A much-loved coffee brewing device, inspired by a simple washing machine.Little bit history not only for Home Barista)
Bialetti
Many coffee lovers use the Moka Pot with a big joy to prepare their daily coffee drinks. The Moka Pot not only brews delicious coffee in a convenient way, but using it also brings cozy feelings of being home. In an old-fashioned way, the Moka Pot is placed over a stovetop. We hear the coffee gurgling and perking. The room is filled with wonderful fragrances. Love is in the air and it smells like coffee!
What’s the story behind the Moka Pot?
It’s the beautiful and inspiring story of a deeply curious man, who enjoyed observing the nature and things around him carefully. It’s also the story of a simple thought that changed the way of life in many homes around the world…
In the beginning of the 1930s, an Italian metalworker, named Alfonso Bialetti, observed how local women were using a simple washing machine to do the laundry. The machine consisted of two containers that were connected by a central pipe.
The container at the bottom was placed over a fire to bring soapy water to boil. Once the water started to vaporize, the created stream and pressure pushed it up through the tube to redistribute it over the laundry in the upper tube.
While watching the women doing the laundry, Bialetti came up with the brilliant idea that this mechanism could also be used to prepare coffee!
Revolutionizing the way coffee was prepared at home
Together with his business partner, inventor Luigi di Ponti, Bialetti was putting ideas into action. They rolled their sleeves up and invented a new way of brewing coffee, creating the so-called ‘Moka Express’, an aluminum stovetop espresso maker that pushes water from one chamber to another, through a tube and aromatic coffee grounds .
In the 1950s, Alfonso Bialetti’s son Renato brought fresh wind into the business processes. He hired the designer Paul Campani to create the new company logo and symbol: a caricature of a little man with a big moustache, who looks at us passionately, raising his finger, ordering another cup of coffee. It is believed that this man resembles Alfonso Bialetti.
Renato Bialetti was indeed a marketing genius, who successfully popularized the Moka Pot in Italy and beyond, using TV campaigns and more.
Ever since it had been invented, the charming Moka Pot became a part of the Italian way of life. Many Italian immigrants took their Moka Pots with them, to make themselves feel home, wherever their journey in life took them.
Moka Pots are commonly used in various other European countries, especially in Hungary, where it is called Kotyogo.
Preparing coffee with a Moka Pot is becoming a global trend. Many designers are now creating new Moka Pot versions, being inspired by the original, classical, elegant masterpiece.
