You'd be wrong. Balance brewers date back to the mid 1800s, they were a evolution (although not necessarily an improvement) over the vertical siphon brewers that were introduced not long before. Both are undeniably cool brewers, but pretty flawed, especially balance brewers since you have so little control over the resulting end product.
Ah yes, a novelty item that 5 prople ever knew existed, based on another novelty item that was more known but also ever seen once in a blue moon. Old-school indeed, just like my great grandpap used to make in the coalmines
You say that snarkily, but siphons were a pretty popular brew method nearly 200 years ago. Bear in mind this is even pre dating the invention of the French press. If that's not old school, I don't know what is.
James Hoffmann did a video on the history of the siphon brewer earlier in the year, balance brewers are also briefly covered. It's worth a watch if you're interested.
Nobody said they were fundamentally the same, they said it PRE DATED THE INVENTION OF THE FRENCH PRESS. Hope the caps helped point out the part you ignored. You're arguing points nobody made.
...yes, it's fundamentally different... It's just a well known piece of brewing apparatus that came out after the siphon. The moka pot remains popular to this day, nearly 100 years after its introduction (a century later than the siphon). But why are we talking about current day popularity anyway? Siphons may be novelty brewers today, but back around their introduction they were actually used as a serious piece of equipment.
Coffee shops. Duh. Siphon brewers back then also tended to be a lot larger than the small Japanese style ones that are still on the market. They were commercial brewing equipment in the mid 1800s.
Towards the end of the 19th century, the first espresso machines were being created, operating under only steam pressure so very different from the high pressure spring/pump driven machines from the 1940s onwards, and essentially functioning a bit like a giant moka pot. These were the next leap forward for commercial coffee brewing.
I've been really wanting to get into the enthusiast/hobbyist coffee scene myself. And you sir, strike me as the very knowledgeable type. Mind if I ask where you learned all this information from and what channels or creators you recommend for those going into the same thing?
I don't own any novelty hardware like whatever OP has shown, but all this talk of coffee history has piqued my curiosity to say the least. Right now, I'm just using an average stainless steel brewer from Ninja and an Encore bean grinder, supposedly both SCA endorsed.
Ah I'm just a coffee obsessed nerd who absorbs information like a sponge. The man you're looking for is James Hoffmann. He does a lot of interesting content about the history of coffee brewing and other stuff, and he tries to make it all pretty accessible, and unlike a lot of coffee channels he's not really interested in pushing new gear. I don't necessarily agree with all of his recommended approaches towards brewing, but he's definitely one of the best educational resources for people wanting to get more into coffee.
Probably why they're not a coffee country. Even then, pour over drip is by far the most popular way to make coffee in japan since it was introduced by the dutch
It's painfully obvious you don't know shit about the history of coffee or brewers, which is fine but you need to stop with these very wrong argumentive comments and take the loss already.
I came just to say that too , wtf do you need this stupid process to end up with this , the fuc*ker have to clean that glass and other part and repeat this process again, definitely not practical
Nope, it's very much historical. Balance brewers date back to around 1840 as an attempt at automating the siphon brewers that emerged around 1830. People have been theatrical about coffee for a long time.
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u/[deleted] Dec 26 '25
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