juvela

https://tinyurl.com/mzlkynf

Italuminium

This is brilliant, thanks for sharing.

I don't really miss the high pressures of a true espresso machine with my trusty Bialetti. The trick is to pour boiling water in the lower chamber, that will reduce the chance of overcooking the coffee to
almost zero.

juvela

thanks for the tip. i accomplish a similar goal by not assembling the pot until the water in the lower chamber is about to boil. one needs to grind fairly coarse and not tamp. fine grind and tamping raise the extraction temp to undesirable heights.

happy to meet another coffee enthusiast! ;^D

unworthy1

I'm not just (another) coffee enthusiast, but also a collector of stove-top espresso pots (AKA Mokas). I don't even know how many I own, but I have very few aluminum units (Bialetti or other brands) since I feel that stainless pots give a cleaner brew...and come in many more shapes than the basic "faceted" Bialetti. I like the little cartoon logo-man!

cyclotoine

hmmm....

Italuminium

I like the logo too. There's a very interesting article out there by prof. Schnapp on the relation between coffee, aluminum, Italian fascism and the prevalent attitude at the time in regard to arts and crafts.

some of the highlights of note for us bike nuts:

-espresso was seen as an expression of speed, one of the primary virtues of the time arising out of the massive influx of planes, trains, cars and off course bikes in the daily life.

-the fascist government decried the 19th century as the age of (english and german) steel, but the 20th aught to be the italian age, replete with the Italian metal: aluminium! Because Italy had (at the time) large reserves of the stuff they made it a figurehead for their economic development. Besides the stockpiles, the Italian govt. rightly believed that the best and most skillful, not too mention artistically gifted aluminium designers and craftsmen were Italian.

-coffee was off course the pride of Italies subjugated lands in Africa, so a certain colonial pride was mixed in the odious fascist brew of the time.

all these factors came together perfectly in the classic Bialetti; however, as prof. Schnapp shows, the golden age for the bialetti was not i the fascist era, but in the post-war recovery era when coffee consumption shifted from coffee houses to the modern home and the son of mr. Bialetti, himself not a marketing gebius, took over and marketed the pot to the nation, instead of a few shops and country fairs.

all in all a very interesting read for Italuminiums on sick leave

WNG

Curious, how are you guys assembling the espresso pots without burning your hands with your methods?
Fellow enthusiast would like to know.

Italuminium

Wet kitchen rag, or oven mitts

sailorbenjamin

Nice tunes, too.

Hadn't heard this before but it makes a lot of sense. Fascinating period of history and culture.

unworthy1

Thanks for that, I will try to find his article...I also came to admire the great skill with cast-aluminum that Italians developed when I saw my first Atomic stove-top maker in North Beach, SF. That, and others like the Vesuviana were masterpieces of craft and design. I starting my collection buying these second-hand in local thrift shops, but somebody changed my thinking by pointing out that the (porous) cast aluminum will trap oil (always present in coffee) and that oil will eventually turn rancid...smooth stainless does not (steel is real...there's your bicycle content!).
At the risk of tedium: when you get a chance to examine (and admire) an Atomic espresso maker, let that admiration direct you to some other Italaluminum products: Weber and Dellortto carburetors, Campagnolo auto wheels and...bicycle components...Artistry!

Italuminium

It's on Jstor, don't read it if you're allergic to the annoiying tendency of humanities majors to use all the hard words they know. (For gods sake, why write imbibe instead of drink unless you try to be a poet, quaint or mock a humanities scholar?)

As for the oils, I;ve read on multiple sites that frequent (i.e. daily) use makes the coffee maker all right again, so it's really the addicts' way of brewing. Fortunately I fit that description rather well!

juvela

here is the link to article cited by Italuminum.

https://www.jstor.org/discover/10.230...21102637565627

this one, in italiano, commemorates the 80th anniversary of the Bialetti moka pot and includes a photo of the original model -

https://design.repubblica.it/2013/08/.../?ref=HRSN-6#1

a question for the moka pot users: has anyone worked with any of the steam-driven piston models?

juvela

the Schnapp piece is available here as a free download; no registration required:

https://ebookbrowsee.net/the-romance-...-pdf-d54712869