The Coffee Machine

Honestly, it wasn't my idea to get one of such high maintenance toy! I had been the victim for such machine. As much as it could serve, I need to clean them up each time it gets into use.

Well, I told myself 'who knows I am going to be a barista' soon? This is my training ground for making a good coffee in future. And well enough, this require lots of 'trial & error'. All started with you tubing, I tried with a ready grained coffee powder which was meant for filtered coffee.

And well enough, the spending partner did his homework too, asked around from some experts, bought a few packets of grounded coffee bean, including the Illy Arabica, which then finally went perfect with my coffee machine.

There are just a lot to learn. In order to make a fresher coffee, selecting the right bean is a wide range of knowledge. This made me needed to buy several other accessories - coffee bean grinder, stopper, milk froster mug, thermometer, coffee cups an saucer and a set of glass for my favourite Afagato.

The family of coffee machine started with this, Philips Saeco's HD8325/08 manual expresso machine. No build grinder, and it is ever basic. To me, it has been ever complicated to operate, it failed me couple of times, when I first used the BON filtered coffee grained pack.

Philips Saeco 

I soon tried you-tubing, and this movie helped me a lot. Especially on the milk frosting part. :)

The companion of coffee machine started with these 2 sets of cups from Ikea (in fact I broke 1 cup before, and replaced it). I specially bought a set of small glasses for my favorite Afogato (coffee with Vanilla ice-cream) on the visit for the replacement cup.

Ikea Cups

Ikea Glasses

My coffee accessories then further increased with the addition of a entry level Coffee bean grinder, the Krup F203. All the way from US, and it is important to check the input voltage of the machine, a regulator is usually needed for US electrical stuffs. I needed one with the price of RM30. Thanks to a colleague who usually helped me as US courier-man, and even for Tokyo courier services too. I think this machine cost me closed to $20, while I had other accessories which made a total slightly above $25, a presser, a thermometer and a small milk froster mug.

Coffee bean / spice grinder

The accessories

My 1st trial on the grinder. The bean wasn't fine enough, and it is manual, been difficult for me to handle its level of finest. So far, I am still practicing it with some cheaper beans I got from Chiang Mai BON cafe. More practice required... where I hope practice makes perfect.

BON cafe dark mocca bean

The beans

The grinded effect

Some tasty coffee I have tried at home. 

Afogato with Free Mori bread

Cappucino with Arthur's Crepe Cakes

The classic look