Customer Reviews

AeroPress Micro-Filters, Package of 350

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The disclaimer: I do not work for Aerobie. I have no commercial connection with Aerobie. I do confess, however, to owning two (2) Aerobie Aeropresses.

Okay, now for the part you've been waiting for, the review:

I'll make this really simple: throw away all your other coffee makers and use the Aeropress. Well, you can keep your $350 espresso maker and your electric drip coffee maker, your French press, and your ibrik. You won't USE them anymore, but you can sure keep 'em if you want to.

How serious am I about a good cup of coffee? I roast my own beans. In 1968 when America was brewing coffee in percolators, I saw Michael Caine grind coffee beans in the opening scene of "The Ipcress File" and went right out and searched for coffee beans and a grinder. People thought I was very strange because, after all, "I don't see the difference between vacuum packed and coffee beans." But I could tell the difference. I used a plastic cone and paper filters back then, a system which has basic flaws overcome by the Aeropress. Whatever kind of coffee you've been drinking, it'll be better if you make it with the Aeropress.
A word about the filters. I can taste the paper in coffee made in those drip makers of various kinds. I cannot taste the paper in coffee made in the Aeropress.

If you grind your own coffee, you don't have to get an expensive grinder because the Aeropress is not very particular about the fineness or coarseness of the grind. Fine is better. Coarse will work. You could probably pound the beans with a meat tenderizer and come up with a grind that would work okay in the Aeropress. Whatever grind you use, none of the grit will wind up on your teeth because the economical paper filters keep them out of your cup. There are people who do like the tactile sensation of coffee grounds on their teeth such as coffee brewed in a French press or made in an ibrik. I'm not all that fond of it myself.

The coffee that comes out of the south end of the Aeropress is, certainly from a tactile and visual point of view, free from grounds. So? Well, for one thing, there are no grounds still brewing in the coffee you've got waiting for you in your stylish thermal carafe or in the cup you're savoring right at the moment, and that means that the coffee doesn't get bitter. Think about that for a moment. You get distracted, the coffee in your cup cools off. You nuke it for a few seconds. It's now hot enough to drink, but it just doesn't taste right. Or after a few hours in the carafe, the coffee, while it may still be hot enough, has become bitter. This just does not happen with coffee brewed in an Aeropress. Nuke that neglected cold cup of coffee sitting in front of you, and it's all but indistinguishable from a freshly brewed cup. Pour a hot cup from the carafe a couple of hours after you brewed it, and it's just like a freshly brewed cup. And when you drain the last drop of coffee from your cup, there are no grounds forming a reverse alluvial fan left behind. This can be a disadvantage to people who tell fortunes by reading coffee grounds. Anybody do that? Even more remarkable is that coffee stored for a day or more in the refrigerator can be reheated without an objectionable loss in quality. It's perhaps enough to notice, but if that coffee was made in an Aeropress, don't bet a large amount of money on a taste test, unless you're a professional taster, that you could tell reheated refrigerated coffee a few days old from a brand-new cup.

The measure that comes with the Aeropress holds three tablespoons which the Aeropress website recommends for a five-ounce cup of coffee. Say what?! Okay, the coffee does not, as in a French press, brew for four minutes; it brews for less than a minute, counting stirring and plunging time. That short time makes for a cup of coffee that's low in caffeine but with a robust coffee flavor. You can even make coffee with half the amount of water into an espresso cup, and, trust me on this, it is delicious. All the intensity of espresso's fullness of flavor, but without the bitterness. Now, I have a very good espresso machine, and one day, after having used the Aeropress for several months, I wanted to experience another cup of espresso.

I'm tempted to heave a huge sigh right along in here. Espresso is finicky. My machine (did I mention it's a good one?) is a semiautomatic. That means that it makes coffee with the same amount of pressure and at the correct temperature every time, but I have to put in the right amount of grounds and those grounds better be ground exactly right. Too fine, and the pump can't force the water through in 23 seconds, and the coffee will be extremely strong and without crema, that thick foam that's the hallmark of a correctly brewed espresso. Too coarse, and the pump forces the water through too fast, and you get a weak cup of coffee. And you don't get crema that time either. So I had to experiment with the grind and the amount to the tune of three tossed shots of espresso before I got one right. Did I mention espresso is finicky? It was quite good, but I discovered that not only is espresso finicky, so am I. I had grown to prefer the simplicity of the forgiving Aeropress. Once you get past getting water to the right temperature, I can't think of a way you can make a bad cup of coffee with the Aeropress.
And, by the way, I discovered that the correct amount of coffee grounds to use for a cup of espresso in my machine turned out to be the same as one Aeropress coffee measuring scoop.

Making a pot of coffee? Since brewing coffee in the Aeropress takes less than a minute, once you've got your water at the right temperature, you can brew up a whole lot of coffee really fast. A note on making coffee with really fresh coffee grounds such as those from beans you've just roasted: It foams up like a freshly poured beer. So you'll not be able to fill the receptacle up to the "4" mark. The solution? Do I have to think of everything?! Fill it to the "3" mark. Do this twice and you've made a quart of coffee in perhaps three minutes.

One really endearing feature of the Aeropress is that it's a snap to clean. You remove the little black filter basket at the bottom of the press, push the grounds into the kitchen wastebasket, rinse off the rubber plunger (look at the photos to see what I mean by "plunger"), rinse the basket. You're done. Sometimes I swipe the remaining grounds off the plunger with the stirring paddle before I rinse it. The whole operation takes maybe 15 seconds. I have another Aeropress in my office where I work (as a highly paid professional, of course), and my little windowless cubicle -- I mean my spacious corner office with panoramic view has no running water. I found that I'm able to clean it almost as well using a damp paper towel. I save the rinse for later.

Now, the word "plastic" has the connotation of "cheap" or "flimsy" for some people. Bear in mind that telephones and bowling balls are plastic, and nobody thinks of those two items as flimsy. The Aeropress is made of what appears to me to be very high quality plastic. There are no rough edges. It's thick and strong. And it's made in the United States, something that's apparently a value for the company. So for all of you who want to buy American, here's your chance: invented in America by an American and made in America.

The Aeropress requires that the user have the ability and the patience to bring water to the right temperature, 175 degrees Fahrenheit. If you don't have a thermometer, you'll have to buy one. I have the kind you can stick into a slab of meat or dunk into an Aeropress. It works just fine, and it's not very expensive. Under five dollars as I recall at my local hardware store.

How bothersome is it to bring water to the correct temperature? It's not. I experimented for a few minutes and discovered that in my microwave, water poured to the "3" level on the plunger thingy was brought to the right temperature in one minute on high. How hard is that? Or if you're not up to measuring the water, just stick your thermometer into the whistle on your teakettle and soon after you hear the water making that noise like it's about to boil (somewhere around 165 to 170 degrees Fahrenheit), it'll be at 180 degrees. I like this temperature because when you pour it into the Aeropress plunger, it cools off to just the right temperature of 175. Your mileage may vary.
There might be easier ways to make coffee, but I know of none better.

A note about Amazon. Buy it here. Free shipping? Arrives right at your doorstep? Under $[...]? Best coffee you ever made in your life? What are you waiting for?

This makes a great cup of coffee. One of my favorite discoveries was when I read the instructions and they mentioned rinsing off these filters and reusing them. I had never thought of that, but considering how coffee filters DON'T decompose well in the compost, I love this idea and the amount that comes with the Aeropress will last a long time this way without ordering the extra pack. Just rinse and re-use.

I love my Aeropress. I love the fact that one package of filters lasts a year. And I was astonished at how fast my refill pack of filters arrived after I ordered them. All in all, I think I'm going to be an Aeropress fan for life.

I decided to see how many times I could use one filter. I rinsed it off right after use, always used the stir paddle provided with the coffee maker, and I used it at least once a day for about the last year and a half. I used the last filter for 2 1/2 months before I accidentally scraped a hole it it.

I went through many drip coffee makers,then several French Press styles (all which eventually leaked coffee grounds into my coffee) and decided to try the aero system . I love it. I grind my two scoops of coffee beans each morning then add boiling water stir and press. Its easy to clean and use and it makes a rich fresh flavorful cup one at time. I'm hooked.Aeropress Espresso Maker

These filters are a part of a system for making coffee/espresso that I love. But when I bought the contraption that makes the coffee, I didn't realize it came with so many filters.

Save your money and just use those that come with the thing. They will probably last me a year or more--and I drink a lot of coffee--plus, they say you can rinse the filters and use them more than once if you want to be more green and conservative in your filter use.

It's good to have extras.... How else can I review coffee filters?


The color, angelic white.
The thickness, a few million atoms.
The shape, surprisingly circular.
The price, recession-friendly.

The outcome: not bad at all.

I was prompted by Amazon to "review recent purchases" so here goes. This is just (JUST??!!!) the filter component to the Aeropress, which kicks major butt as a coffee maker. I can't recommend it enough... and if you use the Aeropress, you'll NEED these filters that allow it to work in the first place.

DUH!

So, yes, I LOVE THESE FILTERS which allow me to make coffee, which I cannot seem to live without. I grind espresso beans in a Solis Maestro, run that through the AP and wham-bam-thank-ya-ma'am... a wondrous liquid is born of mere water and plant matter.

"How long can this dude go on blathering over these simple paper filters?" one might ask.

No longer than THIS.

Might be silly to write a review, but this accessory to this new espresso maker is very good. Just a simple pile of micro filters and highly reccomend to everyone they buy 1 or 2 of these packages once they get the hang of their new machine and like it.


First, perhaps I'm paranoid but when there's anything I actually LIKE it seems it's cursed to disappear or go out of business. Movie series, comic book, TV show, software... So I'm stocking up on filters to keep making it a long time. Might even get a second press... No, I'm not kidding.


Second, there are exceptions, like "Star Wars" (the fictional franchise, not the RL horror waste of money) and I'm hoping this is one of them. That it'll catch on and the makers of the automated ones will panic and both drop their prices and make better systems.


So for the reasons I gave, it's good to buy more filters and perhaps a back-up device. This is a very good product that delivers what it promises; excellent coffee (espressos, lattes, etc.) for a microscopic price ($30) compared to the multi-thousand dollar machines. This company deserves the support of anyone and everyone who likes good quality coffee in this horrible recession. Give them that extra sale, spread the word to your friends, get those extra units moving, they deserve the business. If this works out, and they get bigger and expand, well you can give your extra back up device (sturdy, the first one should last years or more) as a gift, and if they disappear you'll have good coffee for years and probably use your "desktop fabricator" to make another!


Also, I've tried some re-using of the filters, just to give feedback on that issue. I've done it twice in a row, both within an hour and leaving it overnight to dry. It does work with no noticeable depreciation in quality. One thing I'd recommend is to switch directions per pressing, obviously rinsing it first to dislodge stuff. A to B, B to A, and so forth. This reduces trapped micro particles that'll eventually clog the filter. Any fractional particles that get through into your drink are not noticeable and far smaller than those that swim through a regular coffee filter.


However, there is nothing to be 'guilty' about using a filter as one-use. As I said, they deserve the extra sales -and- as their manual points out there is less material used in one thousand filters than is used in a single newspaper.

These are the correct replacement filters for the AeroPress coffee maker, which I use at least once a day. They work exactly as advertised.

The manufacturer claims I can wash and reuse the filters, but I don't. They go away with the coffee grounds.

Thanks to the AeroPress people for not overcharging for the filters (and even at $0.01 each, I'm sure they make a little profit). They profit, they sell more coffee makers, I get a good product at a fair price... exactly how capitalism is supposed to work. :)