Coffee and Caffeine FAQ

First let me say that vacuum pots not only produce some of the best coffee you are likely to ever be fortunate enough to drink but they also look really cool while they are producing coffee.

How do vacuum pots work? The buildup of steam in the lower bowl forces the water up into the funnel, where it mixes with the ground coffee. A quick stir may be needed to wet the grounds into the water. A small amount of water is left behind in the lower bowl. This keeps the steam coming and the temperature constant. Brewing continues for 1-3 minutes. Then the siphon is taken off the heat. With no more steam being produced, a vacuum forms in the bowl, which sucks the brewed coffee down through the filter.

As a note if you have a vacuum pot that uses a spirit lamp to heat the water you will probably want to warm the water to a near boil before adding it to the vacuum pot. This will make the process much quicker since a spirit lamp can take quite a while to boil water.

Most people feel that you should allow the water to come to a boil or near boil in the lower chamber before putting the upper chamber on your vacuum pot. This will help reduce the chances of cool water getting pushed into the upper chamber before it is ready.

The Cory brand vacuum pots use an interesting glass filter. It fills the hole that coffee is pulled back through via vacuum after the heat is removed. I honestly do not know exactly how it works but it is able to keep sediment almost completely out when using finely ground coffee. This is the most efficient method of keeping sediment out of the final coffee that I have ever seen with the exception of paper filters. Unlike paper the Cory filter doesn't trap any of the oils in the coffee. I would highly recommend trying to find one of these filters if you have a vacuum pot that can accommodate using the glass rod. Unfortunately Cory is not longer making the part but there seem to be a number of them available online.

You should take care when serving and drinking coffee made in a vacuum pot it will be much hotter than with an automatic drip pot.

I’m told Vacuum pots also make good tea.

A few vacuum pot brands include:
Cona (the original) in England
Hario in Japan
Hellem in France
Yama Glass in Taiwan
Bodum
Cory, Sunbeam, Silex, Kent, Remington Electric and Westinghouse have all made vacuum pots in the past.
For more information and great pictures visit the <!-- SPCode u2 Start --> vacpot page at oldcoffeeroasters.com.