Coffee Machines.
Of late between wife and I we are spending $12. a day 6/7 days a week on coffee and 90% of them are take away on the way to work.
Time to invest in a coffee machine,
Anyone got one. Whats good whats not?
Not a pod machine..
I have a Lelit Mara and I find it is pretty good. Doesn't take up a lot of bench space, great steam pressure and consistent group head temperature. You really need a dual boller or HX machine if you are making multiple cups. We did a simple barista course which helped a lot.
We came from a pod machine and miss the simplicity but the flavour far outweighs the mess and extra hassle. You will hear it a lot but you will also need to budget for a grinder to make the most of the machine. We now use Aldi beans and they are producing as good a shot at $10/ kg vs the $40 bag of beans we started with. So it works out to about $12-15 per month for the beans plus the milk.
Time to make the switch, you'll make the cost of the machine back in savings in no time!!Im currently using this www.breville.com/au/en/home/index.html and have had it for maybe 2 years (got it from a breville outlet in sydney for around $250 and they retailed for around $500 at the time). had a very basic model before that. it does the job, i work from home have about 4 coffee's a day, wife has 2-3 a day. Coffee taste's just as good as from a cafe, you need a bit of practice though with grinding size and tamping strength, but once you work out how you like it and which beans you like, you'll struggle to go back to a cafe.
it just depends on how much of a coffee afficando you are, if you really picky, then you would want a separate blender and a better machine.
I bought a 2nd hand Delonghi Dedica espresso machine.... it's a half sized machine meant for smaller spaces, and works pretty darn well. Beats my previous Sunbeam machine.
After you get good at making coffees you will find it hard to ever pay for one in a cafe again!
Usually I just jam myself full of coffee before I walk out the door, but wife is using her snazzy keep cup for the commute and is loving that.
Paid itself off in a few months, excellent investment
I have a bean to cup Delonghi. Nothing to learn except the initial tweaking of settings to get the coffee you want over the first ten or so cups. Then it's push a button and wait.
The missus suggested I get the one that was easiest as she knew I would use it less if I had to grind, tamp, brew, clean. It was a good call for mine.
Ours is a Magnifica. Five or six cups a day for three years and it hasn't missed a beat.
Good beans make a big difference too and we get ours freshly roasted from a local firm. Shout out to Yallingup Coffee House. 
I use a cheap chinese copy of Bialetti stainless steel stove top coffee maker. I spent the time to get the grind and the quantity of coffee right for how we like it. You can buy them on eBay for $25.
We both like to have a big mug of strong coffee so we use a 6 cup maker for the two of us. When they say "cup", they mean "shot" of espresso. So a single cup would be a tiny little espresso cup.
I weigh the beans before grinding so we always use the same amount. It varies depending on the brand of beans we buy. I always fill the water reservoir to the same spot.
I heat the milk in the microwave in a glass measuring jug. That get's the quantity right and the temperature right without scalding or stirring up the coffee grounds etc. We tried various milk frothers but they were all crap.
The only problem is that we now don't want to leave the house until we've had our coffee. Commercially available coffee is rarely as good as what we have at home.
We've got an isomac la mondiale, $3000 machine makes nice coffee. You'll need to budget about a grand on a decent grinder too. The isomac needs a service and has been sitting in our garage for nearly two years since I grabbed my Moka out of our camping kit and started using that until I got around to servicing the isomac.
The Moka makes a good coffee too and doesn't take up bench space.
Want a 3k coffee machine for a grand?
check out the coffeesnobs forum to get some good advice
fresh beans and a good grinder are the key
i recently upgraded from a sunbeam cafe series and grinder to a rocket Giotto and Macap grinder. The sunbeam setup was surprisingly good but the new setup has taken my coffee to very good cafe level.
I spend $50 on fresh beans a month and get 50 double shots, so $1 per coffee. I rarely buy any take away coffee now that I'm producing a quality coffee every morning
Isomac Tea at our house
Coffee and newspaper in bed and then one more before work
takes about 1 minute to make two flat whites
you need a decent grinder as well as has been pointed out
i would say nespresso, but you don't want a pod machine
people say the pods are destroying the environment?
but out of my 240L bin they don't really take that much room, and the bin is full every week for a family of 4
The pods are consistent in quality, a good variety and easy to use
otherwise a bialetti
or synesso hydra if you have the coin - industry standard
I challenge all coffee snobs to pick the difference in taste between their $10 cafe one and quality beans in a one cup press thing done at home. Once u add the milk and sugar etc I bet none of you can.
Like wines where the experts even picked red and whites as the OTHER colour in blind tests. It's all keeping up with the Jones' w^nk
We have an inbuilt one at home.... Just add the beans it grinds then dispenses ... We used to do the whole separate grinder barista style thing ( I always spilt coffee grinds on the bench).. But the inbuilt is way more convenient with no mess... Taste between the two is pretty much the same ...( back no milk or sugar )
As far as the best coffee I have had it was always from the moka style thingo.... Old Italian painter (Domenic ) always had one on site... Made amazing coffee
We bought a Rancilio "Silvia" a couple of years ago. Bullet proof build with basically commercial components and a top machine if you want to get involved in making of your coffee. The recommended grinder is a "Rocky" but found this to not have fine enough adjustment at the expresso end of the business.
This thread is fairly pointless without Andy stating his budget.
I would then say first money to a grinder and the best by a country mile at reasonable price is Breville smart grinder. from $150 with good bargaining.
After that in increasing order of price
Moka/bialetti/stovetop
Aeropress
Silvia
Breville dual boiler
Any E61 Hx
The only step off this path would be for a lever machine like the la pav. I have a la scala butterfly which is an E61, but I would love a lever. Not practical for parties though.
Select to expand quoteGoonDog said..
We bought a Rancilio "Silvia" a couple of years ago. Bullet proof build with basically commercial components and a top machine if you want to get involved in making of your coffee. The recommended grinder is a "Rocky" but found this to not have fine enough adjustment at the expresso end of the business.
+1 on this. i have had one for quite awhile now, it's made a kazzilion coffees without a murmur of trouble. ( I blew up two breville espressos and two pod machines before this I got the Silvia in a fraction of the time)
For a stove top, I'm a big lover of coffee, and imho this machine or piece of engineering makes one of the finest brews to cross my lips,
Mate has one from 1948 we love our smoko coffee
Select to expand quotefangman said..GoonDog said..
We bought a Rancilio "Silvia" a couple of years ago. Bullet proof build with basically commercial components and a top machine if you want to get involved in making of your coffee. The recommended grinder is a "Rocky" but found this to not have fine enough adjustment at the expresso end of the business.
+1 on this. i have had one for quite awhile now, it's made a kazzilion coffees without a murmur of trouble. ( I blew up two breville espressos and two pod machines before this I got the Silvia in a fraction of the time)
Yep, had my Silvia and Rocky for about 8 years now and hasn't missed a beat. I've had no issues with the grind on the Rocky. I've never had the need to come close to maxing out the 'fineness' setting.
Select to expand quoteMark _australia said..
I challenge all coffee snobs to pick the difference in taste between their $10 cafe one and quality beans in a one cup press thing done at home. Once u add the milk and sugar etc I bet none of you can.
Like wines where the experts even picked red and whites as the OTHER colour in blind tests. It's all keeping up with the Jones' w^nk
We mock what we don't understand
I like my coffee black & strong (yes, like my women (am I allowed to say that these days)) and I've never ever found a cafe that can make a decent black coffee. Spoke to some of these coffee machine lovers, who only indulge in coffee with some degree of white stuff in it, and they said that its because most coffee machines burn the coffee.
Are there any black coffee drinkers who have found a solution (or machine) to the problem? If you don't drink black coffee, you won't understand, so don't bother sprooking off with your words of wisdom if you are a lover of the white. I drink both and they are miles apart. Bit like milo and tea.
Even using that same spoon to stir a black coffee that has just stirred a white coffee will destroy the flavour.
you get exactly what you pay for! for us we went for a higher end pod machine and love it! with 3 kids ( one being a baby) time is everything so for us it works really well! but I think coffee is one of those personal things too. just buy the best machine you can afford! 
Select to expand quoteCrusoe said..
... most coffee machines burn the coffee.
Are there any black coffee drinkers who have found a solution (or machine) to the problem?
A proper machine with a solid group head like the E61 design (from italy 1961) will maintain correct water temp.
Here is what my shots look like. This is with my own home roasted/blended beans.
You can't get this from a pod machine (and you pay $90-$130 per kilo of coffee with a pod machine!!!)
Also I did a quick search of my google photos to find a few examples. I found their algorithm fail quite amusing.
My coffee boys
HERE IS WHAT IVE LEARNT AFTER 20 YEARS OF COFFEE ADDICTION.
1. ALL POD MACHINES ARE CRAP
2. A MID RANGE MACHINE IS ALL YOU WILL NEED.(EVEN A SUNBEAM OR BREVILE WILL MAKE YOU A MUCH BETTER COFFEE THAN THE PIMPLY 16 YEAR OLD AT YOUR LOCAL ONCE YOU GET IT SORTED)
3. AS IN LIFE KEEP ALL YOUR HOLES CLEAN
4. DO NOT GO NEAR ANYTHING AUTOMATED.
5. (PERSONAL CHOICE) THE BEST OFF THE SHELF PRE GRIND IS GRINDERS.
6 STAY AWAY FROM ANYTHING AUTOMATED AND GRIND YOUR OWN BEANS IF YOU CAN.
