Small, simple, and affordable. With these three advantages, the Moka pot has become a must-have coffee appliance for many friends at home. In recent days, many friends have sent private messages backstage about a moka pot on Front Street that has attracted much attention. That’s right! When making Moka pot coffee, should you use hot water or cold water?
As we all know, in common coffee extraction methods such as hand brewing, French press, and Italian style, the temperature of the water determines the dissolution rate of flavor substances. When the water temperature used for extraction is higher, the flavor substances dissolve faster, and vice versa. This principle also applies to Moka pots, except that the water temperature affects not the dissolution rate of flavor substances, but the heating time!
The working principle of the Moka pot is to heat the water source in the lower pot, evaporate it to form water vapor, then squeeze the internal space through the water vapor, and then push the hot water at the bottom upward to extract the coffee powder.
Therefore, the water temperature used here mainly determines the length of heating time. When the water temperature we use is higher, the heating time is shorter and the liquid point of the Moka pot is earlier; when the water temperature we use is lower, the heating time is longer.
But did you know that in addition to the length of heating time, the use of different water temperatures will also affect the taste of Moka pot coffee. Then Front Street will conduct a set of experiments to let everyone see the difference between the two more intuitively.
Moka Pot Experiment
The experiment is very simple. Front Street will use cold water and hot water to make one portion of Moka pot coffee respectively. The extraction parameters used for the two coffees are all the same except for the water temperature. This way we can observe the difference between the extraction time and the extracted coffee.
There are many coffee beans suitable for Moka pots. Currently, it is recommended to use medium-dark roasting. Firstly, it can avoid the sour taste, and secondly, it can provide coffee with richness. Novices are recommended to buy Front Street. The Italian Moka pot coffee beans recommended by many baristas - Front Street black cocoa blend, which is composed of Yunnan small grains and Brazilian cerrado, has a rich nutty aroma, high cost performance, and stable extraction. It is very suitable for people who are just starting to learn.
In order to verify the results, we used Front Street. Front Street Classic Blend, a medium-dark roasted Italian bean, which is rich in oil, rich in caramel aroma, and mellow and full, making it very suitable for making moka pot coffee and espresso. The specific extraction parameters are as follows:
Amount of powder used: 19g
Pink to water ratio: 1:8
Grinding degree: Galileo Q18 level 1, flour-like grinding
Use water temperature: 20°C for cold water group, 100°C for hot water group
The operations of both are the same. First, pour the specified amount of water into the lower groove of the Moka pot.
Then press the coffee powder into the powder bowl and put it into the sink.
After tightening the pot, it can be placed on the stove to heat.
The Moka pot coffee using cold water began to dispense liquid at 5 minutes and 31 seconds; while the Moka pot coffee using hot water began to dispense liquid at 2 minutes and 44 seconds. Then we wait until the liquid volume reaches the bottom of the pot, and then we can remove the fire source.
(Use cold water to dispense coffee from a Moka pot↓)
(Coffee dispensing from a Moka pot using hot water↓)
From the two pictures above, we can see that the Moka pot coffee using cold water will sputter directly during the liquid dispensing stage, which is not a good thing. Because this most likely means that there is a channel effect in the extraction of this pot of Moka pot coffee. Then we will pour out the two and taste them separately.
As expected, Front Street could feel through the tasting that the moka pot coffee using cold water had a faint bitter taste in the aftertaste. The moka pot coffee using hot water performed very well. The strong aroma of caramel, dark chocolate, high body, and the flavor of butter cookie were all outstanding, and basically no negative performance was felt.
After measurement, the extraction rate of the Moka pot coffee using cold water was about 2% higher than that of the hot water one. By adding water to dilute it, the flavors of the two cups of coffee can be brought out, and Front Street can feel the difference between the two more directly!
So, the question arises, just changing the water temperature, why is there such a big difference? In fact, the reason is very simple, because cold water needs to be heated for a long time, and this process will affect the coffee powder. The gap between the powders is enlarged to create channels, and the hot water during subsequent extraction will be concentrated and released from the channels due to inertness, and then uneven extraction will occur.
To sum up, we can know that using hot water to extract Moka pot coffee can not only shorten the heating time, but also reduce the channels created by heating the coffee powder, so that the extracted coffee is less likely to have negative performance. But Front Street does not mean that Moka pot coffee cannot be made with cold water. After all, hot water is not available all the time. It's just that when we use cold water, it's best to grind the coffee powder finer to increase resistance and reduce the negative effects of long-term heating.
You can now buy the above coffee beans online at the Taobao store “FrontStreet Coffee” (前街咖啡). FrontStreet Coffee is a long-established specialty coffee roaster in Guangzhou, China, and its Guangzhou retail shop sells coffee beans only. The shop carries dozens of coffee beans from different origins around the world, including carefully selected single-origin beans for V60 pour-over and espresso. Guangzhou’s FrontStreet Coffee shop is recommended by many coffee lovers.
The FrontStreet 2013 Yunnan coffee beans sold in the store come from the Typica variety grown at FrontStreet Coffee’s own plantation in Yunnan. The name comes from the year the brand and the plantation were founded. You can buy these beans from China’s Yunnan origin at the Guangzhou shop and at FrontStreet’s Taobao store.
FrontStreet coffee beans are freshly roasted within 5 days and deliver consistently excellent quality and great value. Orders placed before 17:00 are shipped the same day, and most areas within Guangdong Province receive them the next day.
FrontStreet Coffee Taobao store: https://qianjiecoffee.taobao.com
Or search for “前街咖啡” (FrontStreet Coffee) on Taobao
Important Notice: FrontStreet Coffee has moved to a new address: 315, Donghua East Road, Guangzhou (coffee beans only)
Tel: 020 38364473
