StuDudley

>>So it seems some people are calling drip Mr Coffee type machines electric perks<<

I think it was only me......

Stu Dudley

NeoPatrick

Stu, I think it WAS only you, except that robjame in his original post was doing so also, as he mentions just above your last post.

Percolators also usually had that little glass knob or bubble on top where you could see the water bubbling up and gradually turning darker. I was fascinated watching it as a kid. Hey, some kids before the days of gameboys were easily amused!

ggreen

How funny that your Parisienne said she had never seen a French Press! The first time I ever saw one was in Paris about 20 years ago - and the first coffee maker I ever bought was at the end of that stay, to bring back to the States with me. Back then, they were much more difficult to find and certainly more expensive Stateside than in France...

Now I'm a lazy slob and use my electric, filter coffee maker. sigh!

Christina

I thought robjame's friend may have been doing that, also, which I could understand if she were French and didn't know what that term would mean in North American (as a drip coffeemaker would be electric). I read online that percolators actually boil the coffee (I remember those from the old days) so they aren't as good as the drip kind in terms of coffee quality--can make it bitter.

I know I've seen Bodum products in Galeries Lafayette's home store (and BHV), but I'm not sure about a French press. They probably have one, though, they have lots of other Bodum products. What they call a French press in the US is a cafetière à piston in French (as I said, cafetière just means coffee pot, and you can have a cafetiere electrique, manuelle, etc.). The fact that they just call it a cafetiere in the UK doesn't surprise me, they use French terms in their own way often.

Here is an example of a Bodum cafetiere a piston for sale by a French kitchen equipment website
http://www.cuisinstore.com/cafetiere-a-piston-bodum

AnselmAdorne

My father made coffee in glass percolators for many, many years. Like Patrick, I found it fascinating as a child to watch the water start to bubble up the glass stem in the centre of the pot. It hit the glass lid and fell down into a basket filled with ground coffee. And yes, the water gradually darkened as it continued to perk.

My brother and I just cleared out my father's house and discovered two of these percolators in the basement. We sent them off to auction, along with many other items from the house.

robjame, like you, we have been using a French press at home for a number of years. (We make the coffee double strength and then add an equal amount of heated milk.) I don't recollect ever seeing a press in all of the gîtes or apartments we have rented. We have encountered electric kettles and cone filters, as well as electric drips--the kind where you fill a reservoir and it pumps the heated water into a filter basket. (I've had a bit of bad luck with those; when you swing the basket back in place you can accidentally fold the paper filter over. This can lead to weak coffee or worse, a diversion onto the counter top. Either is maddening when you are in desperate need of caffeine ...)

And one other oddity: we take our own coffee to France. There is a local roaster in Wolfville Nova Scotia who makes an excellent dark roast. We're addicted.

Anselm

ira

>Coffee purists say that this is the worst way to prepare coffee because it boils the already boiled coffee.<

Not if you turn the heat down so that the only boiling is in the area beneath the stem of the basket.

It should be a glass pot, with a glass stem and basket.

It is much better than pouring ground coffee into a pot with some eggshells and letting it boil.

robjame

<<we take our own coffee to France.>>
Not Folgers I hope, Anselm?

Our apartment is located a few steps fron the Arnaud Delmontel boulangerie, (who won the "best baguette in Paris" contest this year), Vivienne's fromagerie and the Brulerie de Montmartre (link below). That covers all the food groups, n'est-ce pas?

http://www.e-quartier.com/boutique.php?id=145

Check the price of a cup of Arabica - €1.20

AnselmAdorne

Folgers!!! Ouch. No, it's an organic fair trade place we buy from. We really like their dark roasts.

<<That covers all the food groups, n'est-ce pas?>>

Don't forget wine; that's a major food group, LOL.

AA