System Büttner coffee maker


"System Büttner" coffee makers have been a type of manual and semi-automatic coffee makers combining coffee steeping with drip-filtering.

Overview

The idea to combine steeping with drip-filtering was utilized by the Berlin-based coffee roaster Carl Artur Büttner in his 1926 invention of a manual zero-bypass flat bottom coffee maker consisting of four parts, all made out of porcelain: a filter pot with lid, saucer and coffee pot. The filter pot featured a through-glazed porcelain filter with triangularly-arranged slits with some air space below. The captured hot air causing mild micro-turbulences on the underside of the coffee grounds were said to help avoid clogging. Steeping was achieved utilizing a valving mechanism stopping the flow through the filter by a specially designed rotatable saucer with a single hole, which had to be positioned between the filter pot and the coffee pot so that the hole was initially closed and was manually opened when the coffee had been steeping for three to five minutes. Once released, it then took between three and six minutes for the coffee to drip through the meanwhile settled coffee bed into the coffee pot, a method sometimes also called cake filtration.
Marketed since spring 1927 and up into, at least, the 1940s, these coffee makers were available as stand-alone devices for home use, but were also adopted by various other German coffee roasters, Georg Schrader & Co. aka Geschraco, , and Columbus ) as part of larger coffee machines produced by the porcelain manufacturer for heavy-duty semi-continuous batch use in restaurants and canteens. The Büttner extraction method was boldly marketed claiming to be the world's best moka and coffee filter.
The properties were said to be:
  • 100% porcelain, no contact with metal, enamel, or paper impacting the taste
  • Permanent filter requiring no paper filter or bags, thereby reducing costs
  • Claim to have no tendency of clogging the filter sieve holes
  • Full aroma, claimed to have up to 30% increased extraction efficiency, thereby reducing costs
  • Reduced amount of oily components and caffeine in finished coffee
  • Easy to clean by just washing out with water
  • Possibility to draw coffee from the coffee pot even before the coffee preparation process has been finished
  • May need preheating of the porcelain due to longer than normal extraction time
  • Needs coarser than normal coffee grounds

    Preparation

Forms and sizes

Known forms include:
  • Büttner Kaffee: "Inhalt 2½ Ltr. 16–17 Tassen"
  • Büttner / Bauscher: 1423/1, 1423/2, 1423/3, 1423/4, 1423/5
  • Bremer Kaffeemaschine / Bauscher Weiden: 1518/3,00
  • Ferd+Eichhorn Braunschweig / Bauscher Weiden: 1521/4
  • Büttner / Bauscher: 1521/3, 1521/5
  • Bauscher Kaffeesparmaschine System Büttner: 1550/100
  • Bauscher Weiden: 1550/175
  • Büttner / Bauscher: 1560/0,80, 1560/1,40, 1560/1,7 Ltr. G/3½ Ltr., 1560/2,00
  • Heimbs & Sohn Braunschweig: 1560/3,00
  • Geschraco / Bauscher Weiden: 1755/1,00
  • Columbus / Bauscher Weiden
Sizes:
  • Size 1: 0.5 litre
  • Size 2: 0.75 litre
  • Size 3: 1.5 litre
  • Size 4: 3 litre
  • Size 5: 6 litre