Neapolitan Flip Pot

The Neapolitan flip pot, or cuccumella, is the coffee pot Naples used before the moka pot. It’s two metal cylinders, one with a spout, joined by a perforated coffee basket. You heat the water in one half on the hob, then flip the whole pot over, so the hot water sits on top and drips through the coffee by gravity into the half with the spout. There’s no pressure involved, just gravity. Here’s how to use one, and where it came from.

The short version

• Two halves and a coffee basket: one half for water, one with a spout for coffee.
• Heat, then flip: gravity drips the hot water through the coffee.
• Fill to just below the small hole, and heat until steam comes out of it.
• A medium to medium-fine grind, coarser than for a moka pot.
• Credited to Jean-Louis Morize, 1819, and the pot of Naples until the moka.

How does a Neapolitan pot work?

1. The water half sits at the bottom on the hob. A small hole near its top shows the fill line and lets out steam when the water is ready.
2. The coffee basket sits between the two halves, with a perforated filter screwed on top.
3. The spout half sits on top, upside down at first, with its spout facing down.
4. When the water’s hot, you flip it. The water is now on top and drips through the coffee by gravity into the spout half, which is now the right way up.

How much coffee and water should I use?

There’s no single standard, and the cuccumella uses more coffee than most drip methods. In Perfect Daily Grind, Simone recommends 18 g of coffee to 200 ml of water (about 1:11). Caffè Ernani goes stronger, with 140 g per litre, or 28 g for the 200 ml of a 3-cup pot (about 1:7). In practice, fill the water half to just below the small hole and the basket with coffee, as the pot is sized to match.

What grind size should I use?

Medium to medium-fine, a little coarser than for a moka pot, as Italy Heritage puts it. Perfect Daily Grind notes that the finer you grind, the more intense and bitter the brew. Caffè Ernani’s test: if the water takes more than about 4 minutes to drip through, the coffee is ground too finely.

How do you use a cuccumella, step by step?

1. Fill the water half to about 5 mm below the small hole, and no further.
2. Add the coffee to the basket, set it in place and screw on the filter.
3. Fit the spout half on top, spout facing down.
4. Heat it until a thin jet of steam or a drop of water comes from the small hole.
5. Take it off the heat and flip it, holding both handles firmly.
6. Let it drip until the water chamber is empty.
7. Lift off the water half and basket, and pour.

Guides disagree on the drip time: about 2 to 3 minutes (Perfect Daily Grind), about 4 (Caffè Ernani), 5 to 10 (Italy Heritage) or 10 to 12 (Caffè Vergnano). Pot size and grind make the difference. Caffè Vergnano’s guide also times the flip differently: turn off the heat, wait about a minute, then flip. In Naples, a small paper cone called a cuppetiello is traditionally put over the spout while it drips, to keep the aroma in. Brew mode on this page times the drip for you.

A short history of the cuccumella

• 1819: most sources credit a French tinsmith, Jean-Louis Morize, with the design, which is why it’s also called the cafetière Morize.
• Naples: it became so closely tied to Naples that it’s known as the caffettiera napoletana. The name cuccumella comes from cuccuma, a Neapolitan copper or terracotta pot.
• 1886: according to Wikipedia, it was made of copper until 1886, when makers switched to aluminium.
• The moka: it stayed Italy’s everyday home coffee maker until Bialetti’s moka pot arrived in 1933 and gradually replaced it.

Neapolitan pot vs moka pot

	Neapolitan flip pot	Moka pot
How it brews	Gravity drip, after a flip	Steam pressure, upwards
Pressure	None	Steam pressure
Time	Heat, then about 2 to 10 minutes to drip	About 5 minutes
Skill	The flip takes a little practice	Easy

General guidance only. The pot is full of near-boiling water when you flip it: hold both handles firmly, flip away from you and anyone else, and use a pot with sound handles and seals.

Neapolitan pot vs other methods

• Moka pot: the steam-pressure pot that replaced it.
• Biggin: another early drip pot.
• Vietnamese phin: a single-cup metal drip filter.
• South Indian filter coffee: a slow metal drip for a strong decoction.

Explore every metal-filter method in the gravity chapter.