Best Coffee for Cafetiere: Our Top 8 Picks & How to Brew Them!

Choosing the best coffee for a cafetière, or French press, is crucial for a rich and flavorful brew. This article provides insights into selecting the right coffee beans, highlighting factors like grind size, roast level, and bean origin. It also offers recommendations for top coffee brands suitable for cafetières

The French press is a slow brewing method that works well for home use.

Finding the Right Coffee for Your Cafetiere

There’s no perfect coffee for the French press. Finding the right coffee for your cafetiere depends on your taste and desires.

Coffee Beans vs. Coffee Grounds

When making French press coffee, you need to consider whether you want coffee beans or ground coffee.

Ground coffee makes a cup of coffee in less time than coffee beans. However, if the coffee is finely ground, your coffee will suffer from over-extraction.

When you over-extract, the water absorbs more than the grounds have to give. It takes the coffee beyond that optimal flavour and into the world of murky horror.

Coffee beans offer the opposite problem. If you use them whole, the water can’t reach as much of the bean and it won’t reach that optimal flavour.

The solution? Buy whole beans and grind them yourself. Freshly ground coffee with a coarse grind is most likely to offer a delectable brew.

Top Tip: Pre-ground coffee loses goodness to its surroundings. Freshly ground coffee contains more flavour, aroma, and endorphins.

Roast Level

When buying fresh coffee beans, you need to know which level of roasting you like. There are four main levels:

• Light
• Medium
• Dark
• Darker than dark

The longer coffee roasts, the less moisture it contains. Roasting increases the traditional coffee-like flavour, brings the oils to the surface, and gives the cup more body.

Some people prefer light roast, which has a higher caffeine and moisture content. It also has more herbal flavours.

For a French press, we suggest using medium or dark roast coffee.

Since the roasting process brings the bean’s oils to the surface, the cafetiere can extract all the rich coffee flavour.

The Best Coffee for Cafetiere

Jim’s Organic Coffee

Overview

Jim’s Organic Coffee is made from a blend of 100% Arabica beans. It has a rich, full-bodied flavor with a hint of chocolate and smokiness.

This coffee is decaffeinated using the Swiss water process, which preserves the delicate nature of the bean. This means that you get all the great taste without sacrificing your caffeine fix!

The 11 oz bags come in packs of 12 or 24 and are available in dark or medium roast.

Peet’s Coffee Major Dickason’s Blend

Overview

Major Dickason’s blend by Peet’s coffee is dark roasted, making a full-bodied cafetière coffee.

This blend comes in a variety of ground sizes including:

Drip
Espresso
Percolator
Whole beans
This brand is produced in the USA and blends beans from Central America and the Indo-Pacific.

They roast multiple small batches of beans every week so you only get the freshest roas

Coffee Masters Flavored Coffee, Butter Pecan, Whole Bean

Overview

Coffee Masters Butter Pecan Flavored Coffee is a delicious blend of creamy butter and pecan flavors, with a hint of butterscotch. It’s the perfect way to enjoy a cup of coffee without any hassle or mess. This whole bean 12-ounce bag is easy to use and won’t leave behind any mess after you’re done!

This flavored coffee makes a great gift for the people in your life who love butter pecan flavored treats. You can also use it as an ingredient in baking recipes or smoothies!

Butter Pecan Flavored Coffee is made with 100% Arabica beans, which means it’s rich and flavorful without any acrid undertones. It’s also kosher, so it works well with most dietary restrictions, including vegan diets!

You’ll love how easy it is to prepare this flavored coffee at home—just add hot water and enjoy! No more expensive trips to the coffee shop for your caffeine fix when you have these bags on hand!

Ethiopian Yirgacheffe and Guatemala Antigua, Whole Bean Coffee Bundle

Overview

There’s a reason why Ethiopian Yirgacheffe and Guatemala Antigua are our best-selling coffees. Not only do they have the perfect balance of sweetness and acidity, but they also offer rich body, as well as notes of chocolate and peach. And that’s just the beginning!

When you order our Ethiopian Yirgacheffe and Guatemala Antigua, Whole Bean Coffee Bundle, you’ll get two 12-ounce bags of each kind—that’s 24 ounces total! That means your caffeine addiction will be satisfied for days on end, which is great because we know how much you love your coffee.

The coffee beans in this bundle are roasted to perfection in order to bring out their full flavor potential. They’re then packed into airtight containers so they stay fresh until they reach your door. You’ll be able to experience the best part of waking up with every sip of these delicious coffees!

San Francisco Bay Coffee Fog Chaser Whole Bean

Overview

San Francisco Bay Coffee Fog Chaser Whole Bean 2LB (32 Ounce) Medium Dark Roast is a bold and rich coffee that’s perfect for mornings in the office or afternoons at home. This medium dark roast is made with 100% Arabica beans—the only type of bean that can be called “coffee”—and it’s roasted to perfection so you can enjoy every sip.

San Francisco Bay Coffee Fog Chaser Whole Bean 2LB (32 Ounce) Medium Dark Roast is a bold and rich coffee that’s perfect for mornings in the office or afternoons at home. This medium dark roast is made with 100% Arabica beans—the only type of bean that can be called “coffee”—and it’s roasted to perfection so you can enjoy every sip.

Lavazza Gran Selezione Ground Coffee

Overview

Our Lavazza Gran Selezione Ground Coffee Blend is an Italian espresso blend that’s perfect for the true coffee connoisseur. The rich, dark roast gives it a bold flavor that’ll make you forget all about that weak stuff you’ve been drinking.

Gran Selezione has been our most popular blend for years, and for good reason: it’s smooth as silk and as bold as it gets. It’s got a deep, rich flavor and aroma that will keep you coming back for more. If you’re looking for something new to try—or if you’ve never tried Lavazza before—this is the one to do it with!

illy Moka Classico Ground Coffee Medium Roast

Overview

Illy has been gracing the homes of coffee lovers for over three decades. It’s a classic Italian coffee blend made from 100% arabica beans.

This blend serves the traditional Italian Moka coffee market. A Moka pot is a two-part metal coffee kettle that fits on the stovetop.

Thanks to its construction, it traps moisture within the pot, leading to a fantastic flavour for such a simple device.

The cafetière, or French press, follows a similar concept, so this product works well for cafetière coffee.

Lavazza Espresso Italiano Whole Bean Coffee Blend

Overview

This medium roast blend of 100% Arabica beans is rich and smooth, with a strong, full-bodied flavor that’s sure to please even the most discerning coffee drinkers.

We’re not just saying this because we’re biased—we only sell the best coffee around! We know because our founder spent his childhood summers in Italy and has been drinking Lavazza Espresso Italiano Whole Bean Coffee Blend since he was old enough to drink coffee. He couldn’t believe it when he found out that you can get this same high quality coffee at home, so we decided to make it easy for everyone to enjoy.

You don’t have to worry about GMO ingredients or anything like that, either—this coffee is grown and roasted in Italy according to traditional Italian methods by a company that specializes in making delicious Italian food and drinks. We stand behind our product 100%, so if you’re not happy with it just let us know within 30 days of purchase and we’ll give you your money back!

Tips for Brewing Coffee in a Cafetiere

When buying the best coffee for your French press, you also need to know how to brew it.

• Use enough coffee – To make the perfect cuppa, you need to know how much coffee you’re making. Using the appropriate amount of bean coffee or grounds is the first step to excellent coffee. As a rule of thumb, use one part coffee for every 15 parts of water. Every millilitre of water weighs one gram, so: 250g of water ÷ 15 = around 17 grams of coffee per cup.
• Time the brew well – Using a French press or cafetiere is a relatively slow brewing method. However, you can’t afford to brew the coffee for too long. Coffee brewed for too long will have no flavour. Coffee that hasn’t brewed long enough will taste sour or salty. It’s best to aim for around 6 to 8 minutes, with a coarse grind, and 3 to 4 minutes with a fine grind.
• Grind the coffee to the right size – Many people think that the key to good coffee brewing is grinding the coffee bean as fine as possible. With a French press, you want a coarse grind (between #1 and #4 on your average coffee grinder).If you’re brewing the coffee longer, make the grind coarser, and vice versa.
• Don’t burn the beans – Despite what you might think, the best coffee comes from water that isn’t too hot. Generally, you want the water to be at around 94°C when you add it to the press.

• Know your roast level – Irrespective of the brewing method used, you should always know which roasting level you prefer. The best coffee beans for you have the flavours you prefer. Do you enjoy the fruity herbal notes of light roast or the rich coffee aroma of dark roast? If you’re unsure, start with medium roast coffee then try either extreme. Most coffee drinkers prefer a dark roast for their French press.
• Fresher is better – Always remember that fresher beans have a better flavour. A freshly ground batch of beans generally gives more flavour than pre-ground coffee.

Above and beyond these things, remember that coffee is a matter of personal taste.

You may like a sweet milk chocolate blend, or prefer the heady tang of citrus. You might like decaffeinated coffee, or prefer the buzz of caffeine.

The best cup of coffee for you is the one that you enjoy. Experiment, and find the roast, blend, or origin that you love.

To learn more about how to make the perfect cup of coffee, check out our whipped coffee guide.

If you want to make the most of your coffee waste, have a look at the ideas for leftover coffee grounds.

What do you love about French press coffee? Let us know in the comments.