The typical coffee maker of grandparents or the office is coming back into fashion due to the quality of the coffee it can produce
Coffee lovers have a lot of options to make our favorite drink. Not only are there many preparations and combinations, but also a great variety of coffee makers. One of the simplest ways is using capsule coffee machines, but an interesting step to obtain a much better tasting coffee is to opt for one of the ‘traditional’ methods.
Along with the Italian coffee maker, the electric filter coffee maker is one of the cheapest ways to prepare coffee. It is associated with a not very good taste and is a typical coffee maker in many offices, but it is experiencing a second youth because used in the correct way it is a very interesting way to prepare coffee.
The other typical coffee maker. If we think of typical coffee makers, the Italian mocha surely comes to mind. The other is that appliance that we have seen in dozens of movies, that is in the pantry of an old rental apartment, in some offices or in the one where your grandparents continue to prepare coffee when the family gets together. The filter coffee maker became very popular before the arrival of capsule coffee makers because it allowed an extremely simple preparation that fills several cups.
We add water, put in the paper filter, add the coffee, turn it on and wait for the glass jug to fill. There are quite expensive machines of this style, but in general they tend to be economical and, as we say, a few decades ago it was a very popular way to prepare a large amount of coffee in a short time. With the arrival of capsules and perhaps a greater awareness of specialty coffee, electric filter coffee makers were forgotten, but with the right technique, they are an excellent option.
The usual with coffee: ingredients. Something important is that, even if the best technique is used in any coffee preparation, if a bad raw material is used, the result will not be satisfactory. It is useless to have the best technique or the best machine if we have bad coffee or very hard water. The main thing is, as we always say, to have the best possible ingredients and there is no need to go for a Geisha coffee, but specialty coffees and ground just before preparation are essential elements.
If you have ever had a coffee in a coffee maker of this type and you don’t have a good memory, it could be due to two things: a design problem with the machines themselves that we will address later and, above all, that the easiest thing is for the coffee that was used for preparation was not the best.
Machine. That said, the machine is even simpler than an Italian coffee maker (whose design has its merits). These appliances have a water tank, a system of resistances that heat the water, a tube through which hot water comes out and is poured onto a container in which there is a paper and coffee filter. Through a small hole, the infused coffee is poured into the glass container. Depending on the type, it will have a more or less large tank, but a good calculation is the ratio of 30 grams of coffee per 500 milliliters of water.
Practically all brands specialized in cooking have their electric filter coffee maker and we find Ufesa, Russell Hobbs, Taurus, Severin or the classic Melitta (which is the one who invented this filter coffee). The price is around 50 euros, although there are always much more expensive examples such as those from Moccamaster, which cost 230 euros. This is where the design comes into play, but also that the water reaches the optimal temperature (the most difficult thing to achieve for cheap machines) and the drip system is more optimal. But the operation is basically the same in all of this type.
Let’s go with the tricks. Although the operation is simple, the truth is that there are a series of tricks that can help us achieve better coffee extraction in this type of coffee makers. Yes, by doing what we are going to say, we are moving away from that spirit of pressing a button and the coffee comes out, but it is what is causing a kind of renaissance of these coffee machines in recent years among… well, among coffee growers.
The first is to measure the temperature at which the water comes out. The heating systems of the cheapest machines will surely not reach the ideal temperature to prepare coffee. This should be between 90 and 96 degrees and, if it does not reach it, what we can do is buy a kettle that does reach that temperature and pour the preheated water into the tank. Or, at least, not cold water. Moccamaster claims his system reaches between 92 and 96 degrees.
The second trick is to stir the coffee tank a little with a spoon when the water starts to come out. If we do not do this, the jet or drip will most likely soak the coffee in the center and its immediate surroundings, leaving the peripheral coffee dry. When stirring the coffee, what we do is soak all the beans. Speaking of the grains, they should have a grind like sand or salt. They should not be as fine as those of a coffee espressosince the extraction in that case would not be carried out properly.
Hacking the coffee maker. With these two tricks, we will greatly improve the taste of the coffee from the electric filter coffee maker, but there is something else. One of the attractions that companies usually advertise about these machines is that, under the jug, there is a ceramic or aluminum base that keeps the coffee hot in the jug for a certain time. There are resistors passing through there that heat up that plate and, therefore, the jug heats up due to contact.
The growing trend in recent years is to directly render this plate unusable. There are three methods: placing something that will not be damaged by heat (like some wooden sticks or something like that) between the base and the jug, turning off the coffee maker just after the last drop of coffee has fallen, or directly opening it to Deactivate the contacts of that resistor so that it does not heat up.
Why is this done? Although it is true that it is comfortable to pour a cup and return at the same time for another one that is still hot, when we keep heat over already prepared coffee, it is like it ‘cooks’. Aromas and texture are lost, and may even burn. That is, if you buy the best coffee, but then let it reheat, it’s like you haven’t done anything.
If the coffee is good, it is like an infusion. In the end, with a preparation that is not as simple as the one that was devised when these machines were launched, what we achieve is being able to make a good specialty coffee in this type of coffee makers. It is a very convenient system because it allows several people to prepare quality coffee without investing a lot of time, but as you can see, there are some tricks and issues that are worth taking into account.
In the end, with this method what you should obtain is a kind of infusion, with a coffee that does not look black and, above all, is very smooth. And the good thing is that you don’t have to go for 200 euro machines, since with what we have mentioned, even a very simple one of about 50 euros will do a great job.
Images | Moccamaster, Elke Wetzig (Elya), Melitta
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