More and more people are learning to drink coffee these days as it has become a cool trend. And the machines that brew it are trendy and functional too.

Coffee technology has come a long way since the days of the Turkish Ibrik “coffee brewer” which was nothing more than a copper pot and ladle that were super heated to draw out the flavor of the beans. As it didn’t do any filtering, it produced an immensely strong brew and is used in the Middle East quite often still today.
Getting on to more modern times, let’s look at some of the best coffee makers available today.

The most commonly used and perhaps also the largest selling type of coffee maker is the drip model. Drip coffee makers are relatively inexpensive, but can fall at all price points if you look long enough. Drip coffee makers also come in a variety of sizes from single cup coffee makers, to one that brew up to 10 or 12 cups. In addition, a vast variety of new features have been added in line with the latest technology and user-friendly features.

In the modern coffee makers, there are interesting features like LCD screens that display the time, the duration for brewing, temperature, along with a timer. Such screens are especially handy in darker surroundings late at night or in the early mornings when most folks brew their single cup coffee. In addition, features like auto-off are especially useful for bigger households where the busy family can easily forget to turn it off. In the earlier days, coffee used to continue to drip over into the heating plate even after the brewing was complete, causing scorching or worse.

Besides having these user-friendly features and benefits, modern drip coffee and espresso machines are also extremely easy to clean, especially with the introduction of coffee pods. These are basically small paper containers of coffee. Water is made to flow through them and they also have the advantage of providing good filtering for grounds. After the brewing is complete, pull out the coffee pod and throw it out.

There are some models that come with water filters, which are quite expensive but also help improve the results.

Another interesting option in filtering are models that have a permanent type filter for the coffee grounds. These are especially preferred by users who are environmentally conscious and who don’t mind a few grounds getting through into the finished coffee. In fact, there are some models that come with integrated bean grinders, though such devices are more cumbersome to clean up.

In order to decide about the model that will suit your needs and wants, you should ideally study and analyze the features of various models available and compare them against your budget and needs.

Tags: shopping

Posted on February 3