Single Serve Coffee Forums

smity wrote:...I used the illy disc in the coffee ground drawer and it yields a richer extraction of coffee...

Just to be clear, you put it under the coffee, right?

Yup, disc on bottom, coffee on top.

T he illy disc has been sticking inside the drawer after a extraction, have to pop it out from other side of the drawer. The aeropress disc should be less effort.

I've brewed three 10-oz. cups (20 g. of coffee each) using the ground coffee drawer so far, and I have to say I'm impressed with overall flavor and the almost total lack of sediment. Think I'll still fine up the grind a touch more, but I'm not far off.

A few little niggles:

- The lower metal filter pops out when you turn the drawer upside down and tap to remove the grounds. Don't throw it away by mistake!
- I wish the hinged lid would open up and out past 90 degrees.

The spent grounds look very much like an Aeropress-style puck post-brew...tight and fairly dry.

smity, I'm not sure what you mean by the "Aeropress disc." A paper filter or one of the metal ones available for sale? If the latter, it doesn't fit in the ground coffee drawer--just tried this one. A paper Aeropress filter only fits well if you push it in a bit.

A flat disc like the able should work better. The hinge is not bad, but it would be better if it would open more as Josh said. The coffee is still wonderfull still dialing the virtuoso in Now where is the lipid meds ha ha

I have a couple of issues with the brewer now that I have had it for a while. The biggest gripe is that it is messy as hell. Every time I brew a k-cup it spits all over the place. My mom had her Senseo finally crap out on her so I recommended this brewer. She is a neat freak to no end and I know pretty soon I am going to hear her griping about what a mess it makes. A lot of this could be fixed if Bunn would have created some way to bring the mug up closer to the brew head. Many of the single serve machines have this now. Why did they not think of this? The last gripe would be that the machine isn't tall enough to fit my travel mugs. This has always bugged me out about single serve brewers that brew 12oz or more. Sure....you can brew into another container and then pour it into your travel mug. When you do that though....you lose even more of the coffee temp in the second transfer. I really hope Bunn looks into these things and makes some improvements the next time around.

smity wrote:A flat disc like the able should work better.

No, that's what I'm saying: the Able DISK Fine doesn't fit at all. Not that I want or need it to anyway (!), but still.

rahl, I sense you and your mom must be MC backsplash wipers. I lean that way, too. Why not improvise some sort of mug stand to raise your/her favorite mug up closer to the brew head? About the travel mug issue, this does come up often; when I'm making my wife coffee in the morning using the MC, I instinctively avoid travel mugs that don't fit and choose the 16-oz. Contigo West Loop, which does.

Aromacup's video review of this unit:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0Fk4A39eq8

Toward the end (11:03) Brian even reviews the hot water tray. Yes, he went there!

Ok, I did 4 test brews this morning using the k-cup drawer. There was a little bit of a learning curve for me with it, but now I think I'm good. Two mishaps:

1. On my very first try, I got a lot of water in the cup in addition to coffee. Turns out that the gasket around the upper needle hadn't been seated properly, which may have caused the gash in the k-cup's foil seal that I found afterward. Ground coffee had escaped but didn't make it into the cup.

2. Later on, I got a cup that was *entirely* water. Incomplete puncture by the upper needle caused that. I just didn't press firmly enough on the top when closing up the drawer.

One of the k-cups I brewed (Starbucks Pike Place) had a puffy top, but it wasn't a problem. Whether or not this actually helps, I should repeat/reshare one forum-tested tip for brewing puffy k-cups, which is to push the k-cup all the way down onto the bottom needle before closing (and puncturing) the top. Didn't need to do anything else.

Agreed that the k-cup drawer is a little messier than the others. I blame the machine's pump, which really shoots water through that bottom needle. A tall mug helps reduce spittiness, as does holding the mug up closer to the brew head toward the end of the cycle.

Next up will be a few taste tests, i.e. B40 vs. MCU while holding the k-cup and amount of water constant and then the same on the MCU alone with and without "pulse."

Josh, your analytic nature makes me want to be a better man. I'm going to conduct some serious cuppings when my MCU arrives tomorrow - Will report back!

-Rush

Ok, that made me smile! Thanks. Been watching "Jerry Maguire" lately?

Great--will look forward to reading your impressions.

jbviau wrote:The spent grounds look very much like an Aeropress-style puck post-brew...tight and fairly dry.

Here's what I mean. After I brewed 20 g. of Ristretto's Ethiopia Kaffa Forest tonight, I let the ground coffee drawer sit in the sink for 15 min. A man's gotta drink his coffee in peace, you know?! When I came back, the drawer hadn't dripped from underneath at all. Turned the drawer upside down over a plate, popped the puck out by pushing on the tab underneath the lower metal filter, and this is what I got. Great coffee, by the way! Even the empty-too-soon mug smelled divine.

I've gotta start pushing mine out that way. Been banging against a trash can and getting no puck. Makes it hard to clean out.

Yeah, and banging against the side of the trash bin can leave you digging through the trash for that lower filter, too. On the flip side, my way generates an extra dish (the plate).

I've never had the filter come out by banging it because the grounds seem to stick to it and keep it pressed in there. Granted, I always empty right after brewing