-cream pail (with lid) by your trash can. Dump used grounds, filter and all in the pail. Grounds can be used for several interesting things!

1. We simply dump them on our “worm farm” pile way out back, along with other organic scraps. Worms love coffee! They multiply like mad, and the fish like them better. It is said that coffee acts as a deodorizer on compost piles. Serious composters add a bit of ground lime to counteract the acid from coffee grounds, neutralizing the soil. They appreciate how coffee increases the nitrogen balance in their compost.
2. It is said coffee grounds repel insects, some people make a thick ring of wet grounds by ant hills – and claim they pack up and move out. Some people scatter them over their lawn, and in their flower beds to keep ants and other bugs from setting up home. If you do this, be sure to dry the grounds first: spread them first on newspaper to dry so they don’t ferment or grow fungi. Once dry, spread about by hand. Over winter, grounds can be kept outside until spring thaw – then dried and ready for spreading.
3. For house plants, some people top off the soil in pots, which allows it to dry and compost better. Most tropic variety houseplants appreciate a boost of acid.
4. Try used grounds for a foot soak! Because skin is acidic, coffee is a treat for skin (the Japanese literally lay in tubs of coffee for a therapeutic spa treatment!) A couple of cups of grounds strained in a gallon of hot water makes a great foot soak. Follow by rinsing, drying and applying lotion to feet. Some people even use grounds as a facial exfoliating agent, as well as a sort of mud pack.
5. Crafty mothers make a play dough for their kids: Mix 2 cups used, dry coffee grounds, ½ cup salt, 1 ½ cups of cornmeal, warm water (enough until moistened). This dough has a very unique texture. Its great for rolling, patting, and pounding, and making inverted “fossils” from objects pressed into it.
6. Used coffee grounds are marketed as “java logs” (fire logs someone invented), ceramic pottery items (one guy makes brown ceramic pigs from grounds!), soaps, etc.

Because of all these uses for used grounds many coffee shops also save on their garbage bill as customers gladly haul them away!