Coffee Machine Buying Guide - Espresso Warehouse

Knowing what to look for when buying your own coffee machine is made easy at Espresso Warehouse with our buying guide on what to look for when buying a coffee machine.

In buying the right coffee machine for you, you need to consider:

• If you usually drink espressos or long blacks, choose a machine that delivers consistently a great tasting coffee.
• If you usually drink lattes and cappuccinos, it’s more important to choose a machine that consistently delivers that café standard silky, textured milk.

Other coffee machine buying factors to consider include:

• Before you buy a coffee machine, determine what features the machine has.
• Clear and simple controls digital displays are generally easier to understand than indicator light, especially when programming the machine.
• An adjustable grinder lets you adjust the grind to suit the bean and machine. Check the grinder mechanism safely inaccessible.
• Variable strength coffee allowing you to adjust the intensity of your coffee taste.
• Footprint - a big machine is fine if you have ample bench space, so have an idea of where the machine will be placed and what available bench space you actually have.
• The quality of texturing the milk for lattes and cappuccinos:  the less air bubbles and the silkier the texture of the milk, the better.
• Choice of coffee bean vs being locked into buying brand specific pods etc.
• Ease of programming – the greater the control of the brewing process you have the better the quality of the coffee.
• Adjustable dosage of coffee and water quantity allows you the ability to produce like a barista.
• Coffee temperature – look for machines with dual-heating systems to ensure that you that the temperature of your coffee and milk is not compromised, or you have delayed recovery times.
• Taste of coffee – ensure your machines makes a great tasting coffee.
• Make sure the water reservoir is large enough for your requirements.
• Make sure the cleaning and maintenance procedures are easy to follow. Remember every coffee machines has 3 inputs, coffee beans, water, and milk and all 3 leave behind oils etc that need to be removed by 3 separate cleaning processes: daily milk-line cleaning and periodic cleaning of brewing unit and periodic decalcifying of machine.
• For fresh coffee – ideally your coffee machine will have a built in grinder that will take whole beans and grind them. If you buy a machine that uses ground coffee (manual or semi-automatic), consider buying a grinder.