How To Brew With AeroPress, According to Evan Hafer

Off-the-grid excursions often require significant time away from our favorite at-home coffee brewing devices. But adding the AeroPress coffee maker to your go-bag is an easy and relatively inexpensive way to continue enjoying your favorite roast while on the go.

This lightweight device is easy to pack-out on your next outdoor adventure and is a smart choice for almost any type of travel.

 Photo by Kelly Getzelman/BRCC Blog.

While a simple “AeroPress” word search on YouTube will result in many helpful tips on the different brewing techniques to use with this device, half the fun of packing in a portable coffee maker like this often comes down to a bit of trial and error. I mean, who doesn’t love a little manual labor, right?

Black Rifle Coffee Company CEO Evan Hafer walks us through his personal brewing tips using the AeroPress coffee maker. The five-minute trial-by-fire tutorial filmed by the BRCC Coffeeheads team gives new users a solid starting point for brewing a great cup of coffee without breaking out your scale or electric coffee grinder.

 Photo courtesy of Black Rifle Coffee Company.

Using a simple two-finger rule to measure out 30 grams of coffee, Hafer lets us in on his tricks, which include a useful technique of inverting the AeroPress when developing a brew.

“Most of the time, I am using the AeroPress when I am out and about, so I’m not weighing anything,” Hafer explains. “All I am doing is adjusting grinds and water to come up with the appropriate profile that I want.”

So while going on epic adventures often means giving up the comforts of home — including home-brewed coffee — the AeroPress makes it a little easier to get a quality cup while on the go, whether in the backcountry or just in an ill-equipped hotel room.

This article first appeared in the June 3, 2021, coffee vertical of Coffee or Die Magazine.