Coffee Percolators

I loved the smell of my grandma's old stovetop percolator in the morning. Never tasted burnt.

My glass stove top percolator makes the best coffee ever. I should haul it out more often, but the coffeemaker is easier.

Mmmmmm, boiled coffee! Yum!

Actually my parents drank percolated coffee until I was a teen and I recall it tasting fine. It was kind of a messy production, though....

The people who love them REALLY love them. My cousin made such a big deal out of hunting one down in the late Nineties. I don't get it.

Percolators make the best coffee. That Keurig shit is shit.

Only use my K machine when in a hurry for one single cup, and don't want to bother with mess/clean-up.

Perks and moka pots make some of the best strong hot coffee you can get. It all comes down to design and technique.

Only a French press makes good coffee. I understand most of you have very low standards and aren't intelligent enough to appreciate even awful coffee, so your forgiven.

My parents had a metal model when I was growing up. Nice memories.

Great coffee and it didn't cost $6.00 a cup.

They made real coffee not like those wimpy drip Mr Coffee Kuerig shit

K-cups make shit coffee.

I have a small travel percolator that I keep in my motor home for travel. It will work off of 110V line current or 12DC car current, so it's handy. It's an old travel coffee set from Montgomery Ward!

One sees so many K-cup machines in recycling bins, thrift shops, or just thrown into trash.

Here's Chet Huntley and some average American housewives weighing in on pyro-ceramics, i.e. Corningware, specifically Corningware percolators:

You can tear my moka pot from my cold dead hands.

Chemex

Keurigs suck because the coffee is barely lukewarm once you add some milk.

R8 I still have my mom's metal percolator coffee pot! I'm glad I kept it - makes great HOT coffee.

Good trolling statement OP. Look at all the responses. Why not do a few more threads on other topics. You really know how to do it!

R7 isn't intelligent enough to know the difference between your and you're.

The more you spend on your coffee maker, the better it tastes. Everyone knows this.

r20

Is two stupid 2 know I did that on purpose sew youd replie

OP is the guy in the video he attached.

The burnt coffee smell is a definite memory, but the taste not so bad. the big difference between coffee now and in the past is that pre-Starbucks, we accepted a pretty dishwater-like flavor from takeout coffee and instant and made dreadful coffee to match it.

I know people who today think Starbucks tastes burnt. There is a couple of generations now that have never had real true great brewed coffee. Too bad. This is how you make coffee.

Here's one of those electric ones. (My grandmother had one of these.)

Vintage Pyrex Glass Coffee Percolator was cool, you could watch it perk.

I have an electric percolator. The one thing I love about it is that it keeps the coffee warm for a long time (no auto shutoff) but doesn't burn it like drip coffeemakers with heating plates. The downside is that it's slightly more difficult to clean (although at least you don't need to descale it.)

I remember Joni mispronouncing it on BLUE.

I just use integrated bean to cup machine.

Don't understand why they aren't more popular in the US?

I quit percolating coffee in the fall of 1976, and changed to using a Melitta funnel and filter mounted on top of a glass coffee pot. The pot was then kept warm on an electric heating platform.

Now, I am still using the Melitta funnel and filter, however it is mounted on top of a stainless steel Thermos bottle and there is no need to use any heating element.

I have NO plans on ever changing to any other way of making coffee.

[quote] I just use integrated bean to cup machine. Don't understand why they aren't more popular in the US?

Ahhh probably because they are $1700.00 and we don't have maids that have all day to take it apart to clean? I dunno, just a hunch.

It takes 5 minutes to clean one and all of the removable parts are dishwasher safe.

They're kind of the 'must have' addition if you are having a new kitchen fitted in the UK, lot's of people have the stand alone versions also.

R33 Smell you. My coffee-maker is self cleaning.

bean to cup machines

The % of UK households with a coffeemaker priced over £1000 is minimal. You are being bullshitted.

The best reason not to have one of these is that there are too many components to break. You will still need another coffeemaker while scheduling the repairman.

I think percolators make great coffee and it's piping hot. But they are a pain to clean so I rarely use mine. French press pots make great coffee too but it's never hot enough and they are also a pain to clean.

I don't have one of those bean to coffee machines in my kitchen, but I do have a Bunn home model which I think is wonderful. I do, however, have a Teasmade in my bedroom, and have a spare in the basement, kind of unusual in the US.

R36 I am British and most of my Working Class/Middle Class friends with their £25,000 kitchens and 60 inch TV's have bean to cup coffee machines (mainly integrated).

People notice this shit here, it's expected. You don't really see them in the rest of Europe, but they are a status symbol in the UK.

We change Kitchen's as often as people in the US repaint BTW.

My Sherian would be appallled

I used to love the smell of my mother's percolating coffee so a few years ago I bought a percolator of my own. Lately I've become dissatisfied with the flavor and am thinking of changing to a something with a glass pot. I'm intrigued by the Moka pots mentioned here.

Can anyone tell me what it is they like about the Moka pots?

Moka pots are metal.

They make intense flavorful coffee via steam. They are cheap and you throw them out when they get too pitted.

My daily morning coffee is a pour over with a #4 filter, like R31. My husband uses a fucking Keurig. But he also likes flavored "coffee."

At work, I have a Gaggia Accademia super-automatic, which I use for espresso and Americanos. I have never used the milk carafe that comes with it.

When I have people over for dinner, I pull out the old metal stove-top percolator as I clear dishes. Not to serve the coffee, but to fill the house with the aroma of it. I serve pour over to guests who want coffee. Once in a while, I'll have a cup of the percolated coffee, but then I'll be up very late, so I don't do it often.

Proper cup of coffee....

[quote] Only a French press makes good coffee.

Oh, honey - no. As my Italian colleague said, it's swill for people who've never had a good, strong cup of coffee in their lives. Even the French themselves have switched to espresso-based drinks once Australians introduced them to proper coffee in the past decade or so, by opening decent coffee shops in Paris itself.

Fresh perc coffee done well and correctly is extremely flavorful.

However, "well" and "correctly" require practice.

Too much effort on a daily basis, but nice when you have the time.

R41

Do you clean your perk pot often? Regular deep cleaning is crucial with all coffee makers, but especially those made of metal. Oils from coffee aren't easily cleaned out even with a good washing after use, but require something stronger, otherwise built up oils will go rancid and affect taste of brew.

More moka pot bliss:

Different people really want different things from coffee - hot and strong (as in a caffeine punch) are what I prioritize over taste - so I'm much happier with a $1.75 large with milk / no sugar from a random corner deli than with something fancier - but that's just me. My mother much prefers the taste of instant Nescafe over brewed, and only hauls out her old Farberware electric percolator when my sister visits -- that thing must be 50 years old, but she only really used it on holidays or when company came over so it has lasted forever. I drink coffee several times a day, and this thread has me toying with the idea of buying a percolator - but I know I'd still end up just walking to the corner anyway -- it's nice to take a "coffee break" and walk outside.

That is something have never understood.

Each morning watch groggy eyed persons walking like zombies down streets of Manhattan, NYC towards Starbucks for their morning coffee, some of them in what still looks like their PJs. Why pay all that money for overpriced swill instead of learning how to make a decent morning cup at home I will never understand.

Yes, can see grabbing a coffee, latte or whatever on one's way out to work/school in AM; but these people are going right back home.....

Well R50 - I only buy cheap deli swill - but nevertheless I do do as you describe. I actually enjoy the walk first thing in the am, but also if you make coffee at home you 1 - need to have the room on the counter for a coffee maker - which I do not; and 2 - need to clean said coffee maker / percolator afterwards - I barely have a kitchen sink, certainly no dishwasher.

But I really don't cook anything pretty much ever, so I'm a hard case. In case you think I'm lying about point 1, the small amount of counter right next to the small sink is the same size as said sink and not near an outlet. The only way I fit a microwave is by putting a cutting board over the burners on the 20 inch wide stove and sticking the microwave on top of it -- I mostly use the microwave to re-heat the left over deli coffee that gets cold while I shower. Inside the oven I store random crap. I turned off the gas valve years ago. It may be an insane way to live, but it works for me.

It's part of my morning ritual.

I drink both drip coffee and espresso. Different tastes for different times of the day. In the morning, drip brewed Stewarts Private Blend Coffee, nothing else, just ordered another case. In the afternoon, Lavazza espresso, double, made with my Krups machine for a quick shot of energy in the afternoon. On a bad day, four or five in a row!

I still use a percolator, great HOT coffee. Not the pot, brand of coffee.

Coffee time...

The three big improvements over the years have been: 1-The Drip Coffee Maker 2-The Thermal Carafe 3-The Bean To Cup. Coffee starts to burn on a hotplate in just 8-10 minutes. After 30 minutes its undrinkable. The thermal carafe keeps it "almost" fresh brewed tasting for much longer. A quick turn in the microwave to get it to fresh brewed temperature (never a second longer). The bean to cup machines are way too complicated. I make the coffee in the morning and it's nice to be able to serve everyone at once. I can't imagine waiting to brew cup after cup.

They make great coffee at a very reasonable per-cup price, but I can't get over how expensive bean to cup coffee makers are in the US -- they're double pr triple what they cost in Europe.

I had a Saeco in Austria that I got for EUR 299 20 years ago. It lasted over 10 years, and now I have a DeLonghi for the same price that's also performing really well -- just the simplest models, I try to stay away from stuff with too many electronic features to go wrong.

So why does this stuff seem to cost at least double in the US? It does seem like they only market the high-end ones here, but there's got to be someplace offering the basic models too? If your household drinks four or more cups of coffee a day, you'll save on coffee what you pay extra for the machine.

If you insist on pods, the Keurig are absolute shit IMO. Nescafé is much better, although I hate all the waste they produce.

I've never had a really good cup of percolator coffee, but filter drip can be pretty good when it's fresh. I'll use a moka pot if I have nothing else to hand.

My cheap ass parents used a percolator into the mid 80s. It was quite an event when they upgraded to a Mr. Coffee drip maker. They would even drag that percolator on family trips because they were too cheap to get up and get a cup of coffee at the local diner. I remember waking up to the sound of that thing chugging and churning. I am an anti-percer mainly because of my youthful trauma. ;)

I don’t drink coffee. I’m strictly tea. I don’t like the taste of coffee no matter how you dress it up or what you make it in. My parents never drank coffee at home. My father took a thermos of Sanka to work with him. I knew Sanka was a bunch of brown grains thrown in boiled water and that most coffee drinkers hated Sanka.

When I built my house ages ago, I knew I had to buy a coffeemaker for visitors. My aunt insisted I had to get one of these 12 cup percolators because coffee only tasted good when made in one. And you needed to fill the pot all the way up to the line, then put in the coffee. If you’re going to make coffee she said, you need to make a whole pot. Ok, says I, not realizing my aunt was the designated coffee maker in the office where she worked and she made 3-4 pots every day.

I had no idea they took so long to make coffee. The first time my FIL came to my house he had a fucking fit because I didn’t have coffee ready for him to drink with his lunch. I never knew anyone who drank coffee with lunch. Coffee came *after* a meal, as far as I knew. So I filled up the percolator and put the coffee in and waited. He then threw a conniption because I didn’t use a Jolting Joe DiMaggio drip coffeemaker. I had to listen to him complaining all day about not having coffee immediately served to him. “When do you know me to have a meals without coffee, Millie? (his wife). I ALWAYS drink coffee with my meals. ALWAYS.” Like I was supposed to know this and be prepared for a royal visit.

[quote]Why pay all that money for overpriced swill instead of learning how to make a decent morning cup at home I will never understand.

I agree with you. That said, a woman once told me, "I'm not going to meet a man at my coffee maker!"

I love a percolator. They make real coffee. These drip makers make weak coffee because the grounds don't have enough time to emit their flavor into the water as they do in percolators. Personally I use a french press. Simple and makes fabulous coffee. No electricity involved.

It's not boiled coffee R3. Hot water surges up the center stem, hits the lid, then lands on ground coffee in the basket. In good percolators, there was a speader cover over the basket that allowed the hot water surge to drip onto the ground coffee.

I prefer french press nowadays.