KRUVE Sifter Review
One of the most important things to consider, when home brewing coffee, is your grinder. Cheap grinders mean inconsistent grind sizes, which means coffee that is not extracted perfectly. You see, when you have a cheap grinder you’re going to have tiny particles of coffee (called fines) along with large particles (called boulders). The fines extract quicker than the boulders so you have parts of your coffee over extracted and bitter and other parts under extracted and sour.
This is usually the reason why you can’t make coffee as well as that coffee shop you love – you don’t have the $3500 grinder that they have.
That is until the KRUVE sifter came along. It’s an affordable gadget that separates the fines and the boulders from the good stuff, allowing you to recreate a coffee shop grinder at home, without spending the price of a second-hand car.
How it works
The KRUVE sifter is split into three sections that are separated by two fine mesh filters. Big holes at the top, small holes underneath.
You clip the whole thing together, pour your coffee into the top and shake! The coffee falls through the first sieve, that catches the bigger particles, then hits the second, where only the tiny particles fall through. The end result is the undesirable coffee at the bottom (throw it, use it for gardening, baking etc), the desirable coffee in the middle, then the boulders in the top, which you can then put back through your grinder.
There are a big selection of sizes to play around with so you can find the exact particle size that works for you.
Testing
To test the KRUVE Sifter I chose 10 specialty coffees for cupping. I ground the beans using a very common grinder, the Baratza Encore, which is arguably the best entry-level grinder on the market. One cup was ground regularly and the other was sifted.
Results
The results varied wildly depending on the coffee. I charted the results here:
| Coffee | Sifted Grind | Regular Grind |
|---|---|---|
| Proud Mary Angel Blend | Bright, clean, sweet | Sweet, fuller body |
| Proud Mary Honduras | Bright, medium fruit flavours | Full body, light fruit flavours |
| Groundswell Zambian | Complex, bright, medium fruit flavours |
Bright, medium fruit flavours, full body, sweet |
| Groundswell Decaff | No noticeable difference between each |
No noticeable difference between each |
| April Coffee Roasters – Rwandan | Very sweet, intense flavours, fruity, overly sour notes |
Sweet, intense flavours, fruity, excessively sour no matter what I did to it |
| MECCA – Kenyan | Sweet, fruity, well balanced, incredible! |
Only slightly less fruity and well balanced. Still incredible |
| Koppi – Ethiopian | Fruity, complex and sweet | Big body but very little else shone through the brew. |
Overall I really enjoyed the coffee that the KRUVE sifter created. It was often brighter and more complex than the regular grind size, but it definitely lacked body in comparison to the non sifted version.
Other Uses
Speaking with the guys at KRUVE, they’re very excited about the fact that the sifter can be used to create a “grind language”. By this they mean that they want to get rid of the terms coarse, medium and fine grinds, and replace with microns. We take so much pride in measuring every other aspect of our brewing, why shouldn’t this be the same? The nerd in me loves this part!
Good Points
Brighter, fruitier coffee flavours
Uniform grind means easily repeatable pour times
Useful for calibrating grinders
Decent price compared to the professional grade sifters
Looks amazing
Bad Points
Filters take practice to secure into the device
Slightly time consuming compared to normal grinding
The cheaper the grinder the more wastage you’ll see in the fines chamber
Conclusion
If you have the time and coffee to spare, it’s a fantastic device to take your home coffee game to the next level. You’ll be able to take your cheap grinder and get coffee shop quality results from it, plus you’ll look fancy using it, as it’s a beautifully designed device. Or, if you’re like me, it’ll highlight to you that it’s probably time to open your wallet and upgrade your grinder.
KRUVE were generous enough to donate a KRUVE Sifter to give away to one of you lucky buggers! To enter use the widget below: