How to Brew a Chemex

The Chemex is a beautiful coffee brewing device. It consists of an hourglass-shaped glass carafe with a wooden collar around the neck, which allows it to be easily handled and poured when full of hot coffee and requires a proprietary conical filter, made of bonded paper, that is thicker than the standard paper filters used for drip coffee makers. Its elegance and simplicity have made it a popular brewing method.

How the Chemex Works

The Chemex brews by infusion similar to a pour-over. The thick paper filter sets within the Chemex by leaving it folded but pulling separating 3 sheets from one, forming a cone. Ground coffee is added to the filter and hot water is gently and evenly poured over the coffee for several minutes. As the water saturates the coffee and dissolves its solluables, it passes through the filter and into the bottom of the carafe producing a clean and smooth cup of coffee.

Coffee Water Ratio

We recommend a water-to-coffee ratio of 16:1. This means 16 grams of water for every gram of coffee. To calculate how much coffee you need, weigh the amount of water you want to brew and divide that by 16. That will give you the amount of coffee to grind.

Grind Size

We recommend a medium to coarse grind with a consistency similar to kosher salt. The finer the grind, the longer it will take for the water to work through the ground coffee lengthening your brew time and potentially over-extracting the coffee.

Chemex Recipe

Water: 600g

Coffee: 37.5g

Grind: Medium-course

Form your Chemex filter into a cone with 3 layers set to one side.

Place the filter in your brewer with the layered side facing the spout.

Wet/rinse with hot water, then discard the rinse water.

Grind 37.5 g of coffee medium-coarse.

Place the coffee grounds in your filter. Level the grounds by tapping the side of Chemex.

Place your Chemex brewer on a scale, tare to 0.

Start Timer

Pour 80g of water into the center of the ground coffee.

At 0:30 Pour 200g of water starting in the center of the grounds, circling outward, then inward. Be sure to keep from pouring water onto the edge of the cone.
This can dilute your brew by bypassing your coffee grounds. Total weight will be 280g

At 1:30 Pour 170g more just as before. Total weight will be 450g

At 2:30 Pour 150g again, one last time. Total ending weight will be 600g

4:00-5:00 END It should be finished before 5 minutes.
Serve coffee once filter stops dripping. If it went longer, try a more coarse grind next time. Did your brew end after 5:00? Try a coarser grind. If it ended earlier than 4 minutes then try a finer grind.