Ever wish you could bring that fancy one-cup coffee maker home from the office – the Keurig machine with its handy little “K-cups”, the Flavia with its array of mix-and-match packets?
Turns out, you can!
We set out to review the home versions of two popular office coffee machines, as well as two cup-at-a-time coffee pod brewers, and here are the results.
The Flavia Fusion Drinks Station
We’ve worked in offices that had Flavia machines, and we loved the way you could combine different Flavia Filterpacks to create unique beverages. Like “Creamy Topping” or “Milky Way Swirl” added to your favorite Flavia coffee variety.
So we were really looking forward to reviewing the Flavia Fusion, the at-home version of the office brewing machines we’ve so enjoyed.
Unfortunately, we weren’t able to give the Flavia Fusion a fair review. We had a defective unit that wouldn’t work properly and we had to send it back.
The Flavia Fusion retails for $99.95.
Keurig Platinum B70 Single-Cup Home-Brewing System
Wow. We love this machine.
Some of us have Keurig machines in our workplaces, so we were already familiar with how they work. The home version – specifically, the Platinum B70– was no disappointment.
Keurig brews beverages from what it calls “K-Cups” – little white cups that look like diner-style creamers. They hold coffee, tea and hot cocoa. You pop one into the Keurig machine, the machine punctures the cup and brews a perfect beverage quickly and easily.
The one big drawback to machines that only use their own beverages is, obviously, you can’t buy other brands of coffee and tea. However, Keurig makes something called “My K-Cup” (which we did not try); a reusable filter that you can fill with your favorite ground coffee, creating personalized K-Cups. Keurig also offers a huge variety of K-Cups – far too many to list them all here – that includes beverages from Newman’s Own, Timothy’s, Emeril’s, Celestial Seasonings, Twinings, Ghirardelli, Bigelow, and many, many more. We were genuinely impressed with the available variety – and taste quality – of the K-Cups.
The B70 home brewer is just as reliable and easy-to-use as the at-work machines. And it was loaded with features we fell in love with.
A backlit LCD screen on the unit displays the time, and allows for programmable options. You can tell the B70 what time you like your coffee in the morning and it will be ready to brew when you are. You can choose the temperature of your brew. It will tell you when it’s time to descale the machine. When the water tank is running low, a blue light from under the tank begins to flash.
We were thrilled with the beverage-size flexibility the B70 offers: choose from 5.25, 7.25, 9.25 and 11.25 ounces.
And there’s plenty of room for any size cup -- even tall mugs.
The water tank holds 60 ounces – great for when you have company.
The Keurig Platinum B70 worked flawlessly right out of the box. We couldn’t find anything to complain about.
It’s not for everyone, of course – it’s expensive, and if space is an issue, you’d probably do better with a more compact machine.
But if you really, truly love that Keurig at the office, and you’re due for a treat, the Platinum B70 is an indulgence that will serve you well.
The Keurig Platinum B70 retails for about $199.95.
K-Cups cost $13.95 for a pack of about 25 (or you can get 5-packs for $2.95).
The Senseo Deluxe Coffeemaker
We had high hopes for the Senseo Deluxe, but found it was all style and no substance.
Certainly a cute-looking machine for your counter top, but the Senseo dispensed absurdly puny cups of coffee. We just had to show you. Look at this:
We even stuck a ruler into a freshly-brewed cup and discovered there was less than an inch of coffee in the cup! We brewed several cups and the result was consistent.
The Senseo offers less flexibility than the Melitta One:One (reviewed below) as far as beverage size. Two different buttons allow you to choose between a small or large cup of coffee. But even the larger size didn’t even give us half a mug of coffee.
Also, the Senseo does not adjust for different size cups. Look what happened when we tried to put our favorite tall mug under the spout:
There was something weird about the water tank. It didn’t feel secure when it was in the machine. It just kind of…sat there. It didn’t “snap in” or anything. Realistically, if a person elbowed the machine at just the right angle, the water tank would knock right over and spill water all over the counter. Also, there was a strange gap between the machine and the tank, right at the top, can you see it?:
In our opinion, this is just sloppy design. Why couldn’t the lip of the water tank come flush to the machine? And doesn’t this leave your water open to possible contamination, with dust, or anything else flying around the room – air freshener particles? Bug spray? The gap bothered us.
We did like one feature of the Senseo’s water tank that we wish the Melitta One:One would incorporate: raised “grip” bumps in the plastic that made it easier to carry to and from the sink.
The Senseo brews coffee from round pods, just like the Melitta One:One. Although Senseo makes its own brand of coffee pods (Senseo Douwe Egberts), we found that using other brands of round pods in the Senseo machine produced the same results as Senseo’s own pods: all very frothy, all very tiny cups of coffee.
The Senseo Deluxe retails for $99.99.
Coffee pod prices vary depending on brand; Senseo’s cost about $6.96 for a box of 16 pods.
The Melitta One:One Java Pod Brewing System
For an affordable machine that provides office-style, cup-at-a-time brewing, we loved the Melitta One:One Java Pod Brewing System!
This machine worked like a charm right out of the box, and offered several thoughtful features we really appreciated.
We liked that the One:One offered four beverage size options: 5, 8, 14 and 20 ounces, each dispensed with a single touch of a button. Unlike other machines that dispense ridiculously small cups of coffee, the Melitta brewed generous cups for real coffee drinkers. We weren’t disappointed.
The One:One also allows for brewing two cups at a time. The clever spout dispenses coffee from two holes spaced about an inch apart, so if you want a single cup of coffee, just center your cup directly under the spout and collect all the coffee into one mug. If you want to brew for two, place two cups under the spout, and each cup will collect coffee from one of the two dispensing holes. And Melitta makes it easy not to put your cup in the wrong place, because the drip tray is contoured for one or two cups, so your cup is actually guided into place by the circular ridges, right where it should sit under the spout.
Another thing we liked about this simple but ingenious spout was the fact that it adjusted for different size coffee cups. Just push or pull the spout to raise or lower it over your cup – so it allows for taller cups. Not every coffee machine does this. And we like our big mugs!
One of our secretary testers noted that she liked the compact shape and size of the removable water tank, because it allowed her to get the tank under her faucet even when her sink was full of dishes! Other coffee makers had clunkier tanks that required more sink space to fill. (And still, the Melitta One:One’s water tank holds a hefty 40 ounces.)
The Melitta One:One also has an automatic shut-off feature when the machine has been idle for 30 minutes.
It was also very easy to clean and had minimal parts, which we loved. Simplicity.
It brews coffee from round single-serve pods, which Melitta manufactures. (The One:One came with a nice sample variety of coffee pods in a charming wire basket.) But the good news is, you don’t have to buy Melitta’s pods. This is a limitation of some other machines; you can only brew their coffee. We tried other brands of coffee pods in the Melitta One:One and they worked just fine. This was especially good news for us because we did not like Melitta’s coffee. They make a wonderful machine, but their coffee leaves much room for improvement.
We highly recommend this machine, but do offer Melitta a couple of design suggestions for improving on the One:One.
We would’ve liked the water tank to have a carrying handle molded into it. While the tank was more maneuverable under the faucet than others, it felt a little insecure in our hands as we carried it.
Also, how ‘bout designing the pod holders so they attach to the side of the machine? The One:One comes with two pod holders of different sizes, for brewing one or two pods at a time. At any given time, there’s at least one pod holder on the loose. For those of us who lose things easily (or are just too lazy to go hunting in a drawer), why not create a pod holder-holder on the side of the machine? Even a simple molded plastic pocket would be helpful.
The Melitta One:One retails for $49.99 (in our opinion, a huge bargain)
Coffee pods vary depending on brand; Melitta’s cost $4.99 for a box of 18 pods.
