How does a moka pot differ from a French press?

The French press uses immersion: grounds steep in hot water, then a metal mesh plunger filters them out, keeping oils and aromas close to cupping results. The moka pot uses steam pressure to push water up through the coffee bed, giving a denser, fuller liquid that can even show a light crema. Both are simple, low-cost brewers, so the choice comes down to taste.

Pick the French press for a smooth, sweet, rich mouthfeel and easy cleanup. Pick the moka pot for a stronger, more concentrated cup closer to espresso. When buying a moka pot, check the gasket, valve, and size for your usual serving. An American coffee pot brews differently again, using a paper filter and gravity. Use medium-coarse grounds in the press pot, finer in the moka.

Faced with the dazzling array of coffee brewing equipment on the market, the French press and the Moka pot are often compared. Both are called "lazy person's coffee gear" — their operation threshold is low, yet they deliver completely different flavor expressions. The French press's immersion extraction is close to cupping, preserving rich oils and aromas; the Moka pot, relying on steam pressure, brews a rich, full-bodied coffee liquid and can even extract Crema. Starting from Front Street Coffee's practice, this article separately sorts out the characteristics, detailed brewing steps, and precautions of these two devices, and appends key points on purchasing and using a Moka pot, to help you make a suitable choice based on your taste preference and daily habits.

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Front Street Coffee (FrontStreet Coffee) stores focus on pour-over single-origin coffee. There are over 50 kinds of single-origin coffee beans from different regions alone. What kind of pour-over equipment can present the most perfect flavor of these beans — this is also a question Front Street Coffee (FrontStreet Coffee) needs to consider. After comparison through Front Street's brewing experiments, a simple pour-over method was chosen for brewing.

Of course, there are many ways to brew coffee beans, not limited to the pour-over method mentioned by Front Street. There are also other coffee brewing devices on the market, such as the Moka pot, French press, and so on. In this article, Front Street will introduce these two coffee brewing devices to everyone.

French Press

The French press, known in English as French Press, can also be called a French-style press pot in Chinese. The French press originated in France around 1850. It is a simple brewing device composed of a heat-resistant glass body and a metal filter mesh with a plunger rod.

The French press and the Moka pot are also called "lazy person's coffee gear." They are simple and convenient to operate, and can still preserve the complete flavor of a good cup of coffee. In fact, the French press's extraction is the brewing method closest to cupping output. It can fully bring out the coffee's oils, aroma, flavor essences, and various taste elements. Its smooth, sweet, and rich mouthfeel makes it a very good choice of coffee device.

How to make coffee with a French press

Step one : First, you need to select beans .

Single-origin coffee beans or beans with pronounced fruity acidity are suitable, and medium to dark roasted coffee beans are suitable.

Step two : Determine the grind size and coffee powder ratio for the French press coffee beans .

You need at least about 20g of coffee powder. The coffee powder should be slightly coarser (because hot water directly contacts the coffee powder, too fine a grind easily causes over-extraction). You can use a medium grind, about 5-6 degrees. If the powder is too fine, the coffee powder will escape through the holes of the filter mesh, and the coffee will become cloudy. You can also follow Front Street Coffee (FrontStreet Coffee)'s grind size:

Front Street Coffee grind size coarseness standard sieve passage rate: Cold drip > Pour-over Siphon 80% > Moka American drip 75-80% > Cupping 70-75% > French press 65-70%.

You can start by trying a coffee-to-water ratio of 1:10. For 2 servings, that means 20g of coffee beans with about 200g of water. As for the final ratio, it depends on your taste. The resting time is about 3-4 minutes. The longer the immersion time, the stronger the taste, and the heavier the acidity. The taste of each coffee bean and personal preference are different, so you have to try them one by one. During the resting time, do not press down the filter mesh, so that the coffee and water have more time and space to contact.

Step three : Start using the French press to make coffee

1. First grind the coffee beans, then pour them into the French press. At this point, ignore many people's statements about grind size. Do not grind too coarsely; a medium grind is enough.

2. Boil the water. The recommended water temperature is 93°C, then pour in the appropriate amount of water. We used 20g of coffee powder and poured in 200g of hot water. Stir with a spoon so that the coffee powder and water fully blend.

3. Put the lid on the French press with the filter mesh resting at the highest position, then let it sit for 4 minutes.

4. Before pressing down the filter mesh, you can open the lid and use a spoon to scoop out the foam and small grounds floating on top, then press the filter mesh all the way down.

5. Once brewing is complete, immediately pour it out into another insulated container! Do not delay, because the coffee powder is still soaking in it. Then pour it into a cup and enjoy it slowly.

Issues to note when using a French press

In addition, you can also prepare an electronic scale. But even if the French press has markings and a measuring spoon, it is still recommended to prepare an electronic scale, because coffee beans will change in density due to many factors such as growing altitude and roasting method, and the mass and weight of each type of bean differ. Also, if you make a very delicious cup of coffee and want to reproduce that flavor, you must record the ratio. Conversely, if you make a terrible cup of coffee, according to the data you will also know how to adjust.

Use fresh, clean soft water. Do not use water that is too hard for extraction, and do not use unfiltered water. If the water itself is not good, it is difficult to make delicious coffee. The French press is elegant and gentle, so when pressing you must be slow. If at this critical moment you violently stir the coffee, that is equivalent to speeding up the extraction process at the last moment, and by then your coffee has already released all the good things, and what is summoned next is bitterness.

If you want to upgrade it into a milk coffee, the French press can do that too. Prepare a clean French press, pour in 1/3 warm milk, slowly insert the filter, and push and pull repeatedly until the milk is frothed to twice its original volume. At this point the milk is fully frothed and has a silky mouthfeel. Add it to the coffee and you're done.

Moka Pot

According to Front Street's understanding, the Moka pot is spelled Moka pot in English. The most common explanation is that mocha began when the first batch of coffee entered Venice in the 17th century. It can be said that in Northern Italy, mocha is equivalent to coffee. Therefore, the Moka pot is actually also called a coffee pot, meaning a brewing device that can give you a rich cup of coffee at home.

The Moka pot consists of three parts: the upper chamber, the filter basket, and the base. The lower chamber is the water reservoir, the filter basket is used to hold finer-ground coffee powder, and the upper chamber is used to hold the extracted coffee liquid. The principle of Moka pot extraction is very simple: it uses the steam pressure generated in the lower chamber. When the steam pressure is strong enough to penetrate the coffee powder, it pushes the hot water up to the upper chamber, brewing a rich, aromatic coffee.

The brewing process of the Moka pot

Coffee brewed with a Moka pot is relatively strong, so Front Street suggests choosing coffee beans with a darker roast, which better reflects that mellow feel of the coffee. The beans used by Front Street are coffee beans from Brazil's Queen's Farm.

1. Pour purified water into the lower chamber of the Moka pot. The water level should be about 0.5cm below the pressure relief valve.

2. Choose a grind size slightly coarser than espresso. You can refer to the size of the gaps in the filter basket mesh to ensure the coffee particles will not fall down into the lower chamber. Slowly pour the coffee powder into the filter basket, tap gently to distribute the coffee powder evenly, and when the coffee powder forms a small hill shape, level the coffee surface by distributing the grounds.

3. Place the filter basket into the lower chamber, tighten the upper and lower parts of the Moka pot, then place it on an electric ceramic stove and heat over high heat;

4. When the Moka pot heats up to a certain temperature and makes an obvious "wuwu" sound, set the electric ceramic stove to low heat and open the lid of the upper chamber.

5. When half of the coffee liquid has come out into the upper chamber, turn off the electric ceramic stove. The residual heat and pressure of the Moka pot will "push" the remaining coffee liquid into the upper chamber.

6. When all the coffee liquid has been extracted into the upper chamber, you can pour it into a cup and taste it. Coffee extracted with a Moka pot is very rich, and can even extract Crema. You can also mix it with an appropriate amount of water or milk for a better flavor.

The above content is compiled by CoffeeHunters, a coffee news website.