How much coffee per dose?

[ouch]

I'm trying to figure out the relative price of tea versus coffee. I know that I use ~3g of tea to brew a cup, but how many grams of coffee do you use per cup?

I think a rough guess would be that a pound of tea would yield as many cups* as around eight pounds of coffee, but I'd like to get a more accurate measure, if I can.

What do you think the coffee/tea ratio would be?:confused:



*Yes, just for the first infusion. Tea becomes a better bargain when you consider that three good infusions can be had.

[Mr-Scruffy]

I did some internet research on this a while ago. There are quite a few sites on the internet dedicated to this very question.

Anyway, this is what I found:
1lb coffee = 5.25 cups dry = 60 heaping tbsp = 75 level tbsp

I do not know if that helps.

[Limey]

The use of coffee can be a bit relative in that I make espresso/coffee with either 2-3 shots using ~ 7g of beans per shot. Some folks might only use 1 shot so a coffee could vary between 7-21 grams per drink. :confused:

[Flaxorca]

I think it depends on the coffee... But of the brands that I drink regularly it is about 6-7 grams per cup for regular coffee.

With tea it really depends on what type of tea... I usually measure that in tbsp... Roughly a tbsp per cup plus a little extra for the pot... However with some teas this doesn't work, for example a white tea that I have which consists of large leaves, or with a gunpowder which IMHO is more concentrated.

And of course there are teas and coffees in many different price ranges... But you are right you can get 3 infusions from tea vs only one from coffee...

[ouch]

I guess I should provide some parameters. For tea, I almost exclusively drink oolong, unless I feel like a barbarian. :biggrin: One teaspoon in an yixing pot makes a nice cup. Coffee is all ground pretty much the same, so it doesn't have anywhere near the variation in volume as tea. A teaspoon of oolong weighs more than a tablespoon of pouchong- that's why it's best to measure by weight, as opposed to "scoops".
With coffee, I normally use two scoops to yield enough Aeropressed concentrate to produce a ~10 oz cup. A pound of beans usually yields between 15-20 cups this way, hence my 8 to 1 estimate.


What I'm looking for is some way to gauge the relative costs of tea vs. coffee. How much is a $10 lb. of coffee worth in terms of tea?

[Scotto]

According to the SCAA (http://www.scaa.org/), the coffee dose standard for America is 10g per "cup", where a cup refers to just over 5oz of final liquid.

edit: If you believe that, then there are ~45 cups of coffee per pound. The Aeropress uses a lot more, of course, which is a separate issue.

[ouch]

According to the SCAA (http://www.scaa.org/), the coffee dose standard for America is 10g per "cup", where a cup refers to just over 5oz of final liquid.

I find I need a bit more than that- no way do I get 22 cups from a pound 'o joe. I'm probably at around ~25g, and back to that 8 to 1 ratio again.


The reason I mention all of this is that I have often purchased tea for $200-$300 per pound without batting an eye, yet the thought of coffee at $25-$35pp makes me wince, although it shouldn't, given the aforementioned calcualations.

[Doc4]

Beethoven always used 60 beans per cup of coffee.

I'm kind of a barbarian when it comes to coffee, buying a big tin of pre-ground to put in my French Press ...

[Ken]

Ouch,

I think it is best to look at a per cup cost. If you pay $10 for a pound of coffee and get 40 cups, then the cost is 25 cents per cup. A pound of tea is generally reckoned to make approximately 200 cups (using weight not volume to measure), so the per cup cost of a $10 pound of tea is five cents (or 5:1). If you make only 20 cups per pound of coffee (which seems low compared with most users who probably do get closer to 40 cups), then a cup of coffee is 50 cents. You'd have to spend $100 on a pound of tea to equal that (10:1) Since you make even fewer than 20 cups per pound, then of course the ratio worsens. If one assumes that you make an average of 17.5 cups of coffee from a pound, your cup of coffee from a $30 per pound of coffee would cost $1.71 per cup. That would roughly equal the per cup tea cost from a $350 pound of tea.

Of course math is not my strong suit, so these numbers could be meaningless.:smile:

Ken

[ouch]

Ouch,

I think it is best to look at a per cup cost. If you pay $10 for a pound of coffee and get 40 cups, then the cost is 25 cents per cup. A pound of tea is generally reckoned to make approximately 200 cups (using weight not volume to measure), so the per cup cost of a $10 pound of tea is five cents (or 5:1). If you make only 20 cups per pound of coffee (which seems low compared with most users who probably do get closer to 40 cups), then a cup of coffee is 50 cents. You'd have to spend $100 on a pound of tea to equal that (10:1) Since you make even fewer than 20 cups per pound, then of course the ratio worsens. If one assumes that you make an average of 17.5 cups of coffee from a pound, your cup of coffee from a $30 per pound of coffee would cost $1.71 per cup. That would roughly equal the per cup tea cost from a $350 pound of tea.

Of course math is not my strong suit, so these numbers could be meaningless.:smile:

Ken


A few things to consider in case you want to recalculate-

If you ever see me with a cup of $10 per pound tea in one hand, you can expect to see a cupful of pencils in the other, as I'll surely be selling them at that point.:cursing:

I believe another name for "40 cup per pound coffee" is water.:lol:


All kidding aside, I find I have to use about eight times as much coffee to produce what I consider to be a drinkable cup as I require to make a cup of tea. The point, I suppose (I never really have a point) is that I've tasted some very nice teas in the $30-$50/lb range, while coffee that is 1/8 that price (the $4-$6/lb range) really isn't all that good, making tea the better bargain of the two.

[VR6ofpain]

I did some internet research on this a while ago. There are quite a few sites on the internet dedicated to this very question.

Anyway, this is what I found:
1lb coffee = 5.25 cups dry = 60 heaping tbsp = 75 level tbsp

I do not know if that helps.
I read that the recommend amount is 1-2 level tbsp, per every 6 oz of coffee. I personally use 5 level tbsp for the 4 cups (24oz) of coffee I make each morning. So 1 lbs of coffee gets me 15 days or 60 oz of coffee. This seems spot on, since I buy a 3 lbs bag of coffee (whole bean) every 1-1.5 months or so.

[Doc4]

All kidding aside, I find I have to use about eight times as much coffee to produce what I consider to be a drinkable cup as I require to make a cup of tea. The point, I suppose (I never really have a point) is that I've tasted some very nice teas in the $30-$50/lb range, while coffee that is 1/8 that price (the $4-$6/lb range) really isn't all that good, making tea the better bargain of the two.

Yeah, we know ... :w00t: