share your stove top percolator technique

Here is mine:

1) whether stainless or aluminum, do not wash it, just rinse it off with hot water and wipe off the inside of the basket with a tissue. It takes a few brews for the coffee oils to cover the metallic taste of the pot

2)add coffee to basket always using the same spoon, or scoop so you can have consistent taste from one pot to the other (we like two leveled scoops), the bottom of the basket must be above the water level in the pot

3)on our metal coil element stove, start pot on highest setting and wait for the first big "perk" (takes 10-13 minutes depending on which size percolator used) as soon as it starts, turn heat down to lowest setting and brew (4 minutes for 8 cup percolator and 5 minutes with the 9 cup percolator), at the end it is still perking but but very, very slowly

4) as soon as time is up, remove from heat and wait a minute or two for the few grinds that made it through the basket to settle to the bottom

5) pour slowly and enjoy

Mine is almost exactly the same, the differences being I use a paper-disc filter (so I can still use my regular grind) and my gas-top stove.
Otherwise its the same; stainless steel pot, just a rinse out (no soap), high heat till it starts then low heat for four minutes.

I'm not a huge fan of the taste from a percolator, but my parents love it. I have a Pyrex 9 cup glass one that is super cool to watch work, so I bring it out when the family is over. I just received a 6 cup Moka pot for my birthday though, so I'll be running that one pretty soon.

I don't like the taste of coffee out of a drip coffee maker so I just got a stovetop percolator and have now used it twice. I'm tweaking the method to find the optimum heat, percolation time and amount of coffee. It brews a very good coffee with a clean profile that is much better than an automatic drip maker. I like my coffee piping hot with a "dirty" and strong taste. I guess you can call it a rich taste. To get this I think I might just rinse and wipe down the percolator like the OP mentioned without washing it. I'm also going to let it percolate a little longer and add more coffee if I need to.

My go to coffee maker at home has been a 6-cup moka pot from Bialetti. I don't wash this after each use, but just rinse it and wipe it down. It is nicely coated with coffee oil. The espresso (I use Cafe Bustelo espresso) out of this thing is about the best coffee I've ever had. It damn near comes out as sludge and is very rich and piping hot. The only thing I don't like about it is that I'm sick of just making one cup at a time. I'm looking for something similar on a larger volume scale with the percolator.

I have a 1960's Comet Pour over Coffee Maker using a hot plate or stove top. I use my kettle to bring the water to a boil and pour it in the top chamber and put the lid on it and let it do its work, I turn on the eye of the stove on low and in 10-15 minutes I got 6 -8 cups of coffee.

If by percolator you mean moka pot (which I'm not sure can be considered a percolator) my routine is pretty simple. Fill base with water to just below valve. Grind coffee a bit finer than drip and fill basket. Put the assembly on medium heat until it starts trickling out the spout. Take it off the heat when water starts going clearer. Pour immediately. Rinse and wipe out all oils and residue. The oils go rancid pretty quickly and should be removed to avoid funk taste.

When I had a Bialetti Moca Pot my routine was very similar. The one thing I never did was adjust the temperature/heat setting. Once the pot began percolating I just would let it go for a minute and then it would finish. I was never a huge coffee drinker but I enjoyed the taste. I wonder now if I was burning my coffee the whole time and was just too much of a taste novice to notice!

My percolator method is as follows:
Step one--do this first because it could take a few minutes--build a campfire.
Step two. Proceed as usual.
Nothing beats coffee perked on a campfire!

Donnchadh_Sempill said:

Nothing beats coffee perked on a campfire!

Click to expand...

Everything tastes better in the woods! Beans, fried baloney, toasts made on a Coleman stove, mmmmmmmmmmmm.

My method is similar to J. Roger's. I use an old Revereware 8 cup Stainless stovetop percolator. I also use a filter.

I add a quart of water to the pot and two rounded teaspoons of coffee grinds to the basket per 6 oz cup of water.

I put the assembled percolator on our electric stovetop and set the burner to high. I set a timer for 10 minutes and when it goes off I watch for consistent perking and when that is happening I turn the burner down to one notch above half setting. I perk for 8 minutes. I let it sit for a minute or two after that's done and I've pulled it off the burner. Then I pour my first cup and set it back on the hot burner which has been set to a low temp (about 1/5 the heat of full). It keeps piping hot and delicious.

I never wash my percolator with soap or detergent. When not in use for days I pour a small amount of vinegar and water in it and rinse that all out when I'm ready to use it again.

I also run a perk cycle of just vinegar and water every once in a great while to cut down on excessive oil buildup in the pot and basket.

Hope that helps.

Chris

The Mrs. and I sometimes use our Coleman, 12 Cup - Stainless Steel Percolator mostly for the bolder taste and nostalgic feeling of the old days when Mom would start the day with coffee (ahh...the smell...what a way to start the day for a kid), and we would smell & hear the percolator in the morning!

Read More: http://www.coleman.com/product/stainless-steel-12-cup-coffee-percolator/2000016403?contextCategory=5180#.UxzuhvlxT5o

Like many members here, we like using a paper filter in the basket and about 4tbsp of Yauco Selecto Gourmet Ground Coffee from Puerto Rico per 12 cups of purified bottled water (a full bodied [and gets you going in the morning!!!], coffee with a creamy and rich taste with almost no distinguished aftertaste).

We also let it brew about 8-9 minutes, pull off the stove, rest for a few minutes, remove the basket and serve!

This Coleman is well made (to include the base, tube, basket and basket lid), sturdy and I believe will 'stand the test of time', but I did buy a few extra glass nobs in case we broke one and/or if one broke from heat expansion.

"The secret to keeping the glass percolator top from breaking while the pot is in use is to be careful not to screw on the percolator top too tightly. Both the glass and metal will expand when heated. If they are screwed too tightly together the hole will actually shrink just enough to break the glass. This is old technology that most of us have forgotten about and so little hints like this are not passed down anymore. Tighten the top just barely enough to keep it from rattling and no more. This will leave enough room between the glass and the metal for heat expansion".

Read More: http://www.amazon.com/Coleman-12-Cup-Stainless-Coffee-Percolator/product-reviews/B0009PUQSM

Besides being careful not to over-tighten the glass knob, coffee made in this manner has a more roasted, bolder and fuller, but rounded taste that our well used filter-drip coffee machine can not match.

"Coffee has its own subtle language". CBJ

PS Another memory is percolating coffee in the field on 'pot-belly' & 'yukon' stoves back in my Army days.