Help me choose a coffee machine!

[redredwine40]

My mother has kindly offered to buy me a coffee machine for Christmas but I have no idea what I want! So I don't want a pod machine (trying to be environmentally friendly and also save money) so I'm thinking either a bean to cup or an espresso machine...

Budget is up to £500. I generally only drink black coffee in the morning then after lunch would like a latte. I like a large coffee though so I guess that an espresso machine is out the window?

Can anyone please help me?! I did look at the Sage Bambino but don't know if that's too much of a faff putting ground coffee in it each time....

@Cynderella

We have Delonghi Magnifica - put beans in top, water in container. Press for a cup of coffee.

You might need to empty grounds that have collected in plastic box and refill water. End of day, empty and wash up containers and drip tray. Once a month, we run descaling water through.

It makes espresso and froths milk, but we just make mugs of black coffee. Mega convenient.

We have one of these too. Love it

@Ozanj yes...very straightforward, the steam nozzle does hot milk and froth, a small collar up or down according to what you want so just a little cold milk in a jug and you are golden. Frothy milk is very impressive, dense throughout

Also it's nice and easy to get the nozzle off for cleaning it's a simple bayonet type fitting.

@ivykaty44 the magnifica has a little hatch for ground coffee. I've not used that yet, but as fizzy said I just realised it will be great for my chum who drinks decaff...I used to make a small cafetiere for her with decaff and a normal one for me!

If you want a beautiful looking machine which makes great filter coffee, get a Mochamaster. You’ll get lots of nice comments. No domestic machine for your budget will make cafe style coffee. Our Best Buy was a decent Melitta burr grinder which grinds directly into our filter cone and you can set different weights/time to suit the strength you want. The 2 combined will still be under your budget.

@LaurieSchafferIsAllBitterNow

also have a delonghi, a magnifica s smart....it does a single espresso, two espressos, a cup and a long coffee

you can adjust the amount dispensed and it will grind more beans to suit

it also does hot water so if you want to stretch the coffee further you can do

and steam for frothy coffees

I love it and have been highly over caffeinated for about three weeks now!

If you have access to a Costco it's on offer at £299 instead of well over £400 on amazon.

We've just swapped to this from a tassimo for environmental reasons.

And we love it so far, only had it a week though.

We got ours from crampton and Moore and paid £349 (instead of 449) ECAM250.23

Thanks to this thread I learnt how to do foam vs steamed milk in the Magnifica.

Thanks Mumsnet

We have one of these. About £12. No plastic at all used in its construction or use.