Electric Percolator

An electric percolator is a stovetop percolator with the heater built in: a pot with a perk tube up the middle and a perforated basket of coffee at the top, plugged into the wall instead of put on a hob. Most switch to keep-warm automatically when the coffee is ready, so there’s no watching the knob. Here’s how to use one, following a maker’s own instructions, plus a little history.

The short version

• The same cycle as a stovetop percolator: water rises up the tube, drips through the coffee, and repeats.
• Cold water to the cup mark. Presto suggests making at least 2 cups.
• Presto’s amounts: 2 tbsp for 2 cups, 4 to 5 for 4, 5 to 6 for 6, with a cup at about 5 oz.
• Regular or percolator grind, with an optional wraparound paper filter.
• No timing: a signal light tells you it’s done, and it keeps the coffee hot.

How does an electric percolator work?

It’s the percolator cycle, with a heating element in the base. Wikipedia sums up the stovetop version: water in the pot is heated, pushed up the central tube, hits the underside of the lid, and flows over the inner lid of the basket, whose perforations spread it over the grounds. It then drips back into the pot and goes round again.

The difference is control. An automatic electric model decides when the coffee is done and then keeps it hot, so you don’t have to turn the heat down by hand.

How much coffee do you put in an electric percolator?

Here are Presto’s suggested amounts for its 6-cup stainless steel percolator, which you can adjust to taste:

Cups of brew	Tablespoons of coffee
2	2
4	4–5
6	5–6

Presto counts one cup as about 5 ounces of brewed coffee, not a big mug. If your percolator marks cups differently, scale the coffee to the water rather than the number on the side.

Presto asks for regular or percolator grind. Percolator baskets have large holes, so very fine coffee is likely to fall through into the pot.

How do you use an electric percolator, step by step?

These steps follow Presto’s instructions for its 6-cup model:

1. Wash it before first use: the inside, cover and basket assembly in hot soapy water, then rinse. Don’t put the base or cord in water.
2. Fill with fresh cold water to the level you want, using the fill marks inside.
3. Fit a wraparound filter, if you use one, with its centre hole over the basket stem.
4. Add the coffee, keeping a finger over the stem so no grounds fall through, then fold the filter over the coffee.
5. Put the basket lid on, seat the perk tube in the perk well in the base, slide the basket onto the tube and push the cover down firmly.
6. Plug the cord into the percolator first, then into the wall. Never plug it in empty.
7. Wait for the signal light. The coffee stays hot as long as it’s plugged in.

General guidance only. Follow your own percolator’s manual: never immerse the base or cord, never run it empty, and take care with the lid, as scalding can occur if it’s removed during brewing.

Why is my electric percolator coffee weak or not brewing?

Problem	Likely cause	Try
No coffee, or very weak coffee	Perk tube not seated in the perk well	Reseat the tube firmly in the indented well in the base (Presto)
Weak coffee	Too little coffee for the cups made	Use Presto’s amounts, scaled to 5 oz cups
Grounds in the pot	Coffee fell down the stem, or the grind is too fine	Cover the stem while filling, use percolator grind or a paper filter
Weak flavour from small batches	Brewing a single cup	Presto suggests at least 2 cups for best flavour

A short history of the electric percolator

• 1889: Hanson Goodrich, an Illinois farmer, patents the modern US stovetop percolator, according to Wikipedia.
• 1905: General Electric publishes a pamphlet titled “Coffee Making By Electricity”, and Wikipedia says electric percolators have been made since at least the first decade of the 1900s.
• About 1922: Ukers’s All About Coffee lists a “Universal Electric Urn” and a Manning-Bowman percolator among coffee makers used in the United States.
• 1948 to 1960: the Science Museum Group holds a Swan “Mayfair” electric percolator, 400 W, made by Bulpitt and Sons of Birmingham in this period.
• Early 1970s: Wikipedia says percolators’ popularity “plummeted” with better instant coffee and the arrival of the electric drip coffee maker.

Electric percolator vs other methods

• Stovetop percolator: the same cycle on a hob, timed by eye.
• Automatic drip coffee maker: the machine that replaced it, passing water through once.
• Urn brewer: big-batch brewing for events and offices.
• Moka pot: stovetop pressure for a stronger, smaller cup.
• French press: immersion, with full control of time.

Explore more metal and gravity pots in the gravity and metal chapter.