Coffee machine

[empitness]

Hi all, posting here for traffic. Me and DH are occasional coffee drinkers and like the idea of having a coffee machine. I want to buy a coffee machine, within a reasonable budget upto £170. My problem is that there is so much variety and I don't know what to pick. Some of them are very reasonable but the replacement pods costs a lot, some are filtered and so on. Please help me select a machine , which is not expensive to run in longer term ( like buying pods and all).
Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you in advance

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Hello, this thread is a little old and some of the recommendations might be out of date. If you’re looking for up-to-date advice on the best coffee machine money can buy, take a look at our round-up of Mumsnetters’ favourites. MNHQ.

[OwlinaTree]

The Nespresso pods are made of foil and you can send them back to Nespresso for recycling.

The big advantage is everyone can have the type of coffee they want easily without having to buy a whole range of beans.

[WomblingThree]

Has anyone tried the Kitchenaid one? You can use your own ground coffee and make it into a mug. It looks brilliant in terms of low waste, but are the actual mechanics of it any good?

[TDHManchester]

I think so called coffee machines and especially the pod type, are poor and you are far better off just buying a good cafitiere and good quality coffee and enjoy the pleasure of brewing your own. The pod type machines are a simple loss leader. You have to keep buying their pods which are an environmental disaster and, from my findings,taste pretty poor anyway.

[IveGotBillsTheyreMultiplying]

I like my stove top Bialetti espresso pot, and grinder. Cheap, simple and all parts replaceable. You can make al, types of coffee.

[Redglitter]

I've got a Tassimo and I love it. Great range of pods and you often get them on offer

[woodhill]

I used the dolce gusto machine abroad and it was great. More a tea fan tbh.

Use a cafetière normally

[Firesuit]

Aeropress.

[Floisme]

We used Which magazine: their cheap and cheerful star buy was a Krups, under £50 at the time and it's bloody brilliant, makes nicer coffee than a lot of so called cafes. They don't do that model any more so in a way that's not helpful but my point is that Which got it spot on. This was back in the day when some libraries had subscriptions but worth finding out.

Personally I don't like cafetiere coffee and furthermore it gives me the shits but I think aeropress is pretty good - no crema as a previous poster has said but decent flavour. (Not sure why it tastes so different from cafetiere when the method of making is no similar but there you go.)

[Hillarious]

A stove top pot all the way!

Why use the earth's valuable resources on pods, be they plastic or foil, when you can make a good cup of coffee without them? Don't go down that road.

[empitness]

Thank you very very much every one, for your valuable inputs. I am going through the choices here one by one, but one thing is sure- I AM NOT GOING FOR PODS. Please excuse my ignorance, I had no idea that pods were bad for the environment.
Time to update my enviro friendly reading.
Will update once I buy the product. Good day everyone

[PumpkinPiloter]

No offence to previous posters but I feel there is a lot of bad coffee advice in this thread.

If you want a coffee machine I imagine you like espresso based coffee.

We are big coffee drinkers and have gone through many reasonably priced machines over the last 10 years.

I would strongly advise against pods which are expensive and not freshly ground. If you go with pods you will miss out on all the delicious varieties of coffee and you will not get that true freshly ground taste of buzz.

The biggest leap in quality for us despite the actual machine was when we bought a grinder so I strongly recommend leaving money in your budget for a good one of these which starts at around £50 new. In my experience the cheap ones are just rubbish.

We currently use a Heston Sage machine which we picked up on ebay for around £100 which is amazing. I would also recommend any of the delonghi machines which can be bought for around £50-60 for the cheapest model if you find one reduced if you want something a bit cheaper. They have more expensive models but they all make good espresso.

We are using a bodum grinder which we picked up for £20 on ebay but can be bought for around £50-60 new.

I do not normally like to buy electronics second hand but coffee machines are often unwanted presents or people just do not use them much if the want to get rid of them and the good ones are made to last.

Hope this helps and please do not buy pods unless you really only want to use it occasionally or do not care about the quality of coffee very much.

[PumpkinPiloter]

One extra point is that a cheap coffee machine with a decent grinder will make better coffee than an expensive coffee machine without a grinder.

[RhiWrites]

Say no to Nestle, they're just as unethical as they always were.

Get a filter coffee machine. I have one I used to have in the office but have recently brought home.

[nocake]

I use a reusable SwissGold filter and grind the coffee with a Hario burr grinder. I also buy good coffee as that makes the biggest difference.

[LeannePerrins]

Agree completely with all of Pumpkin's points, especially regarding coffee grinders. I highly recommend this Krups grinder which is excellent and really good value. Whatever you choose, make sure that it has a burr grinding mechanism rather than a blade.

[Flumpernickel]

Well, you can easily recycle the nespresso pods to be fair as many here have stated. They are also carefully sealed to preserve the flavour.

And dont be fooled into thinking that you need to spend a small fortune on an all singing and all dancing coffee machine, I have had some truly dire thin/bitter coffee at peoples homes that have come from machines with fancy grinders and frothers that they brag cost between £4-600! Coffee that doesnt even come close to the nespresso high end pods imho...

But, as with all these things, its really down to your lifestyle, budget and preference.

[Flumpernickel]

My nespresso is the krups model btw.

[Flumpernickel]

I think pod machines get a bad name because of tassimo and dolce gusto type pod machines, which frankly produce coffee worse than a hospital vending machine.

[ThinkFastNotSlow]

Over the years we have had accumulated:

Stove top pot
Aeropress
Cafetières
Gaggia coffee machine (Classic model, £200 secondhand)

I use the Gaggia on a daily basis, it's super for us.

I never use a cafetière any more (in fact I think we may have got rid of ours) it doesn't taste as strong as I like it. The stove top pot and aeropress goes on self-catering holidays with us, but we prefer the stove top to the aeropress.

Every time any one has made me coffee with their pod machine it has tasted crap - thin and barely tasting of coffee. For that and environmental reasons, I would never consider owning a pod machine.

[Flumpernickel]

Bad coffee advice

Jesus, this thread got snooty fast.

Op, go try out some machines and judge for yourself.

[PumpkinPiloter]

I am sorry but pods are not freshly ground coffee. Yes you can make bad coffee for a good coffee machine but you can not make great coffee from a pod.

"sealed for freshness" Is marketing speak for in a packet.

I believe they are simply a clever marketing strategy to make more money from coffee drinkers by being able to sell them consumables. They are a bit like printer ink. They give away the machines because they know they have you for life with their pods.

Perhaps a better analogy may be they are akin to ready chopped carrots or ready grated cheese. They will never taste as good as if you do the chopping/grating yourself. This is even truer with coffee as it changes completely after it has been ground and left for a while.

They may be good for an occasional coffee drinker but I can see zero benefits of using them with any regularity apart from the fact that they require a little less effort to use.

Plus the other reason you should avoid pods at all costs is that the best coffee should be consumed not long after it is roasted buying a pod machine means this is impossible to achieve.

Apologies for my long rants I just love coffee and want people to experience good coffee at home.

[PumpkinPiloter]

Flumpernickel

Did you even read my post?

I do not believe I was snooty at all. I was genuinely trying to help OP with what I have learnt.

Stating the truth that pod coffee is not very good is by no means being snooty in fact my advice will save you money in the long run.

You post on the other hand was completely useless. Please tell me which shops allow you to go and try out all their coffee machines?

[Flumpernickel]

Pumpkin, no issue with you giving long explanations. Just maybe ditch the haughty comments suggesting others are giving bad advice?

Personally, I agree, some pod machines really are shit. Even some of the weaker nespresso pods are not so good (and particularly the cheap high street knockoffs), the strong higher end ones are fantastic though, and I say that as a regular user having also drunk shite coffee from some grinding fancy pants machines.

Yes, I have no doubt that grinding your own beans is sublime and fresher, but not everyone is looking for that and dont have the space for that type of machine.

Op said they were occasional coffee drinkers, so I offered advice regarding the nespresso because it sounded like it suited their needs.

OP, you have stated you have gone off the idea of a pod machine now, but I would reccomend heading to a nespresso store (if possible) to at least try them before you dismiss entirely.

[Flumpernickel]

John lewis often do demo days with manufacturer sales staff on coffee machines, as do selfridges/house of fraser etc...
HTH.

DFOD with your comment about my suggestion being "useless".