Coffee tastes bitter or off, no matter what I'm using now

[Coffcan]

Just about a week or so ago, my Keurig K50 made decent coffee. After that, I started to get a bitter, burnt taste. And fearing that it could be my
water, which is city municipal water, may be causing the problem. Although, I wasn't sure and purchased a icoffee express single serve brewer. It
ended having that same bitter burnt flavor!:-o:-o

I tried water/vinegar and went so far as to use what I had read on a site: a water/ isopropyl rubbing alcohol. It took some of the bad taste out...after the first cup of K cup coffee. This morning I get up and use the resuable K cup holder to make fine grind brew. It comes out tasting bland and bitter. Bad aftertaste.

Last thing I do tonight is pull out my old sunbeam 12 brew. A cheapie that worked well for a good two to three years. It's taste is off as well!:decaf: I pull up the lid and the coffee grounds don't have a scent to them. A slight smell of plastic perhaps?

It's either the water or my coffee makers? I used very hard filtered water for the Keurig, and tried to use only bottled spring water for the icoffee.
The regular pot I brewed tonight was made with filtered tap water.

 

[John P]

It's either too fine of a grind or the water temp is too hot.
The other reason is just lousy coffee.

Perhaps you are evolving. :coffee1:

 

[Coffcan]

It's either too fine of a grind or the water temp is too hot.
The other reason is just lousy coffee.

Perhaps you are evolving. :coffee1:

I'd heard fine grind can affect the taste. Although, even through my old sunbeam 12 cup maker, it came out tasting like plastic. Up to two weeks ago, there were no problems at all. I was using a Keurig classic K50. The coffee coming from the K cups tasted good, using mostly dark roasts like Green Mountain Dark Magic, Original Donut Shop, along with Tully's French roast, which I'd bought for the first time, the last time I went shopping for K cups.

I'd heard like you're mentioning about the heat affecting the taste. Four different coffee makers though? The Keurig, icoffee express single serve coffee maker, Hamilton Beach flexbrew and just my regular coffee pot and maker, have bad tasting coffee coming out of them. No matter if it's bottled or filtered Brita water from the tap. The Brita water admittedly tastes a little worse, when brewed.

Strangely, after brewing my first cup of a regular pot of coffee in months, the coffee grounds don't smell anything like coffee. Hardly a scent at all, with maybe a minor smell of plastic.

I recall my Landlord say to me that the water in my place was "very hard".

And is that awful bitter taste the plastic from the K cups, being leeched into my coffee?

Evolving . lol More like devolving, if I'm losing my taste for coffee.

 

[ensoluna]

if you want to avoid bitter and off tasting coffee, do as below. And it is not from your water, coffee maker. (Keurig? that is not a coffee maker. it will never give you a good cup of coffee).

1. visit local reputable coffee roaster.
2. pick recently roasted coffee (within 5 days). make it sure that it is light-medium roast.
3. if you like light, flavorful, refined acidity and chocolaty taste coffee, choose Ethiopian, Kenyan or Guatemalan. If you like heavy body, rich and earthy flavor, choose any of Indonesian coffee.
4. use proper coffee vs water ratio
5. if you have regular coffee brew maker, that is fine. but if you can, try out pour over, clever, french press..etc

 

[Coffcan]

Thanks for the advice. Definitely something to think about.

I think I've had it with the one cup coffee makers though. Initially, I wanted something simple to use, where I could use K cups and brew my own coffee.
I had the Keurig for some months before the taste went bad. After that, the only good tasting beverage I could get was from the kettle.

Hamilton Beach also makes a 12 cup percolator, where it's possible just to make one cup of coffee. The thing is made of stainless steel. No plastic.
I'm a single guy and just having the option to put in enough water for one cup, is perfect for me. I may go this route?

 

[Coffcan]

Update:

Today I go and purchase a 12 cup stainless steel percolator, from Hamilton Beach. However, this is a smaller plastic ring around the inside tip, just below the glass.
I brewed my first cup of coffee tonight and luckily it wasn't bitter. Yeah, the taste was still bland and the coffee grounds had no scent once brewed.

The coffee I used was a fine grind from a local chain up here in Ontario, Canada.

The coffee doesn't smell or taste much like coffee. Everything was fine up til' about a week ago, then the one cup coffee makers started to give me terrible, burnt flavors. And although I'd made a mistake of using cold water for the first cup with the percolator, should it still have given me a flat tasteless brew?

I'm not expecting perfect. Just a tasteful coffee flavored brew would suffice.

 

[Coffcan]

Could it have been the very low humidity in my home, affecting the taste and aroma?

I hadn't thought of it until today. I hadn't turned on my humidifier until now. Could this have affected the way my K cup and store bought fine grind
tasted and smelled?

 

[johnrunner]

I am not an expert in these things, but have you tried a coffee maker cleaner added to the water and run through the machine until it is all used, then run a container of water through the machine. Perhaps there are more knowledgeable readers who can advise you. I don't know what the actual difference between a cleaner and a descaler, but I think using either of these might help the taste of the coffee coming out. I use citric acid from a Middle Eastern spice store (powder mixed into a solution with water) to clean the handle on my espresso maker, and have read other people here suggesting that vinegar isn't the perfect solution for cleaning.

Granted, coffee quality is important, but if your machine hasn't had a good cleaning, then there is a smell that accumulates.




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[johnrunner]

PS. Tell me about the keurig...are you filling up a reusable k cup?

It seems your bottom line is you just want to get back to coffee that tastes good to you.

So the possibilities lie either in the coffee: i.e. some coffee sits around on shelves a long time and can stale;

or something with the machine...if the machine has only been cleaned with soapy water, then there is a good possibility it needs to be cleaned differently.

The water may be a possibility, but you can easily check it by buying a gallon of distilled water and trying it out.

Try some freshly roasted coffee and see if that changes the taste.

Start from the beginning and eliminate all possibilities.


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