The Dragon Brewer

[RobertL]

I saw this one Twitter today and thought I would share it. I'm not sure if the guy is crazy or a genius.

Todd Explains: The Dragon on Vimeo

[headchange4u]

I'm going with crazy. I bet that thing is a blast to clean.

Is it me or did that coffee look to be a funny color?

[RobertL]

It appears to be a very light roasted coffee.

[headchange4u]

Another one:

SCAA 2014: Todd Carmichael

[peter]

I'm intrigued.  But from what I gather, the biggest feature of the Dragon is that you can lower the temp of the slurry, as he explains in the video to create whatever temp profile you want based on the coffee you're brewing.  Personally, I don't care to do that.  I think the Dragon is an answer to a question that nobody's asking.

[RobertL]

 
I think the Dragon is an answer to a question that nobody's asking.

Agreed. I think a vac pot could make as good of a cup if not better.

[JCBiker106]

Interesting TOY but I'll stick with my Aeropress.  That is until I find a reasonably priced electric vac pot to take to work and wow the groupies.

[John F]

I'd consider tasting it if that dude made it..

I'm totally perplexed by adding the second dose of water and a few other things going on here but who knows. I tried the biolermaker brew last month...another flamboyant brewer.

[Ascholten]

RobertL,  agreed on the vac pot.  You can profile those pretty easy as well, even with 'when' you lock down the top with the grounds.  I have a bodum santos I use often and you can get a lot out of them once you learn to fiddle with them.

The vac doesn't use paper filters so one less expendable to waste money on as well.

Aaron

[stevea]

It's an interesting toy but ... someone needs to show WHY you'd want to control the brewing temp profile.

The extraction process is generally dependent on temps, time and ythe relative amounts of solvent(water) and solute(the various roast bean content).  In the special case we are concerned with - it's probable that the high conventional brewing temp has a lot to do with the gelatinization temp of the coffee bean starch.

Thinking fairly hard abt the physical chemistry here I see no reason to want to cool the temp aside from creating retrogradation of the starch which might marginally make filtration easier (else require low temps and a lot more time).

OTOH if that is the desired effect - then the design short is ornate and brain-dead.   The pyrex glass is a pretty terrible thermal conductor and can't greatly cool the slurry.  Then there is the problem of temp loss by evaporation as this is clearly an open topped slurry.

Looks like a failed attempt to improve on an aerobie to me.

[John F]

I'm pretty sure you can cook low temp chicken in this thing.   

[Ascholten]

Im sorry but I can see getting onto a plane and trying to bring that setup on,  hello cavity search 

Aaron