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BRUK111

Lake Oswego, Oregon

About me:

My Equipment:

Espresso machine & grinder

MY LATEST REVIEWS

KLATCH BELLE ESPRESSO COFFEE
bruk111 | Tue, 09/06/2011 - 15:48
Of the three top rated coffees I recently bought on this site, this is my second favorite, but not by much. I really like the dark rich flavor. Works great in lattes that I usually have but also makes a great straight espresso. I like that even though its a slightly darker roast, it still has a nice sweetness to it. Great cup, would definitely recommend it.

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VIVACE ESPRESSO DOLCE COFFEE
bruk111 | Tue, 09/06/2011 - 15:43
Recently bought a new Gaggia academia machine and three of the highest rated coffees from this site. This is my favorite of the three. Very smooth, lots of complex flavor notes, like the chocolatey after taste. Definitely a winner. Works great with my new super auto espresso machine.

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KLATCH WORLD'S BEST ESPRESSO COFFEE
bruk111 | Tue, 09/06/2011 - 15:34
Definitely a fine bean and creates a great cup of coffee. Not sure I would rate it the worlds best, but it's up there. Shared with friends and to a man, all loved it. Very smooth, easy to drink. I would buy this again.

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GAGGIA ACCADEMIA ESPRESSO MACHINE
bruk111 | Mon, 09/05/2011 - 18:35
We looked at a lot of different fully automatic machines, (mostly on line and reading reviews like this one), before centering in on the Academia. For the most part we are very satisfied with our choice, produces a great cup of espresso, works with ANY type of bean, (doesn't have the limitation of many of the automatics, which is they don't take oily beans -What? espresso beans ARE oily...), all in all it is a good looking, solid, great piece of equipment. As others have pointed out it is constructed mostly of metal, which I really like, instead of plastic like many of the machines on the market. We love the design of the milk caraffe, clear plastic so you can easily see home much is left - much better than the ugly bottle style on other automatics, that set on the counter with a little siphon tube to the machine. The caraffe, with its built-in little handle sets mostly in the refigerator filled with milk, easy to retrieve and then quickly snap into place on the front of the machine. The steam comes out to meet the caraffe where the actual frothing takes place, so no milk goes into the machine itself, (great design). Self cleaning of the caraffe is frequent, but is OK with us because it seems to keep the frothing system free of any old milk built-up and the caraffe comes apart easily for occasional cleaning. The progamming for the various automatic button functions is easy to use and fairly intuitive. Now to the areas I think could be improved on future models, (many of which have been mentioned in previous reviews): 1. The Return/catch tank for the water used in the frequent automatic cleaning functions is too small - should be at least twice the current size to minimize dumping. Although quick and easy to do this clean out process, it gets a little tedious. 2. Similar story on the clean water supply tank, its small size necessitates frequent filling... Even 1/3 larger would make a difference. 3. Temperature: The shots come out great. It's when you start adding more than a small amount of steamed milk that you run into problems. The temperature of the cup begins to reduce dramatically, especially if you like a large cup of cafe latte to fill your 16 Oz insulated cup before you head out in the AM. Now... We have figured out, and you CAN simply use the seperate steaming wand to bring the steamed milk up to the 160 degrees or so that WE like for a hot cup of Joe. It doesn't take long but it just adds one more step to the process that we were hoping to minmize with the fully automatic machine. Keeping in mind that the addition of any amount of flavored suryp, (we like vanilla lattes), necessitates some additional frothing/heating anyway, so we kind of put up with this one... The thing is, I don't know if any of the other similar "Super Automatic Machines" do this any better, but I would like to see this area improved if possible. 3. Now this one is just plain silly: To activate either the hot water or steam to the seperate wand, you hit one of the main buttons, the one on the bottom left on the face of the machine, THIS activates the two middle of the four central control/programming buttons just below the video display screen. So far so good, right? The difficulty comes with the icons on the initial button on the lower left of the machine, the activating button: They show the wand with the steam coming out of it on the LEFT, and the cup of coffee icon, (to indicate hot water), on the RIGHT. But once you hit this first activating button and move to the central screen to see which small black button below has been activated for what, the location of the icons is reversed. NOW its coffee cup/hot water on the LEFT, and Steaming wand on the RIGHT! VERY confusing for the novice. Now for sure, after a while you barely look at the buttons and icons because you memorize their positions, however, when you are trying to teach other friends or family members how to "make their own cup" which everyone loves to do with these automatic machines - boom - now its confusing again. This one has a simple solution, however: Just change the software. You don't even have to reprint the first button face, just make the video screen show and activate the steam wand on the left and the hot water cup on the right, just like it shows on the face of the first activating button. Simple right? This one should be fixed, its easy, it should be done. "Just do it" as Nike would say... Well that's about it, I could repeat a lot of other comments others have made about the machine but that doesn't seem to serve. Overall a great machine, have had no problems in the month we have owned it, and with the limitations listed above, both my wife and I can easily and consistently produce a great cup of coffee from a good looking machine -- and that's what we were looking for.

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