USING A MOKA POT

Serves: 2 Cups Difficulty: Easy Time Taken: 5 mins,  Active: 4 mins

A Moka Pot or stove top espresso maker,
Your favourite specialty coffee
A grinder
A scale
A cup
Water

The Moka pot is a fantastic tool for brewing great espresso like coffee without having to spend a small fortune on a machine for your kitchen.

Ideal for small apartment kitchens, the Moka pot is a simple tool that brews coffee quickly and is also remarkably easy to clean. A Moka pot works by moving pressurised boiling water through ground coffee from the bottom chamber to the top.

Patented by Italian engineer Alfonso Bialetti in 1933, the Moka pot is an instantly recognisable coffee tool that’s as stylish as it is simple. Today, Bialetti Industrie, as well as a variety of other manufacturers, produce Moka pots based largely on the original 1930s design.

Brewing coffee using a Moka pot only takes a few minutes with a quick post-brew clean up, making it a good way to prepare your espresso if you have limited time.

Time Required: 3 to 4 minutes.

Before you start, fill your kettle with drinking water and bring it to the boil. Using hot water in a Moka pot avoids giving the coffee a metallic taste, which is often the result of boiling cool water in the Moka pot and “cooking” the coffee.

The first step in preparing coffee in a Moka pot is weighing and grinding your coffee beans. For a four-cup Bialetti Moka pot, you’ll need 15 to 17 grams of coffee, ground to the same fineness as you would require for an espresso machine.

Weigh and grind your coffee, then set it aside for a moment. Once your kettle comes to the boil, pour the boiling water into the bottom of the Moka pot, making sure you fill the pot to just below the safety valve.

Insert the metal filter into the bottom section of the Moka pot. It should sit on top of the bottom piece of the Moka pot. Gently pour your ground coffee into the filter and evenly distribute it using your finger so that the top of the ground coffee is flat.

Once you’ve spread the coffee throughout the filter, screw on the top section of the Moka pot. The hot water will have made the bottom section quite hot to the touch, so you may want to wear an oven glove or use a dishtowel for a safer grip.

After you’ve assembled the pot, put it on the stove with the lid closed and bring it to a medium heat. As the hot water in the bottom section of the pot starts to boil, the pressure will force it through the coffee and into the top section of the Moka pot.

The coffee should gradually start to flow into the top section. If it comes through too quickly and spills out of the Moka pot’s spout, the heat is too high. If it barely comes through at all, you’ll need to turn up the heat.

Give the coffee a moment or two to cool down, and then pour it into your favourite coffee mug and enjoy. If you’re using a gas stove, check that the handle of the Moka pot has cooled before you pour it, as it can occasionally pick up heat from the flame.

The Moka pot was one of the first devices to bring espresso-style coffee brewing into the home. Learn about its interesting history in 1930s Italy in I Need Coffee’s The Story of the Bialetti Moka Express.