[gattilorenz]

I'm Italian as well, and Italy's taste for coffee is... at least questionable. Many nonnas drink coffee made with beans roasted to a char, adding a generous amount of sugar to make it palatable. See also the similar "espresso culture" [1, in Italian].

I've seen moka pots where the upper chamber is black with oily residue accumulated in years of not cleaning it to avoid this "sin". The resulting coffee is sour and bitter and generally disgusting (but again, that's what we are often drinking normally).

Part of the idea of not cleaning it is connected to the material (aluminum), which makes a protective layer of oxide which could be damaged by scrubbing; apart from the fact that using regular dish soap is not the same as scrubbing, the oxide will reform, you would need to eat a moka every 3/4 year for aluminum absorbtion to be a problem, and the whole point falls apart when using a steel moka pot.

I recommend trying out yourself in a double-blind test instead of trusting "received ideas": does the coffee after cleaning it taste better? worse? same?

[1] https://www.gamberorosso.it/notizie/caffe-bar-inchiesta/

[jszymborski]

> Italy's taste for coffee is... at least questionable.

I don't know how one can question taste... it's taste after all! It's subjective.

What I'm hearing is that you don't like bitter espresso with sugar. This is to my taste, and yet, I'm not questioning yours :)

[gattilorenz]

I agree! My point being that if taste is subjective, defining something taste-related as "wrong" (washing the moka, putting pineapple on pizza, etc.) is also silly.

Do as you please, eat whatever you will, if it diverges from tradition or received knowledge and you're happy about it go ahead and enjoy!

[jszymborski]

Ah, totally agree, perhaps I misread your comment. I'm not much for prescriptive views on food and my Italian family is full of 'em ;)