Espresso coffee machines....

[Mikew]

Have been thinking of buying one of these for a long time now, has anyone any thoughts or recommendations? Can these machines provide boiling water for tea, or is it only steam? I'm not starting a café, only wanting it for home use!

MikeW

[Quillan]

We have one, it's a Krupps which is a good make and in the upper middle price range, it make Espresso and on the other side normal filter coffee. Although a domestic version we use it for the B&B, filter in the morning and Espresso after evening meal. It has a nozzel on the side to heat milk but can't produce hot water for tea, I fear you would have to go for a profesional machine to do this. I did try once using the filter coffee water for tea but it just does not get hot enough.

The Krupps makes espresso the same way as in a cafe, you put the coffee in the container unit that then screws, by about half a turn, under the unit. You press the button and the hot water is forced through the coffee in to the cup. You have two containers, one for a single cup and another for two cups but we are talking the little French cup size. For us the biggest problem is the water container which on most domestic versions is not very big although the more up market the make the more water capacity but then one has to bear in mind it's not really meant for what we want but to get the smallest proffesional version is about 6,000€ as against 200€ so you pays your money and all that.

A friend has one of these Philips jobs which takes the coffee bag, there are two or three makers of this type of machine now, I just used Philips as an example. Likewise there are only a few suppliers of the coffee bags and to be honest it does not taste the same (I don't know if it's the machine, the way it heats the water or the coffee), at least mine tastes somewhere near what you get in a cafe.

For tea we use a filter kettle and then decant in to thermo jugs and put them out with a selection of teas. The water stays hot enough for about 3 hours to make decent tea.

Hope this helps.

[Racerbear02]

I just bought a full hit commercial job off Ebay for £250 only 3 yrs old with coffee grinder and water filter etc. MUCH better than any of the home ones, and less expensive than a lot of them.

OK it is a big thing but it does look good in the kitchen and makes PROPER expresso

Might be worth a thought.

Happy cafeine

[Quillan]

[quote]I just bought a full hit commercial job off Ebay for £250 only 3 yrs old with coffee grinder and water filter etc. MUCH better than any of the home ones, and less expensive than a lot of them. OK it i...[/quote]

Actually I never thought of Ebay but then as you said the commercial machines are rather big. I have seen a smaller machine that 'plumbs' in and can sit on a work surface but it was expensive and I don't have the space for a big one. Bet yours makes really nice coffee.

[Jill<br><br>Jill (99)]

I posted a similar enquiry a few months ago and didn't get any suggestions. We do have an expresso machine, but I wouldn't recommend it. It makes delicious coffee, but my advice is to ensure that it has a back "wall" and possibly a side wall too. Ours sends a spray of coffee all around it and the warning that the overflow tray is full isn't very obvious. We have had our expresso for nearly 6 years, which I think is longer than any filter machine we have had in over 26 years. But this one is very messy. Professional machines have the machinery at the back and therefore a good shield to other things. I wouldn't go for a professional machine, but just look where it is likely to spray.

[Will]

Knowing that I prefer real coffee to her Nescafé, Judie bought me a Morphy Richards one for Christmas. It's much better than a Philips one I had years ago that rather put me off small espresso machines, and works very well. In fact I've got a capuccino right now.

I'd agree about the water container being too small, and rather difficult to fill. You also have to wait for it to heat up again after making coffee if you want steam, which can be a bit of a pain. It too was messy at first, but is fine now after I removed something called a 'BaR cream - patents pending in all industrialised countries' to which there was no reference in the instructions and the sole function of which seems to be to block the holes where the coffee comes through.

If I was making coffee for more than two people at a time though it would be worth getting a bigger machine. There were some good deals on professional and semi-pro coffee makers at the Whittard shops in England, in particular at the outlet shop at Gun Wharf in Portsmouth (an absolutely essential stop-off for all ferry users).

[Battypuss]

Maybe not a lot of use, but I repeated saw an ad on TV before christmas for a machine that made, coffee, expresso, tea, hot chocolate and for all I know, chicken soup, depending on which "pod" you shoved in the top. The make escapes me; I'm having a blonde day, despite being more or less brunette! Perhaps someone else might remember?

[Dick Smith]

Not the Phillips Senseo? That was heavily advertised over Christmas, but it only makes coffee. I bought one yesterday and it makes good coffee, but you are limited to Douwe Egberts coffe bags.

[Will]

There's another one made by Braun that seems more widely available in France, though there again you need the special bags to put in it and they are only made by one or a few companies. I suppose if these things really catch on then other coffee suppliers and supermarket own brands will jump on the bandwagon but it's probably early days.

[Iceni]

We have a small device that sits on the gas hob - not sure what to call it. Loose coffee into bottom half and water in the top. Cheap alu model can be bought for €10 - 15 or shiny, stainless steel job for rather more.

John

not

[Miki]

We have a large redundant commercial coffee machine, which we boxed away when we shut the commercial side of our business down some while ago.

It has to be plumbed in, has 2 coffee making sections complete with the attachments for the coffee, a steam part and boiling hot water for teas etc. It even has a warming top where all the cups etc are stored.

Thought of putting it with the restaurant depot vente in Rennes this month, anyone fancy a commercial machine going cheap, get in touch. Probably needs good descaling I suspect, as I think before we closed it down, we were going to do it if we kept it but it's been a couple of years or more now !

Anyone interested ?

 

[Penny29]

The all singing, all dancing, making hot-chocolate-as-well machine is called a Tassimo. We got one for Christmas, but can't recommend it either way as we can't work out how to use the darned thing!

[Janey]

We bought a machine just before Christmas, made by FUNIX. Makes Expresso,filter and cappuccino. Can not figure out how to get the milk right for the cappucino though, just not frothy enough, other wise, very nice coffee.

Janey