3TEMP HIPSTER SYSTEM – The profile brewer that sets the standard

We want you to taste every aspect that makes every brew a quality cup of coffee. We all deserve nothing but the best!

The 3TEMP profile brewer

Coffee is complex. And we want to simplify your control over it. Coffee is nuanced, and we want you to be able to access its fullness of it. Coffee is layered. And we want you to taste every aspect that makes a cup of coffee a quality cup of coffee. Let’s pour a quality cup of coffee and dive into the 3TEMP Brew Philosophy.

It is often said that coffee passes through many pairs of hands before it becomes your drink from bean to cup. Our ethos at 3TEMP is simply respecting this process and appreciating the coffee. Recognising that coffee should be treated like the complex product it is. And to equip you with the tools to unlock your brew’s many facets so you can share it with many.

An excellent cup of coffee is, at worst, serendipity; at best, alchemy. With The 3TEMP HIPSTER SYSTEM, we are here to help you tap into the gold.

For decades, the world has applauded the humble, ubiquitous pour-over, or drip, brewing style, known for highlighting acidity, sweetness and body in varying degrees in a coffee. We couple this with the manual brewing skill of the barista. A staple in every speciality cafe. This includes their attention to detail at each step of the brewing process. Like their consistency and intuition regarding the coffee they are working with. We value this skill so much that we bring it to the highest competition standards. And it is often a required competency in every speciality coffee shop.

But how do we replicate this at scale in cafes without overtaxing the barista? How do we serve delicious drip coffee in high volumes without compromising consistency and quality in the cup at any stage?

Enter the 3Temp Hipster Brewer.

The 3TEMP profile brewer breakdown

Each of the six Hipster Brewer models – the 1-Group Hipster, the 1-Group UC (Under-Counter), the 2-Group UC (Under-Counter), The Kobra, the Puls and the Wall – contain the same components in different formats, depending on your cafe layout and desired installation.

These Brewers, and their core components, can be classified into three main categories: the Cold Water Parts, the Warm Water Parts, and the Hipster Control System.

Cold Water Parts

Freshwater is drawn from your cafe’s water treatment system for each brew cycle. The 3TEMP Hipster Brewers do not contain a water storage tank like most other brewers on the market. In such a setting, when water sits in a storage tank, heated periodically to ensure that it is up to temperature for brewing, this can cause it to go stale, as oxygen is gradually removed from the water over time through repeated cycles of heating/cooling. In the patented 3TEMP system, you’ll only ever draw the optimal amount of water you need for the batch you have programmed.

The cold water first passes through the water airbrake. This contains temperature and level sensors detecting incoming water temperature to protect and prolong the usage of the pump. (Our patent: Knowing the incoming water temperature in the airbrake and power of the block heaters, we control the water flow through the heat exchangers, so we end up with precisely the correct brewing temperature).

From there, the water passes through the flowmeter and into the pump of the Brewer.

Warm Water Parts

As water flows in from the flowmeter and through the pump, it passes through the first of two run-through heaters, also known as thermal block elements. Both heaters contain stainless steel spiral coils, which facilitate your water being heated effectively and efficiently. These heaters are off when you are not brewing coffee, a nod to the sustainability at the core of 3TEMP’s values.

The water temperature is measured at regular intervals throughout our patented brewing process. This means you are not expending much energy to heat a single mass of water. But heating water incrementally as it runs through the system is far more energy efficient.

This intuitive energy regulation is embedded in how each recipe is profiled. Particularly with regard to the amount of coffee you are brewing per batch. As well as the pulses programmed into your recipe. The Hipster Brewers can accommodate recipes with yields of between 200 millilitres to 3.8 litres of coffee!

Only one heater is turned on for smaller batches, with yields between 200ml to 1.1L. Both thermal block elements are turned on for larger batches, with yields between 1.1L – 1.6/2.7L. One operates at 100% and the other at varying levels depending on the recipe. And, of course, when you are brewing “Cold Drip Brew” with the Hipster Brewers, the heating elements don’t come on at all.

In each block element, and leading from the second block element to the Brew Hat, lies 2.4 metres of stainless steel tubing to guard the system against limescale and another residual build-up, thus ensuring the longevity of your Hipster Brewer. Because there is a continuous flow of fresh water, there is little chance for the minerals and the limescale to get stuck inside the polished tubing walls. Now heated to the right temperature, your freshwater gets to the Brew Hat, where the real magic happens.

The unique Brew Hat, our signum

Gone are the days of unthinkingly whacking a coarse-ground batch brew on to be brewed at a single temperature for a predetermined number of pulses and then sat on an induction heating plate. With 3TEMP’s Hipster Brewers, we are moving into the age of profile brewing.

For great-tasting coffee, the correct type of water must meet the proper coffee (coarse and roasting level) under the right circumstances. The final cup of coffee is incredibly sensitive to any changes during the brewing process – from tweaking the temperature of the water by a single degree to the volume of water in a single pulse to how finely (or coarsely) the coffee is ground, to how the water is distributed… Add to that the fact that the Hipster System allows you complete control and customizability in varying these factors in the different phases of the brewing process: namely, during your bloom, your brew/ extraction phase, and your draw-down/ end phase.

All of these variables combine in our Hipster Brew Hat, which comprises a flush tank reservoir above the hopper, supplied with water to the temperature that you have specified. The Hat has a wide showerhead for even and gentle distribution while avoiding channelling. Combined with the flat-bottomed geometry and heavy angled walls of the brew basket, which highlights complex acidity and sweetness through a hybrid drip/immersion brewing method, the Hipster Profile Brewers ensure that your coffee grounds are fully saturated for even and consistent extraction.

Bloom – The Fruity Core

In the bloom, several things happen in your Hipster Brew Hat in quick succession. The Hat has a default, swift, comprehensive flush at high temperatures. This initial contact stabilises the temperature inside the brewing cavity to account for your basket’s relatively colder surface, filter paper, and coffee. The pre-infusion flush brings the brewing cavity up to temperature and prepares the coffee for the main brewing phase.

Upon contact with the hot water, soluble compounds within the ground coffee dissolve into the water that forms your coffee yield; the grounds simultaneously expand in size, releasing carbon dioxide for about 20-30 seconds, in a process known as degassing.

Brew – The Sugar Valley

Once we have finished the bloom and established our “core fruity flavours”, we are setting the stage to extract sweetness from our coffee. The Hipster Brewers achieve this in several ways. For example, we can prolong contact time and immersion of the grounds by programming more flushes and/or lowering the temperature of your brewing water to reduce the rate of extraction, keeping the bitter compounds at bay for a little longer to allow more sweetness to form in the cup.

The Hipster Brewer lowers the temperature of the water by speeding up the flow of fresh water through the heat exchange system to decrease the temperature of the water in the Brew Hat, keeping the brewing phase in the “sugar valley”.

With the 3TEMP System and the 3TEMP Brew Philosophy, you are at complete liberty to adjust and manipulate your brewing variables: Your ratios, water temperatures, brew phases, overall contact time, and pulses – to create your desired profile, unlocking new dimensions of flavour in your coffees.

Draw-Down – The Fade Out

The draw-down is the final phase in the brewing process and often corresponds to the last 30-40% of the brew. As the final compounds to extract in the extraction timeline are those that create bitterness, it pays to keep a close eye on the draw-down, as lack of attention to this part of the process may result in undesirable bitterness and a watery, faded mouthfeel. Timing, temperature and freshwater must be in focus.

It’s worth reminding that bitterness isn’t an inherently negative aspect of coffee! Instead, just the right touch of bitterness can round off the flavours of your coffee, enhancing its complexity while highlighting your acidity and sweetness in perfect complement.

Variables To Account For

When you introduce coffee to water, a range of compounds responsible for different flavours in coffee are extracted in a specific set order – namely, your organic acids and enzymes, your sugars, and finally, your bitter compounds.

Organic acids and enzymes are usually the sources of your fruity and zingy top notes in coffee, as they are the most volatile of coffee compounds. You then go on to extract sugars, creating sweetness in the cup and compounds that cause a pleasant bitterness in the coffee. While none of these flavours is inherently harmful, it takes skill to achieve them in balance to create a complex, quality cup.

Often, under-extracted coffee may taste sour, salty or flat because the sugars have not yet been extracted due to reduced contact of coffee with water; conversely, over-extracted coffee can be bitter because contact time is prolonged, such that your complex acids and sugars are lost in the overwhelming bitterness of your final compounds.

Light-roasted coffee is less porous than dark-roasted coffee, which often results in a longer contact time to achieve optimal extraction and balance in flavour in the former. Light-roasted coffee often favours drip brewing with a slow, gentle pouring technique.

Ok, you know the 3TEMP Brew Philosophy, What Happens Now?

It would be remiss of us not to pay attention to the final steps in the brewing process – which include storing and serving your delicious cup of coffee.

At 3TEMP, we stand by our ethos of eco-sustainability. This boils down to detail as simple as storing the brewed coffee in a stainless steel thermos. Our patented brewing system does not have a heating plate like many other batch brewing machines.

Preserving the quality of your coffee for as long as possible

By storing your coffee in a vacuum-sealed thermos, you’re preserving the quality of your coffee for as long as possible before you refresh the brew. There is limited oxidation, or aeration, of the coffee. And thus, a slight increase in tannins in brewed coffee largely correlates with a decrease in the perceived quality of the coffee over time. Additionally, you’re not further heating the brewed coffee and avoiding scalding it or causing it to go flat after a while.

Through every single step, we’re maximising the potential of the coffee you brew. When you see our “Quality in Cup” seal on any of our machines, you know you’ll get an excellent cup of coffee.

The 3TEMP Brew Philosophy and our Hipster Control System

With all of the customizability that our patented brewing system affords, it’s natural that you might have some questions now and again. This is where our Brewers’ IoT functionality comes into handy. Your Brewer is part of a vast network of Brewers worldwide. Overseen by our core team of engineers at our headquarters in Arvika, Sweden.

Each Brewer comes with a router and internal circuitry. And a control system, allowing you to program your Brewer. The team in Arvika proactively monitor the status of all Brewers on our network. This will enable them to narrow down and troubleshoot most issues without hassle. Should you need any assistance? A QR code printed on every Brewer gives you easy access to support.

Circular economy

This seamless end-to-end coverage is part of our Brewer-As-A-Service (BaaS) program. A comprehensive, interconnected way of working directly with other users in the Hipster Brewer community and us.