Most south Indian households will have their own versions of making this. Many have a long winded process which runs all night for the perfect drip coffee by morning.
The equipment
This humble piece of machinery has again 3 parts to it but much simpler than the French press in some ways.
· The bottom chamber which collects decoction reverse of the Moka pot.
· The top chamber which is perforated and which will contain the grounds as well. This has a slot at over 1-2 cms from the bottom roughly indicating the level to which grounds go and also for the tamper/plunger to fit
· The tamper/plunger is the third part which does a bit of tamping and no plunging. It just separates the grounds from the water. The bottom of the tamper has perforations and so it regulated-ly allows water to flow through but does not allow an all open conversational contact between the grounds and the water.
· The lid of course is present
This assembly due to the built of it allows water to slowly move down the grounds to reach the bottom chamber which collects the decoction. Pressure is not applied to water and so the water takes its jolly good time through the grounds. The contact time is higher than most other methods and the whole process can take up to hours. For a family of 4-5 people the mother sets up this apparatus at night for the slow drop-by-drop dripping process to start and Voilà by the time mom wakes up in the morning you have a kitchen filled with coffee aroma and by the time dad wakes up the coffee + milk + sugar concoction is ready – super hot to kick off the day.
Method
1. It is advisable to pre heat the whole equipment. It is metallic and tries to conduct heat quickly but we would like to retain heat to a bit longer than it should.
2. Give it a quick wipe and then fill up the top chamber with the coffee ground. A coffee chicory ground would be more authentic. The grind preferable be like fine sugar. Any finer ground and water will drip deadly slow and will take a generation to make a cup.
3. Slide the tamper/plunger into the top chamber and gently tamp them. The plunger which separates the coffee ground from water does essentially one very good thing. It separates the coffee and water. Coffee has a tendency to oxidize very quickly in contact with air. This imparts a kind of sourness to the coffee. Because of the plunger you have coffee covered by water but not essentially coffee-water slurry like in a French press.
4. Assemble the whole set up. Pour hot water GENTLY in the top chamber. 100-95 degrees of water should do considering the metallic apparatus you have which tends to loose heat and also as the water does not directly come in contact with the coffee.
5. You can see a brown foaming and good indication. Close the lid.
6. Sit back and relax in anticipation of a great cup of coffee.
7. After a few hours when the water from the top chamber percolates to the bottom chamber. Disassemble and pour out the decoction from the bottom chamber into a cup
8. Add milk preferably full cream and sugar or condensed milk or for those other group of people who feel its sinful use toned milk and sugar free.
9. Make a dark to medium brown coloured coffee.
The chicory actually adds a nice flavour and flowery taste and fragrance to it and also gives a certain consistency and thickness to the beverage. It does more than that. Chicory is said to have the good qualities of killing intestinal worms.
More thick mouthfuls and a satisfying drink. A shot of caffeine and sugar in a sustained release mechanism of milk give you the boost for a longer time than plain black any day.
Courtesy-thegreatindiancoffeeblog