History of the Moka Coffee Pot
June 16, 2022 9:05 AM   Subscribe

 
Why would you need a splash of cream to mellow out your brew if it's perfect? I have questions.
posted by seanmpuckett at 9:35 AM on June 16, 2022 [9 favorites]




I'm not personally a fan, but if you are going to get a Moka pot you should get a Brikka Moka pot. This makes a crema and gives more of an espresso feel to it.

Moka pots are really an antique technology that makes the best of an older type of coffee. A Moka is designed to make the most of very robust types of coffee, from different estates, which have been heavily roasted. This is because that is the type of coffee that would have been available when Moka pots were first introduced owing to slow shipping and harvesting. In today's world you can have in-season coffee delivered to your door, lightly roasted so that it retains it's original flavour. Putting that in a Moka pot is... possible. But it's like watching the Godfather movies on your phone: nobody is really happy with the outcome.
posted by The River Ivel at 9:42 AM on June 16, 2022 [15 favorites]


#TIL that you aren't supposed to pack the grounds in a Moka pot - maybe that's why I never loved the results when I tried it. I'll have to buy some dark roast and give it another shot (like I ever need an excuse to drink more coffee).
posted by Greg_Ace at 9:54 AM on June 16, 2022 [3 favorites]


And I was probably using too high a heat, which is also a no-no....
posted by Greg_Ace at 9:56 AM on June 16, 2022 [2 favorites]


"Don’t even talk to me if you use a plastic-dependent Nescafé or a similar cartridge coffeemaker."

I was gifted a Nespresso machine a long time ago that I really like, so I guess I can't tell him that the Nespresso pods are made of recyclable aluminum. For all the details and research he has later on, this first section seems a bit dismissive of other approaches to hot brown. However, I'm sure most of the aluminum pods don't make it back for recycling so I can appreciate the Moka and other devices that don't have a lot of consumables. Also, the Chemex has been around nearly as long, so I'm not sure why he would call that "third wave" (I thought that term was referring to the coffee itself)?
posted by This_Will_Be_Good at 9:57 AM on June 16, 2022 [1 favorite]


After a long period of not being able to crack the Moka code, I've finally got a routine/recipe that works well for me. I've recently started doing Cuban coffee with espuma, which gives me enough caffeine and sugar to really crank through the day. Even with more coffee brewers on hand than I care to admit, I still find myself reaching for moka a lot of the time. Maybe something about the ritual of it?
posted by specialagentwebb at 9:58 AM on June 16, 2022


Maybe something about the ritual of it?

For me, this is a big part of the experience, and the appreciation of the result.
posted by xedrik at 10:01 AM on June 16, 2022 [7 favorites]


After like TEN YEARS of owning a Moka pot, and being constantly discouraged by my results, just this March I learned how to use it.*

And then just two weeks ago I realized it's (basically) an espresso pot and not a coffee pot, so I treated the brew like espresso instead of coffee (i.e., I foamed some milk in the cup), it's it's a damn revelation.

(First I took a home brewing class from my fave local roaster, New Harvest, and then I watched a James Hoffman video that the instructor mentioned.)
posted by wenestvedt at 10:08 AM on June 16, 2022 [5 favorites]


After a long period of not being able to crack the Moka code, I've finally got a routine/recipe that works well for me. I've recently started doing Cuban coffee with espuma

This is basically the only thing we use the Moka pot for these days, but it's always a treat. I like it tooth-chatteringly strong and sweet and usually wind up drinking more than half the ("6-cup") pot.
posted by uncleozzy at 10:16 AM on June 16, 2022


Mrs. Gogi drinks almost exclusively moka pot coffee (made by myself with an electric, plug-in pot) and I almost exclusively drink chemex pour over gooseneck kettle coffee, and yet we somehow have not yet come to blows over it.

After going down a James Hoffman rabbit-hole a few months back, I now add a little aeropress-style paper filter to the moka pot before brewing, and Mrs. Gogi has said it much improves the flavor.
posted by heyitsgogi at 10:42 AM on June 16, 2022 [1 favorite]


The helpful part of the scale includes when to drink your coffee: within two minutes of brewing to capture the most flavors. And how to stir it (even without milk or sugar): vertically from bottom to top to maximize flavor. The annoying side of the scale includes rules like not clinking your spoon against the cup when mixing, never licking your spoon, and never ever ordering a cappuccino after breakfast because “milk after breakfast is too heavy.”

Ha ha oh those wacky Italians--

“The harder the water, the likelier it is for lime scales to develop and cause malfunctioning,” continues Faina. “Bicarbonate and chlorine can also make the coffee bitter. The optimal water quality has calcium 50-60 mg per liter, magnesium 10-15 mg per liter, bicarbonate 200 mg per liter, and not more than chlorine .10 mg per liter.”

JESUS CHRIST DOES THE THING HAVE A TRICORDER BUILT INTO IT
posted by Halloween Jack at 10:47 AM on June 16, 2022 [13 favorites]


The biggest drawback of a Moka pot is that they can be a chore to get really clean, there are a couple of awkward spots, underneath the rubber seal and below the coffee bowl. Those can trap just enough old stale coffee oil to ruin your next brew.
posted by Lanark at 10:48 AM on June 16, 2022


And I was probably using too high a heat, which is also a no-no....

Aside from the equal amount written telling you to use hot water and high heat, otherwise the brew will take to long... making it bitter. I never know what to do. So i do it hot so i get coffee quicker.
posted by ominous_paws at 10:53 AM on June 16, 2022


On the cleaning tip, it really is one of those things that makes me despair for the human race. Consider the following a recurring scene.

Me: Ummm, you don't want to clean that with soap.

Them: Why not?

Me: Because just look at it. How are you going to rinse the soap from inside the chambers?

Them: Well, I've got to clean it.

Me: You've gotta rinse it, but what else are you using it for but coffee?

Them: I've got to clean it. Properly.

Me: So just boil some water through it every now and then.

Them: I never liked these things anyway. The coffee's too strong. I prefer a bodum.

Me: If you want it a little weaker, you can always add a little hot water.

Them: It's not the same if you add the water separately. All the water has to go through the coffee. I read that somewhere.

... and so on.
posted by philip-random at 10:57 AM on June 16, 2022 [2 favorites]


I'm a bit sceptical of what I read about how small differences in technique affect the taste of coffee. I would be interested to see these methods subject to double blind testing, a bit like brulosophy.com does for beer.
posted by night_train at 10:59 AM on June 16, 2022


Look, I'm just saying that if you want to sell me on your Amazing Coffee Pot, maybe you shouldn't open with "was popular with fascists" and "really took off once the Italians conquered Ethiopia", because to be honest I'm sort of working to reduce the number of war crimes involved in my morning rituals right now
posted by phooky at 11:02 AM on June 16, 2022 [38 favorites]


And I was probably using too high a heat, which is also a no-no....

From this video (featuring Hoffmann again) there seems to be an important trick where you heat the water elsewhere and then quickly get the Moka pot to boiling without heating the grounds too much. Now I kind of want to try this.
posted by JoeZydeco at 11:05 AM on June 16, 2022 [4 favorites]


there seems to be an important trick where you heat the water elsewhere and then quickly get the Moka pot to boiling without heating the grounds too much

Oh yeah, I always boil the water in the electric kettle, then pour it into the Moka pot to brew.
posted by uncleozzy at 11:07 AM on June 16, 2022 [5 favorites]


I heat half a cm of water to boiling in the bottom of the pot at the same time as I'm heating the rest of the water in the electric kettle

Some of us just live on the edge
posted by ominous_paws at 11:08 AM on June 16, 2022 [1 favorite]


What's going on inside? Check out this neutron scan of the process.
posted by whuppy at 11:12 AM on June 16, 2022 [11 favorites]


For some people, dicking around with process and ritual is as much of the enjoyment of thing as the thing itself. I think that's cool.
[Slightly dilutes some cold brew concentrate in a mug, microwaves it for a minute.]
posted by seanmpuckett at 11:13 AM on June 16, 2022 [12 favorites]


This_Will_Be_Good: "I was gifted a Nespresso machine a long time ago that I really like, so I guess I can't tell him that the Nespresso pods are made of recyclable aluminum. "

Ha. The Bialetti website sells Nespresso pods branded as Bialetti, complete with the little man and his mustache. I do love me some Nespresso. Almuninum capsule means I don't feel like an ecoterrorist every time I want a cup. (If Keurig machines had been designed to use a foil or aluminum capsule, we'd all be better off.)
posted by caution live frogs at 11:22 AM on June 16, 2022 [2 favorites]


You will never see an Italian move faster than when dashing across the kitchen to intercept the American about to defile their moka with a foamy soap-laden sponge, trust.

And never drink the first few batches out of a spanking-new moka unless you have a penchant for metallic tasting brew.
posted by romakimmy at 11:23 AM on June 16, 2022 [3 favorites]


I remember seeing these on my family vacation to Europe, like 10 years ago…

Had no idea what I was looking at, and just went around the corner to a coffee shop.

Been on team Chemex for a while, but, have also pretty much laid off the coffee for a while, as it is making me tremor more than I like. That being said, this thread made me want a coffee, which I am enjoying right now.
posted by Windopaene at 11:57 AM on June 16, 2022 [1 favorite]


Moka pot with Bustelo cached in the freezer is the "we're out of coffee" coffee in our household. Although more recently dropping some quarters at the bodega has worked just fine.

Pour over with paper filter for day to day though.

I like them, they're fun. A little accessible steampunk to start the day.
posted by jellywerker at 11:58 AM on June 16, 2022 [2 favorites]


The biggest drawback of a Moka pot

I'd say the biggest drawback is the propensity to explode if not properly maintained, which i never have to worry about with my aeropress!
posted by Jon Mitchell at 12:03 PM on June 16, 2022 [1 favorite]


and never ever ordering a cappuccino after breakfast because “milk after breakfast is too heavy.”

Ha ha oh those wacky Italians--


Italian husban having a meltdown over cappuccino
posted by ActingTheGoat at 12:04 PM on June 16, 2022 [5 favorites]


Italian husban having a meltdown over cappuccino

brb. Gotta go get an afternoon cappuccino.
posted by hwyengr at 12:09 PM on June 16, 2022 [1 favorite]


James Hoffmann's already been raised and I know better than to tell Italians how to make coffee.
posted by k3ninho at 12:10 PM on June 16, 2022


Moka pot with Bustelo cached in the freezer is the "we're out of coffee" coffee in our household

Bustelo + Aeropress has been my go-to coffee for ages, but I'd like to try out the Moka without dealing with a different grind. You're saying Bustelo is okay here?
posted by JoeZydeco at 12:10 PM on June 16, 2022 [1 favorite]


You will never see an Italian move faster than when dashing across the kitchen to intercept the American about to defile their moka with a foamy soap-laden sponge, trust.

The finish on the classic Bialetti mokas is not machine washable. I made that mistake once and instead of shiny and smooth it came out dull gray aluminum. There are stainless steel mokas out there but they’re not as popular.
posted by chrchr at 12:11 PM on June 16, 2022


I'd like to try out the Moka without dealing with a different grind. You're saying Bustelo is okay here?

It's more than okay: Bustelo is pretty much the default for café cubano.
posted by uncleozzy at 12:16 PM on June 16, 2022 [1 favorite]


Ikea does a decent steel moka pot.

I do wonder why the cezve / ibrik hasn't taken off in the West. Possibly because it takes too much watching? (Says she, fresh off scrubbing the stove from the coffee boiling over once again...) It does make the smoothest brew I've ever had.
posted by I claim sanctuary at 12:23 PM on June 16, 2022 [2 favorites]




There are stainless steel mokas out there but they’re not as popular.

I am so, so glad to hear this. It explains why the little aluminum moka pot I bought for like $15 at Target felt so cheap next to the larger one my friends have. Theirs is a steel one.

(I mostly use a Bodum knockoff chemex I also got for like $15 at Target, because it’s way less work to clean than the french press I also got for like $15 at Target. “Target: Get cheap coffee hardware here!”)
posted by Mister Moofoo at 12:31 PM on June 16, 2022 [3 favorites]


Hoffman is my favorite type of pretentious that when I try to emulate it comes off as pompous and macaroni.

I have tried mokas unhappily repeatedly, and it seems that I have made every mistake in their use and care.

And since my loan for an Olympia Cremina fell through maybe I'll try again.
posted by NoThisIsPatrick at 12:39 PM on June 16, 2022 [2 favorites]


I mean the steel moka pots are going to have different heating properties than the aluminum ones, and the Bialetti aluminum ones are absolutely the canonical version.

I used the the moka pot daily for years and years mostly because it’s a cool device, but recently I got some concerning labs and I know you can get a lower LDL score by drinking paper filtered coffee instead of unfiltered. After studying some Hoffman vids, I bought a Hario Switch V60 immersion dripper. Honestly? The Switch coffee is better and easier to make. Still, this thread makes me want to get a tub of Bustelo and buzz up some jittery cafés cubanos.
posted by chrchr at 12:44 PM on June 16, 2022 [1 favorite]


My daughter gave me a Bialetti Moka pot a few years ago for Christmas, and I have never used it. This thread isn't making me want to try it anytime soon. But it does look nice on the little shelf in the kitchen.
posted by briank at 1:09 PM on June 16, 2022 [1 favorite]


MetaFilter: it comes off as pompous and macaroni.
posted by wenestvedt at 1:23 PM on June 16, 2022


You will never see an Italian move faster than when dashing across the kitchen to intercept the American about to defile their moka with a foamy soap-laden sponge, trust.

How is it supposed to be washed, then? I'm not a germophobe by any means, but I absolutely hate the lingering stale coffee taste so I'm going to get that out one way or another.
posted by backseatpilot at 1:39 PM on June 16, 2022


Rinse with hot water and wipe with a clean towel. Sometimes you need to scrape old grounds out of the threads that mate top to bottom. Unlike a drip coffee maker, there aren’t any plasticky parts that collect smells.
posted by chrchr at 2:01 PM on June 16, 2022


Personally, I just washed the damn thing every once in a while. Otherwise, just drink the drink, by which time it's cool enough to disassemble and rinse thoroughly with hot water. New ones I'd always run a couple of times with just water to get rid of any manufacturing residue. Same thing if I left it a few hours before discarding the grounds and the leftover water. If I forgot about it until the next day, though, the soap came out.

Some people are precious about washing them with soap, but it's really not an issue if that's your preference, it just takes a bit of effort to get it fully rinsed. And there again, running it with just water will solve the problem if you're really worried about leftover soap.

Proper heating technique is important to avoid a burnt flavor, though. If you blast it to the point where the water sputters forcefully like in that video upthread it's not as good as using a somewhat lower heat such that it builds pressure and just kinda flows out in a stream.
posted by wierdo at 2:04 PM on June 16, 2022


My mom took a hobbyist coffee class in Seoul, maybe a few years after the Coffee Prince k-drama accelerated the transition away from weak coffee in old school cafes & challenged Starbucks dominance (though plenty of Koreans still quaff vending machine coffee and Maxim instant coffee). The only thing she continues to use is the moka pot. Pandemic travel restrictions interrupted my visits to see my parents, so I'm not sure what coffee nerdiness is currently ascendant in Seoul now.
posted by spamandkimchi at 2:08 PM on June 16, 2022 [3 favorites]


JESUS CHRIST DOES THE THING HAVE A TRICORDER BUILT INTO IT

Doesn't matter. This is Italian cuisine: even if you titrate it with a tricorder, someone's mum is still going to tell you you're doing it wrong.

This is, of course, the magic of Italian food culture (or rather Italy's highly diverse regional food cultures): absolute certainty and specificity in theory and absolutely no-one agreeing about them in practice result in a cuisine that refines and reinvents its central dishes and elements without losing sight of the principles that define local food. But it's still quite funny sometimes.
posted by howfar at 2:15 PM on June 16, 2022 [9 favorites]


Love my brikka- preheat the water, rinse thoroughly before next pot. We do have a Bodum foamer and that combo makes an absolutely acceptable cappuchino without too much fuss. We used an aeropress for a few years but I like the coffee the brikka makes better and it's less fussy to my mind.
posted by leslies at 2:17 PM on June 16, 2022


I preheat the water and rinse the top part (because it's too hot to disassemble) which works for me - maybe I should try filling it to the top and let it pull the water back through it when it cools ....
posted by mbo at 2:32 PM on June 16, 2022


My wife and I relied on our collection of Bialetti's at home for years. We didn't do any fancy preparation (other than good coffee e.g. Lavazza Qualita Rossa) and always found it delicious.

I did always feel it was a bit hard on my digestion though, and my wife wanted something with maximum convenience, so we eventually ponied up for one of these. Can't say it's the best coffee, but it's damn good, especially considering all you have to do is push a button.
posted by Alex404 at 2:40 PM on June 16, 2022 [1 favorite]


The nespresso shop in the fancy smanchi part of town gave out free samples and it was just fine. And a press works ok too, but any old tin can will let ya boil water long enough and just a few drops of cold water drops most grounds to the bottom, I don't like my coffee boiling anyway.
posted by sammyo at 2:45 PM on June 16, 2022 [1 favorite]


There are stainless steel mokas out there but they’re not as popular.

Our aluminum Bialetti met an unfortunate demise at the start of the pandemic while I was dashing between my kids doing their first distance learning classes in separate rooms. I replaced it with a Bialetti that has a stainless steel bottom and an aluminum top, and while I love how it doesn’t look all beat to hell after a couple of years, it always seems to leave more water in the stainless reservoir than the classic models.
posted by romakimmy at 2:57 PM on June 16, 2022


I have been using vacuum pots for the last 30 years, mainly this one for the last 20.

Note the lack of a rubber gasket. Most of the rubber gaskets from this era are too stiff to use. This one uses a ground glass seal between the upper and lower vessels.

Which sounds better than it is because the ground glass seal is more delicate and must be perfectly clean on both sides or it won’t work. And not only that, since in order to keep so much air from bubbling through the coffee after the all the brewed coffee has been sucked into the lower vessel that the coffee cools down enough that you lose one of the main advantages of vacuum pot coffee in the first place, that it's almost boiling hot without tasting boiled of bitter, you must wrench off the upper vessel well before pressure has equalized. Which is dangerous to the coffee pot — and to you, for that matter.

This pot also uses a glass filter rod instead of paper or plastic, but still manages to filter out all or almost all of the grounds. You can still taste grounds that are invisible to the naked eye, but I think that's desirable in a good lighter roast.

For fellow purists I feel obliged to observe that the upper and lower vessels in the pictured pot don’t quite match. The two thin and one thicker platinum band on the upper is an older design than the three almost equal bands on the lower.
posted by jamjam at 3:12 PM on June 16, 2022 [2 favorites]


I was gifted the nespresso that only takes barcoded pods from the mothership that makes me UPS the used pods to recycle. I have had many perfect cups from it. But it is too crazy to keep going. I might try either reusing pods myself with film or buying alibaba machined pods with the barcode built in.

Otherwise airpress ftw. I have spent a total of 4k on the monster saeco that fails every year and takes four months to fix. Looking forward to learning more here.
posted by drowsy at 3:20 PM on June 16, 2022


My goodness, I'm now realizing I've been using the same Melitta plastic pourover cone since literally 2003. I like it-- with machines I always say, more parts means more problems. I tried a Moka pot, but there's no automatic off so I tend to forget and burn it. The worst thing that happens with the Melitta is I forget I was making coffee and it gets stale.

The Moka pot I left behind when I moved to NY several years ago, and when my brother-in-law who took over the apartment ventured under the sink, he found it, became sort of enchanted with the way it worked, and suddenly decided to try coffee for the first time. He sent me a Snapchat shortly thereafter where he was literally vibrating with both excitement and caffeination. I believe he's now a three-pots-a-day fancy mail-order-beans guy. I am still Bustelo in a Melitta, drink it iced the next day guy.
posted by blnkfrnk at 3:24 PM on June 16, 2022 [1 favorite]


Gooseneck kettles, Chemex flasks, vacuum siphons, and designer presses seem fussy and unnecessarily alchemical.
To each their own, but apparently for some pouring hot water over coffee grounds = unnecessarily alchemical.

#teamaeropress
posted by jomato at 3:37 PM on June 16, 2022 [5 favorites]


My Dad, a kiwi soldier in WW2 learned to drink coffee (rather than tea) in North Africa - he was used to boiling it in a billy (a pot) on a fire, at home decades later he continued this with a pot on the stove - he also continued to settle the grounds the way he had learned in the desert by sprinkling salt on it - to him the salt had become part of the taste
posted by mbo at 3:42 PM on June 16, 2022 [7 favorites]


Moka maka mocha?
posted by kirkaracha at 3:51 PM on June 16, 2022


If you really want to be able to use soap on your Moka pot, be sure to buy a stainless steel model instead of the traditional aluminum pot. With the case of stainless steel, you can use mild dish soap when you handwash. [x]
posted by Lanark at 4:10 PM on June 16, 2022 [1 favorite]


I am still Bustelo in a Melitta, drink it iced the next day guy.

I hate to admit that I brew a cup of ... Starbucks pre-ground ... auto-drip ... every night and drink it iced in the morning.
posted by uncleozzy at 4:15 PM on June 16, 2022 [1 favorite]


Oh yeah, I always boil the water in the electric kettle, then pour it into the Moka pot to brew.

That's exactly what I do. I'm stuck with an electric (but not inductive) range and my electric kettle is quite zippy. It's just part of my ritual.

That it inadvertently might improve the flavor is an extra.
posted by Ayn Marx at 4:36 PM on June 16, 2022 [1 favorite]


I am still Bustelo in a Melitta, drink it iced the next day guy.

I hate to admit that I brew a cup of ... Starbucks pre-ground ... auto-drip ... every night and drink it iced in the morning.


I always keep one cup from the daily pot for the next morning, and sometimes drink it room temp, because its job is to kick-start my brain.
posted by Halloween Jack at 5:10 PM on June 16, 2022 [1 favorite]


Clearly, while there are better ways to make coffee (and we’re always discovering them), there’s no wrong way, if you like what you’re drinking.
posted by heyitsgogi at 5:19 PM on June 16, 2022 [3 favorites]


Why all the concern about soap? Soap rinses off just fine.
posted by aesop at 5:32 PM on June 16, 2022


You live in a soft water area, huh?

Some people don't know they're born.
posted by howfar at 5:41 PM on June 16, 2022 [5 favorites]


My aeropress gets a lot more attenton these days but my Moka still holds a special place in my heart. I used an electric one for years since our work kitchen at the time didn't have a stove. My Italian friend gave me three tips:
1. Don't pack down the coffee - a gentle touch with the back of a spoon is enough
2. Don't wash your pot frequently with soap and water. you want to retain the oils
3. If you can't afford Illy, get some Lavazza ("the poor man's Illy").
posted by piyushnz at 7:43 PM on June 16, 2022 [1 favorite]


On Sundays I make a mocha and a latte from our fun looking moka pot. Otherwise it mostly just makes the occasional café cubano through the week. The cubano gets made from a can of Bustelo that we keep on hand for the purpose. Milk for the espresso drinks is done via Subminimal wand and careful microwaving.

We clean the pot pretty thoroughly because I'm not fond of the taste of old oils. The only fussy bit is working around the gasket. I'm not convinced I can lay hands on a replacement gasket without forking over ten bucks a shot, so I treat mine like gold.

I use my Aeropress about 6 times a day. Upside-down technique, mostly, although I've been totally happy with right side up. Splash of water, a little half-and-half for color. I rejuvenate the plunger every few months with a long soak in mineral oil and then a zap in the microwave. The one in the camping kit needs to be replaced completely, as the original design used BPA plastic and the plunger is getting melty.

Daily my partner person makes one good sized pourover into a mason jar with a ceramic #2 cone.

We never adjust the Hario Skerton. Same grind for all methods (modulo the cubano): finer than Aeropress recommended but not espresso fine. I like my coffee on the over-extracted side and fussy so-called experts will not change my preferences.

We own a Chemex but I've never been satisfied with my results even with extensive grind experimentation. My old boss made some pretty great Chemex but I've never managed to get it right.

My dad used to make a pot of coffee every day with a big red plastic #6 Melitta. He had that thing down to a science.
posted by majick at 9:38 PM on June 16, 2022 [2 favorites]


our fun looking moka pot

Looks like it just needs a little oil now and then, a heart, and to be kept away from flying monkeys.
posted by Greg_Ace at 10:17 PM on June 16, 2022 [3 favorites]


I got my Moka pot 5 years ago for 6 bucks, when I wanted espresso level caffeine without the price of a machine. Love that little thing; it got me thorough some hard, caffeinated times.

I now have a cheap espresso machine from goodwill that works better than expected, and a friend gifted me a nespresso, so I have my espresso when I need it. But I can’t bring myself to get rid of the Moka pot.

I also would rarely drink less than half the 6 pot amount from my Moka pot. One of my grips about the nespresso, is that I only get one cup/shot.
posted by [insert clever name here] at 10:51 PM on June 16, 2022


After years of being a major coffee snob including some number of years off and on as a barista I've discovered my favorite way to make coffee of all time is when someone else makes it.

I went through my moka pot phase and I thought I would like it more and would be more into it because I could use it over a camp stove or maybe even a wood fire, because I like to go for cold, rainy bike rides and use my camp stove and make a hot beverage to hold and sip while I'm bleakly contemplating my weltschmerz in a nice, grey drizzle.

But it's just way too much work and cleaning per ounce of coffee especially if you're away from a sink.

I thought I would like the Aeropress especially for portable coffee but, now it's also just way too much work per ounce of coffee and then there's the cleaning and filters and no, no that's not it, either.

I thought I would like the Chemex method but as far as I can tell that's just a really slow pourover with extra steps and more cleaning and the big square coffee filters are so bougie and expensive, and they really absorb too much of the nice oils I like and want in my coffee and oh Lord help me they take way too long and there's entirely too much standing around babysitting it and adding water from a kettle and if you're making coffee for one you might as well just use a pourover basket. The Chemex flasks do look pretty and they're nice for coffee for 2-4 people but no, that's not it for me, either.

In the end after trying basically all the conceivable and known ways you can make coffee short of anything involving lasers or a supercritical CO2 extraction it has to be either a French press OR a pourover basket with a mesh filter, but paper filters will do in a pinch.

I mainly like my coffee black, oily, full bodied and with some fines in it. It should be vaguely chewy and al dente.

I really like cold brew but it's expensive to buy. Making your own takes planning and thinking ahead. And if I get back into making my own cold brew at my age my head might actually explode, because once I have a big batch of cold brew I have no self control and I will drink it straight and cold right out of the jug like some kind of deranged coffee moonshiner.

Espresso is a nice treat when I want to savor a really nice roast at a nice coffee place, but when I'm honest with myself I've never really drank coffee just for the taste, it's about the caffeine. My favorite coffee mug is all black and printed with a skull and cross bones Jolly Roger design and that's on purpose.

I mean I do also really like the taste, but let's be real, here. I'll happily drink instant coffee. Shoot, I'll drink instant coffee just so I can get the energy to make real coffee. I have an outside desk and porch area and on that desk I have a camp stove, kettle and jar of instant coffee sitting on it and it all lives out there on my outside desk. Some mornings I'm boiling water to make instant coffee so I can go make a big French press of real coffee.

As for portable coffee? Sometimes I bring my French press out there, but, really? Instant or concentrated cold brew is just fine for portable outside coffee. I don't have to carry water to wash things or figure out how to carry pre-ground coffee or any of that kind of nonsense. I mainly just want something hot, brown and caffeinated that resembles coffee, though I'm not opposed to tea. Tea is real easy to make with a portable stove but it's also not actually coffee.

Your favorite method of making coffee is probably fine. Why, yes, I'd love a cup.
posted by loquacious at 10:52 PM on June 16, 2022 [13 favorites]


I love my mocha pot. I use cheap aldi coffee and probably boil the crap out of it, which makes everything else taste weak now, but I love it... I have had lovely pour over coffee made at particular temperature with bespoke beans but:

I smoosh the coffee in the pot,
they say don't do it,
but i do.

Because i need
a lot.
posted by sedimentary_deer at 11:48 PM on June 16, 2022


I'm not kidding when I say that I couldn't have survived the hard lockdown in Melbourne without my moka. Well. My four mokas. Two cup, three cup, six cup, and nine cup.

In my defence, two of them were gifts, one was inherited, and one was a panic buy years ago when we hosted Christmas.

But, with the nearest decent coffee more than 5k away, and teaching from home in the mornings, the moka was an absolute godsend. Yes, it's not a barista espresso experience - it's a darker, thicker, more bitter brew, with less complexity of flavour - but it's definitely its own thing. We've got it to a satisfying routine - clean and rinse the pot, load it up with water and Lavazza Qualita d'Oro, smallest burner on the stove. Then shut it off when it bubbles, pour, top up with the kettle for a decent long black...
posted by prismatic7 at 1:47 AM on June 17, 2022 [2 favorites]


Hoffman is my favorite type of pretentious

Thing is, James Hoffman isn't in the least bit pretentious - that's exactly who he is, and he's not pretending to be anything other than that. I enjoy his videos, up to a point, but as I can only afford a rotary/choppy kind of coffee grinder and an Aeropress I end up feeling inadequate after a few. I don't feel judged by Mr H, but I am aware of the fact that I'm never likely to spend more than thirty pounds on a coffee grinder. My coffee tastes lovely anyway (all the money goes on nice beans).

Before I had an induction hob I used a Moka (and bought ground coffee), and I found that the best coffee was made by putting the (electric) stove on the lowest possible setting when I got up, then doing my morning sitting, and at the end of that half an hour the coffee was done. Which is basically what everyone else has said, but I wanted to shoehorn in something relevant to the thread.

Anyway, despite the fact I can't use them, I've kept the Mokas hanging around simply because they look nice, which is something that no other coffee making device can claim to.

(They have to have come up with an induction-friendly Moka by now, surely?)
posted by Grangousier at 2:13 AM on June 17, 2022 [3 favorites]


A few observations:

In Australia, we inherited the Italian coffee culture (i.e., espresso as the default means of brewing), though not the taboos (which must be the famous “larrikin spirit”), and further ran with it, producing things like the flat white (which is like a cappuccino only with not quite as much milk). You see moka pots in Australia, but you also see domestic espresso machines. American/Scandinavian-style filter coffee isn't very common; there seems to be a gap between instant coffee (i.e., not being bothered to put in effort) and actual espresso.

The UK seems to be a somewhat mixed coffee culture, having historically been a famous redoubt of tea consumption. There is traditional Italian espresso, and a (somewhat Australian/NZ-influenced) more modern coffee scene, though if people have espresso machines, they're Nespresso. I once witnessed someone in an office in London making a coffee in the office by running most of a mug's worth of water through a Nespresso capsule, topping it up with milk and putting it in the microwave to froth up; I called that the Angliano (after an Italian slang word for not being in full possession of one's faculties).

Sweden, meanwhile, is filter-coffee country, though with the usual global hipster roasteries and cafés in the bigger cities. Espresso is very much the exception here domestically. Coffee is an institution in the form of the concept of “fika”, but the coffee itself takes a back seat to the pastries (cinnamon and cardamom buns, typically) consumed with it.

I myself have an espresso machine (a compact, art deco-styled Smeg one; I had a Gaggia Classic in London, though gave that to a friend). I have a moka pot as well (brought over from Australia and kept over the decades), though it sits in a cupboard. I didn't know how to make coffee with it properly, and ended up with burnt coffee, though should get it out and give it another go. (They do work on induction hobs, right?)
posted by acb at 2:14 AM on June 17, 2022 [1 favorite]


Damn it.
posted by acb at 2:15 AM on June 17, 2022


Kind of unfortunate how this just glosses over the genocidal Italian campaign in Abyssinia, and the rest of the history of where the pot took its name from.
posted by progosk at 3:54 AM on June 17, 2022 [1 favorite]


Why all the concern about soap? Soap rinses off just fine.

On an aluminium moka pot, soap will discolor the outside of the aluminum coffee maker, leaving spots that are nearly impossible to remove. What is worse, the chemical soap smell is likely to stick around for several batches, changing the flavor of the coffee.
posted by Lanark at 4:05 AM on June 17, 2022


As an Italian, you are all insane. Put the Moka on the stove and stop thinking too much about it.

Lately my Moka has started whistling like a kettle when done, surprising on a 10 year old Moka, but nice. I don't think too much about it.
posted by thegirlwiththehat at 4:41 AM on June 17, 2022 [12 favorites]


My Italian friend gave me three tips:

Definitely confirm the slight tamping, and the low flame throughout.

More local (Italian) tips:

- add a pinch of salt to the ground coffee

- else, a pinch of (unsweetened) cocoa

- dump the used coffee grounds in your potted plants / vegetable patch (no idea whether that’s at all wise…)

- never wash, only rinse your moka, let it gather a dark brown patina over the years
posted by progosk at 4:47 AM on June 17, 2022 [2 favorites]


I also use a Bodum knockoff chemex I also got for around $15 at Target. I've had relatives and friends who come over see it and make jokes about how I'm some kind of coffee snob. We've gone so far into coffee fetishizing and mechanization that a cheap pour-over setup with an electric kettle is considered snobbery!

I buy cheap ground coffee from Costco (and occasionally better supermarket stuff) and I don't care what anyone thinks about me.
posted by SoberHighland at 4:58 AM on June 17, 2022 [3 favorites]


For more on the fascism latent in Bialetti's moka itself, N. Romagnoli's Exploring the Caffeinated Legacy of Italian Fascism does a good contextual summary of J. Schnapp's essay on the subject, The Romance of Caffeine and Aluminum.
posted by progosk at 6:11 AM on June 17, 2022 [3 favorites]


I associate Moka pots so strongly with Cuban home life that it never occurred to me that they originally came from a different culture. It will be blazing hot outside and my Madrina will still make a cafecito so that we have something to sip while watching Spanish-language travel shows together.

You'll see Moka pots in the background of any TV show with a Cuban family, almost as a talisman. "One Day at a Time" and "Que Pasa USA" had them. I sometimes think that a Cuban bat signal would be the silhouette of a Moka pot.

And yet, they came from Italy?! My mind is blown.
posted by Alison at 6:12 AM on June 17, 2022 [5 favorites]


I just took my Moka pot out, filled it with water and put it on the induction hob. Nothing.

Chances are the only way to save it from the landfill will be to take it with me to a country where more primitive cooking technologies are still used and give it away to someone there.
posted by acb at 6:17 AM on June 17, 2022


I am generally repelled by meticulous and highly specific coffee culture, which is mired in the same sort of optimization fetishes, life "hacks," and other pursuits of untouchable perfection that make so much of modern western life a bore and a chore, but I adore the theater of making espresso in mine.

After foolishly passing up old Moka pots at thrift stores for decades, where they'd ended up in huge piles right around the time everyone went all pseudoscience over Alzheimer's and aluminum, I finally yielded to curiosity right around the time that I realized that I was overcaffeinating my life and my history of fitful sleep was the result. I've got the "3-cup" variety, which properly makes a tiny old-school mug's worth of coffee, and it very quickly merged with my zen mornings, in which I wake well before dawn, stretch, shower, shave with a mug, brush, and a 1951 Gilette Super Speed razor, prepare a tiny cheese soufflé in the toaster oven, and act out the ritual of grinding coffee with a hand grinder, loading my little Moka, and firing up a little circle of blue flame to put my pot on slow heat.

At the end of the ritual, I'd settle in my big green chair with a tiny cup of coffee and a little soufflé on the table next to me, put on the podcast of the previous day's As It Happens, and slowly let the world catch up to me until it's time to step out into everyone else's realitry.

I am certain that I am doing coffee all wrong, overheating the oils and violating the flavonoids and damaging the fibrous structure of the beans and encouraging an uncouth release of bitterness and bruising the water, and that I occasionally take a soapy rag to my Moka is a crime in some minds, even if I usually give it a good rinse, and yet—

I love my little cup of morning coffee, and since I got my Moka pot, I've found that one twee cup of coffee in the morning is enough to kickstart my days, and I don't crave caffeine throughout the day. It is nowhere as easy to use as my old Melitta perched on a cup was, but that's sort of the point. Like a monk in the morning, I'd act out the steps of my dawn processes with the same sort of calming effect of walking a labyrinth in quiet contemplation before walking back out again.

Of course, I was recently and suddenly propelled, after literal decades in my little monastic existence, into a family situation with a child and a very different partner disrupting my old ways, and as a consequence, I've sustained myself with tea instead, trying to figure out how to best use my little Moka pot on an electric stove and in a setting where I'm also making a vat of French press coffee for the other gentleman of the house and so far coming up a little frustrated. I find myself looking longingly to the backyard of where I live now with the idea of building a little shed where I can start my days writing and brewing a tiny cup of coffee in some residual echo of my long hermitage, but for now, the tea suffices.

My Moka pot taunts me, though, sitting in dust on the counter, reminding me of years of quiet service and of the traumatic experience of an unexpected disturbance in a life full of ritual. I'm thinking, watching those videos, that I can find a way, and probably should, since that mostly unheralded part of my days rooted me to an easier calm and the simplicity of a daily chore, always the same and yet never tiresome, that anchored everything against all the rest of what the world would throw at me.
posted by sonascope at 6:23 AM on June 17, 2022 [11 favorites]


acb: I just took my Moka pot out, filled it with water and put it on the induction hob. Nothing.

Is the gasket between the top half and bottom half shot? I have a packet of three with two remaining -- I would happily mail you one if it's the right size!
posted by wenestvedt at 6:28 AM on June 17, 2022


loquacious: As for portable coffee?

You need to find and try Pocket Coffee. I wish Ferrero would import this to the US. Little chocolate candies with a shot of espresso inside. However they're also super fragile and melt easily, they're not even made/sold in the summer months. But man, they're really good. And they're Italian!
posted by JoeZydeco at 6:29 AM on June 17, 2022 [1 favorite]


Is the gasket between the top half and bottom half shot?

No, it's that the aluminium is nonferrous and doesn't heat up when subjected to a magnetic field. On a gas hob or glowing-metal electric hob, it would probably work fine. But I live in Sweden, where all is induction (as it generally should be), a technology that didn't exist in Signore Bialetti's time.
posted by acb at 6:32 AM on June 17, 2022 [2 favorites]


Look, I'm just saying that if you want to sell me on your Amazing Coffee Pot, maybe you shouldn't open with "was popular with fascists" and "really took off once the Italians conquered Ethiopia", because to be honest I'm sort of working to reduce the number of war crimes involved in my morning rituals right now

Nothing is safe. Mussolini's administration promoted risotto over pasta. On the plus side, that means that pasta is antifa. It also means I can put a "This Machine Kills Fascists" sticker on my Aeropress.

(I did love our Bialetti, though, until it went to the back of the cupboard after getting the Aeropress.)
posted by rory at 6:35 AM on June 17, 2022 [4 favorites]


When I was married, we had a moka pot, a baby Gaggia, a Chemex, and a French press. My wife was raised in Rome and believed very strongly in coffee. In the years since I've had pretty much every kind of coffee maker available. Currently I've got a Nespresso, bought on fb market for $10, a manual espresso machine (thrift store find), and a single cup pour over Melitta basket I use with a coffee sock. Oh and a nice Italian drip coffee maker for work. Also a thermal French press at work, for when I'm only making coffee for me.
I get my beans from an online retailer caked boca java, and Peets capsules from Costco for the Nespresso.I currently don't grind my own beans, though I have a decent grinder in storage.
I haven't used a moka pot since the divorce but my Cuban bil taught me how to make Cuban coffee with his a few years back. It feels like a vacation luxury to me.
My favorite is having coffee from my local café (Fluid downtown Denver). Coffee life is good.
posted by evilDoug at 6:37 AM on June 17, 2022


I sometimes think that a Cuban bat signal would be the silhouette of a Moka pot.

And yet, they came from Italy?! My mind is blown.


Here's a comic (by J. Cañada and D. Moyano) you're well placed to appreciate.
posted by progosk at 6:48 AM on June 17, 2022 [3 favorites]


My brother blew one of these things up one time. Fortunately nobody was in the kitchen at the time. Very loud bang and twisted aluminum wreckage disconcertingly far away from the stove. I busted a Bodum once from trying to depress the plunger too soon. Lobster forearm. Plus those things are a NiGhtMaRe to clean and they make muddy coffee. Plastic Melitta cone = hot BPA = ?! So I use the cheapy grocery store glass cone w/ metal filter and I line the metal filter with one of a large collection of dedicated cotton rags from cut-up tea towels because the metal filter alone lets in too much mud, and unlike loquacious, I do not like it al dente. I grind my own locally roasted beans with a fascist grinder except during power outages when I grind them by hand. If the fascist one ever dies (it won't) or if I manage to break it (very possible) I might get a burr grinder like you're supposed to, but probably not. I have a couple of Chemexes and a box or two of the filters but I never use them. In my opinion they are a pain in the ass. The little wooden neck-muffler thing with the thongs and bobbles is unwieldy and precarious-feeling and you feel like you're going to get burned or spill coffee or drop the bastard; the coffee gets cold immediately; and if you just touch one wrong, it reverts to sand. Sometimes I do get out my box of filters just to stare at the beautiful logo.
posted by Don Pepino at 6:57 AM on June 17, 2022


Reminds me of College days. That was the affordable coffee device. Ours was never perfectly clean after the first use. Good Times, but my preferences have shifted since then.
posted by ovvl at 7:38 AM on June 17, 2022


I thought I would like the Aeropress especially for portable coffee

It’s all personal preference, but a hand burr grinder+aero press is exactly my sweet spot for good camp coffee - the small cyclindrical grinders slide right into the aero press body, and cleanup is as easy as popping the puck out and giving it a quick rinse. In the cold and rain though, the best coffee is the fastest one, so I usually bring some sachets of instant, too.
posted by Jon Mitchell at 8:27 AM on June 17, 2022 [3 favorites]


A little more detail on how we make our hybrid cold brew.

You need: gallon glass jug, 2l storage bottle, large funnel that fits in the jug and the bottle, Large (12 cup) metal coffee filter basket that fits in the funnel (it's a large funnel), coffee grinder.

Day 1: Put 1.7l water in your kettle set for for 96C. Coarse grind 150g of beans. Use the funnel to get the grinds in the jug. Use the funnel to pour the 96c heated water into the jug. Swirl the jug. Cap the jug and set aside on the counter.

Day 2: Gently swirl the glass jug so any floating grinds settle. Put the storage bottle in the sink (to contain accidents). Put the funnel in the storage bottle. Put the filter in the funnel. Slo-o-o-wly pour the jug into the filter, trying to retain as many grinds in the jug as possible without reserving liquid. It's ok if some grinds get into the filter, that's why there's a filter. Let the filter drain. Discard grinds, wash jug with soap and thoroughly rinse. Store the concentrate bottle in the fridge.

Each 100ml of concentrate (in the bottle) has 10g of bean power in it. Serve full strength or dilute as you wish up to three parts water, one part concentrate.

A standard espresso shot is about 7g of beans, that's 70ml of concentrate. When reconstituting for a 500ml go cup, I'll pour 120ml of concentrate in a small jar, microwave it for 60sec, then pour it in the cup and add kettle-hot water to dilute to the top. To make an americano I put 70ml of concentrate in a mug and the same amount of cold water and nuke it for a minute.

This method makes the most of mediocre beans with zero bitterness and excellent drinkability at any temperature. With good quality beans it produces really stellar results, giving you lots of flavour. Also it means I only have to "make coffee" every three or four days when the concentrate runs low. Everything else is just measuring out the right amount of concentrate and adding hot water.

We used to do Aeropress but this makes arguably better coffee and is much less hassle when amortized on a per-cup basis.

Good luck on your coffee adventure.
posted by seanmpuckett at 8:33 AM on June 17, 2022 [3 favorites]


You need to find and try Pocket Coffee

I was gifted some of this recently and wow yes i would buy way too much if i had access
posted by ominous_paws at 9:02 AM on June 17, 2022 [2 favorites]


Back in university (a couple decades ago now) I spent a semester in Sevilla and the older woman I boarded with made coffee with a moka pot. It was great. I bought one from Ikea and it was our main coffee maker for a year or two, but it was never as good as Paquita's. Maybe it was all the washing. We switched to making coffee in a big, family-sized French press for a bunch of years, but I never liked scooping the grounds out into the compost. For a while I had an early schedule in grad school, so I got a cheap Mr. Coffee with a timer so that I could have hot coffee waiting for me when I got up at 6AM or whatever. Sometimes coffee just has to be hot and available. My wife discovered the aeropress during a residency around 2010 and we both thought it was great. I know I'm repeating myself from previous comments on this site, but I like to make one cup of coffee at a time and an aeropress makes great coffee while being a cinch to clean up. They're great for the workplace. I spent a bunch of years happily using it the official, right-side-up way, but for the last couple of years I've switched to the popular upside-down method at home. During a move in 2020, our aeropress was packed away somewhere for a while so I got a hario V60 for pourover coffee. It makes good coffee, but compared to the aeropress I spent more time standing around waiting for the water to filter through. I guess I like the aeropress coffee ritual more than I like the pourover coffee ritual. In 2020 after a few months of working from home, we decided to finally invest in a burr grinder, and then a few months after that my wife picked up a vaccuum seal canister for coffee beans. With that I think we reached our fussiness limit. We do pay a premium for beans from a local roaster that we like, and I think it's worth it.
posted by jomato at 9:16 AM on June 17, 2022 [2 favorites]


You need to find and try Pocket Coffee. I wish Ferrero would import this to the US. Little chocolate candies with a shot of espresso inside. However they're also super fragile and melt easily, they're not even made/sold in the summer months. But man, they're really good. And they're Italian!

Oh, I've had these, as well as other coffee candies. They're nice but way too much sugar. And with the amount of coffee I like to drink I'd end up in a diabetic coma. It also doesn't really do anything for the concept of the ritual of making coffee out in nature and/or holding a warm cup full of something when it's cold out.

I'm a huge fan of the Starbuck's Via instant coffee but I avoid buying that because: Starbuck's. I also wish they'd just sell it in jars like regular instant, but I understand one of the reasons why they don't do that is because Via has some form of "real" coffee in the form microground beans and that would settle out in a jar and you'd have to shake up the jar to re-distribute it. (Which, now that I think of it is probably just the fines left over from processing retail sale pre-ground coffee, perhaps ground even finer and further processed to mix with the freeze dried instant concentrate.)

My go to instant is the generic store brand form of Nescafe Clasico. It's dark and bold, and I can mix it up cold or hot, it's cheap and easy and it just works. I avoid the Nescafe branded stuff because: Fuck Nestle. They probably come from the same plant anyway.

Sometimes I just take cold coffee whether it's instant or "real" coffee in one of my metal water bottles and reheat that on my stove.

My particular matrix of wants/needs for a portable coffee solution is somewhat unique or different than standard camp coffee because I'm not really camping. I'm just going for day rides on my bike and going and sitting on a beach or in the woods, and there's no water source besides what I bring with me. There's no standpipe or water outlet, no stream to get water from and filter it, it's all pack in pack out.

So if I'm doing this I don't really want to have to clean an Aeropress to make the next cup because that means I'm carrying even more water on my bike, and I also want some of that water to drink as water, and it's not uncommon I'm carrying 3-4 liters of water in my bike panniers for this kind of a day trip.

The best solutions I've found for portable "real" coffee is just using a pourover basket with paper filters and bringing a bag of preground coffee. I can put the used grinds and filters into a baggy and use basically zero water for cleanup to brew another batch. Bringing my French press is a close second but still needs cleaning, but sometimes I can scrape that into a bag and rinse it off in the ocean. Or I can do cowboy coffee but that's still as much to clean up as a French press.

But the easiest, quickest solution of all is either a flask of cold brew concentrate or putting a bunch of instant coffee into a recycled spice bottle with a flip top lid and shaker top. Then I can just heat water in my steel kettle or mess kit pot and make smaller individual cups to taste in my camp cup or bring a real mug.

Thankfully I'm not super particular about portable coffee. Instant or cold brew concentrate is just fine. I really just want some hot, dark mud that has caffeine in it. I don't need sugar or cream since I mainly just drink it straight. It ticks all of the boxes for me with no hassle or extra water needed for cleanup or carrying way too many things.
posted by loquacious at 10:02 AM on June 17, 2022 [1 favorite]


but for now, the tea suffices

The Dude abides, and the tea suffices.
posted by Greg_Ace at 10:39 AM on June 17, 2022 [2 favorites]


Cusa Coffee makes very nice sachets of instant, and so far they have been Good People.
posted by wenestvedt at 12:27 PM on June 17, 2022


Hey, Greg_Ace, in the unlikely eventuality that you still have that old Nicro vacuum pot you once mentioned, Hario now makes a very nice stainless steel frame for paper filters that works perfectly with Nicros. I think I paid $10-12 for mine, and it came with 50 paper disc replacements.

I used mine with my Nicro just this morning, and the coffee goes down much more easily than with a glass rod or the stainless filter that the Nicro was made for (I previously refrained from pointing out that your plastic filter was not designed for the Nicro — I assume it originally came from a Bodum Santos, which is the only vacuum pot I’ve heard of that comes with a plastic filter).
posted by jamjam at 1:16 PM on June 17, 2022 [1 favorite]


> James Hoffman...I enjoy his videos, up to a point, but as I can only afford

I now love his videos precisely because I won't afford a better grinder, let alone a Rocket or Rancilio, but I love watching him play with knobs and he does have a tricorder or rather timers, scales, thermometers and pressure sensors for max nerdery.

Look at this thing! A $1650 hand crank grinder. Delightful.
---
No mention yet of the Krups KM4688 electric "moka" pot. I got one before they were discontinued (still $reasonable used on eBay) and while I don't use it much due to clean up hassle, this post has me planning to get it out this weekend. I'm afraid that if I tried French Press, I'd like it just as much as it also has a metal screen filter so the coffee has a lot of "body" from the oils and fines that even a good-ish burr grinder lets through.
---
Metafilter: overthinking a plate of coffee beans?
posted by ASCII Costanza head at 1:37 PM on June 17, 2022


Metafilter: overthinking a plate of coffee beans?

Stop that or I'll put coffee beans up your nose.
posted by loquacious at 4:10 PM on June 17, 2022


Oh cool, thanks jamjam! I'll definitely check that out.
posted by Greg_Ace at 4:16 PM on June 17, 2022


(also, you've greatly overestimated my ability to expediently sell off/donate/deal with something I've stopped using. :D )
posted by Greg_Ace at 4:22 PM on June 17, 2022 [1 favorite]


Since we’ve taken a confessional turn here, I’ll admit that I actually have 3 complete Nicro pots and an extra funnel. They also made an electric version I’ve never been able to find.
posted by jamjam at 4:35 PM on June 17, 2022


I mean I do also really like the taste, but let's be real, here. I'll happily drink instant coffee.

Me too. I like the moka pot coffee, but I also like Nescafe Classico and one of those is fast and easy in the morning and one isn't.
posted by Dip Flash at 6:54 PM on June 17, 2022


yes - an aluminium moka pot wont work with an induction hob .... but my stainless steel bialetti venus 4 cup works great
posted by mbo at 7:08 PM on June 17, 2022


My daily moka practice includes adding a quarter teaspoon of ground cardamom to the (very finely ground) coffee. It's spoiled me for all other (I didn't say lesser, but I thought it) forms of coffee.
posted by Shunra at 11:07 PM on June 17, 2022 [2 favorites]


So I got some med-dark roast from the store last night and made coffee in the moka pot this morning using all my new-found knowledge, and...it wasn't all that different from the times I'd tried before and I still don't like it. I guess the moka pot is not for me; I'll stick with my beloved Aeropress. (inverted method, by the way, because despite what Hoffmann claims on YouTube all the water drains out in less than a minute if I try to use the standard method...maybe I'm using too coarse a grind, or I'm not using the fancy thick filters he mentions in the video. But I like my usual result just dandy so I have no problem flying in the face of convention.)

I also like making cold brew; I combine 6 Tbsp / 30g of coffee (same grind as for auto-drip) with 6 C of water in a large bowl, cover it, and let it sit on the counter ~12 hours. Next morning I use one of these comically-large bad boys (250 is like a 5-year supply for me) in a colander to strain into a stock pot that I then drain into a quart Mason jar, which is the perfect size to hold the result. That jar lasts me about a week; when I want coffee I just top off 1/3 C of the concentrate with hot water in my 16 oz. mug if I want it hot, or prepare iced coffee in the summer. It's also perfect for car camping, it's quick work to heat up a kettle full of water in the morning and dump some concentrate into mugs for multiple people.
posted by Greg_Ace at 12:04 PM on June 18, 2022


One can get a steel base to put under an aluminum Moka pot to work on an induction range. Since we have a couple aluminum pots that's what I'll do when we eventually replace our gas stove with an induction range.
posted by leslies at 2:46 PM on June 18, 2022 [1 favorite]


my pandemic brain can't handle anything more complicated than pre-ground coffee in a Chemex

taquito boyfriend the former barista & coffee snob will not use the Chemex because he has not used it enough to refine a technique to make the coffee come out of it perfectly; he will make twelve consecutive individual cups of coffee in the Aeropress (for guests or himself or me if I request it)

I agree that the Aeropress makes a good cup of coffee but I mislike using it even without the cognitive load, cause if your cup mouth is too wide, God help you, better have the perfect pressdown or get ready to clean up boiling coffee grounds

& if your cup mouth is the right size very probably your cup is too small to make it worth the whole-ass process of making coffee with an Aeropress

before we got the Chemex when I was still willing to use the Aeropress I found exactly two mugs that are large enough with a narrow enough mouth, they are both punny Christmas mugs from World Market, "Deck Yourself Before You Wreck Yourself" & "Rolling With My Gnomies," I have been unable to find any mugs of this shape ever again

used them every day at my last job & no one on a conference call ever mentioned that I was using a Christmas mug year round until the meeting that got called to tell my team we'd been laid off

anyway whenever something bad happens to the Aeropress (I didn't do it I promise) & we haven't replaced it yet taquito boyfriend asks if I'll make coffee in the Chemex

I'll make my standard pot where I put the pre-ground grounds in the filter & unceremoniously pour boiling water into them without particularly "blooming" it or whatever you're supposed to do

inevitably this gets me an "mmm yes good coffee see you're just so much better at the Chemex than I am" (?)
posted by taquito sunrise at 5:23 PM on June 18, 2022 [2 favorites]


Going on the record here for ceramic Melitta cones and 6 cup Chemex. I like medium dark beans without too much grit or acid. The Melitta delivers on a cup by cup basis on the weekdays, and the
Chemex with a coarser grind brings multiple cups on the weekend.
posted by mollweide at 5:46 PM on June 18, 2022


Yesterday when I read this thread I pulled out the Moka pot that's been in the way back corner of my corner cupboard, buried for years. I don't ever use it because the coffee it makes has always seemed... strong, yes, but flavor? eh.

But I didn't know the tricks to pre-heat the water and use low heat on the stove. I tried it this morning by heating a coffee cup full of water for 2 minutes in the microwave, then putting that water in the Moka pot on a medium setting on my glass-top electric stove.

And got damn, that's a good cup of coffee. Thanks, Metafilter!

When I'm traveling I take a Melitta cone and some filters in my bag, because a lot of hotel rooms only give you a drip machine that uses teabag-like coffee packs. Those are a start for the first day, but the day 1 agenda always includes "find a better source of coffee".
posted by ctmf at 9:34 AM on June 19, 2022 [1 favorite]


I have never had a cup of coffee, I hate the smell. I have made coffee for others, no idea how it tasted -- but nobody ever threw up. Such a big deal this is ... not.
posted by alwayson_slightlyoff at 12:06 AM on June 20, 2022


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