OXO Brew 12-Cup Espresso Maker With Podless Single-Serve Perform,Silver

Almost Perfect & Best Thermal Carafe I’ve ever seen.
I am coming from a Ninja Dual Brew Pro that I loved everything about except it’s brew temperature not extracting enough flavor out of my beans. I also have owned Mocha Masters, Cuisinart, and Delonghi brewers that was SCA certified that I ditched do to terrible carafe designs.Carafe1. Best carafe I have ever used. I used to be a Coffee Ambassador for Starbucks in the days when they sold brewing equipment and have the and since had a variety of these. I don’t use glass with hot plates because they destroy coffee and I’m a purist.2. The picture is showing the temperature of a slightly less than half full carafe of coffee that sat for 7 hours. At 7 hours the coffee was temping at 148 degrees. Most run of the mill coffee makers only brew at 150-170 and out put a cup at about that temperature. This is highly impressive.3. The lid design doesn’t allow a lot of space for heat to escape – and it’s brewing process doesn’t require a large opening for the coffee to drip into.4. The handles is very solid and sturdy and the carafe itself is not light of flimsy – great attention to detail here.5. Reviews for coffee machines are often littered with people rating down because the “hot plate” doesn’t heat a thermal carafe. NO THERMAL CARAFE HAS A HOT PLATE. If you want a hot plate, you must purchase something with a glass carafe. Thermal carafes are insulated and that would destroy them.Beverage Quality & FlavorI ground and brewed Starbucks whole bean Winter Blend – a coffee I am not liking – and brewed a pot in my old Ninja and the Oxo side by side. The aroma that comes out of the Oxo when pouring a cup is amazing and nonexistent from the Ninja. Out of the Ninja, the coffee was fuller bodied but bitter (why I don’t like it) and out of the Oxo bad coffee was transformed into a smooth delicious cup…. I was amazed that I suddenly didn’t mind what I thought were some bad beans.The body of the coffee is my one and only complaint about the OXO. Because you cannot control the brewing process at all (based on number of cups brewed, the Oxo brews each size in different ways but you can’t change a setting to force a longer contact time of the water with the coffee). This results a a more watery, less fuller bodied cup of coffee but a cup that has amazing flavor. I have tried three different freshly ground beans and compared to the Mocha master and Ninja and all of them taste so much better out of the Oxo.I thought the single serve brew basket produced a better cup than brewing a full cup. Usually, these options ( like in the Ninja) don’t allow enough contact time with the grinds to do as good of a job in flavor extraction as when brewing a full pot. This was not the case with the Oxo which slows down the drip time based on the size and the insert ensures full coverage from the rain head. The single service uses a cone where full pots at flat bottom – which is actually what you want as those are the best brew methods for those sizes of coffee.The only other negative which is also a positive is the brew time. The water compartment is glass (no plastics exposure which is great!). To hit the 195-205 degree SCA brew temp, the Oxo pre-heats the water in the glass chamber and then uses a second heating element during the brew process. The problem is, the pre-heat cycle for a full pot takes almost as long as it does to brew a pot of coffee. While this model has a timer, you really should pre-heat your carafe with hot water so keep in mind of setting to brew the night before, but not preheating the carafe you won’t keep your temperature as long as I mentioned previously.At the end of the day, this machine makes one heck of a good cup of coffee. I would recommend – especially while it’s 100 off. It fixes all the things that were wrong with the other two oxo models for sure.

First Impressions Positive
6 MONTH UPDATE: Consistently good, hot coffee, now that I understand it betterSo far, the brewer performs consistently and makes good tasting, hot coffee.As mentioned in earlier updates, it needs to be descaled at about 30 cycles, not at 90 cycles for good tasting, hot coffee. 1/2 tank white vinegar, 1/2 filtered water, followed by 2 tanks of filtered water and wash shower head and carafe and wipe down all internal areas. This is very time consuming, needing to be done monthly,The controls have lost some of their haptic feel, but they still work. I have minor concerns about how this brewer will perform at 5 years, just based on the controls.The rim or collar at the top of the carafe makes it difficult to wash and impossible to fully dry. You have to let it sit open on the countertop for a few hours. Your hand won’t fit inside with a sponge or dish towel.The rubber tube that attaches to the screw on lid is very difficult to clean. You have occasionally submerge it in hot dishwater between monthly descaling.The overall design really should have factored cleaning and maintenance in more.Still think it needs a sealing lid, still think it is overpriced for all the extra maintenance, but still happy with it.———————————————————————————————–2 MONTH UPDATE: Reduced from 5 stars to 4 starsThe coffee maker continues to brew good tasting coffee. However, to keep the brew temperature hot, you have to descale and clean monthly. Not every approximately 90 cycles as recommended by OXO. Also, using filtered water helps taste and scale build up. If you wait 90 cycles to descale, coffee will only brew warm and not taste as good.As mentioned in the original review, the carafe should have a sealed lid for keeping coffee hot after brewing. Other reviewers who stated coffee stays hot for hours. It doesn’t. It just stays warm.Still happy with the purchase but the 5 cup Krups machine I have makes pretty good (and hot, with frequent descaling) coffee. And for less than $35.Would I buy it again? Yes, but for a much lower price.——————————————————————————————ORIGINAL REVIEW:First impressions after a few uses … I like it so far,I can’t speak about reliability yet. I read several reviews on Amazon and OXO website about machines that stopped working early on. I hope that was just early production glitches.Pros:1. After unboxing and running the first pot of water through the machine, I tested the carafe to see how long it kept water hot. I laid a dishtowel folded over four times across the top to cover the two openings in the lid. It was still burning hot an hour later. This was after brewing on the 9 to 12 cup brew setting.2. The dark roast coffee I use brewed very bold and tasted excellent. I’ll probably use one half or one full scoop less in the future. I attribute this to the bloom feature.3. I read reviews on Amazon and OXO websites about the excess noise. It’s no more noisy than any other coffee maker I’ve used.4. I read reviews on Amazon and OXO websites about having to buy commercial filters. The brew basket is large. The grounds spread over a wider surface area and the shower head is wider. It evenly distributes the spray and touches all of the grounds during blooming. It’s not that big a deal to buy commercial filters on Amazon.5. The controls are easy to use.Questionable / Cons:1. Not sure how easy it will be to clean the glass tank. The opening isn’t big enough to get your hand in. I like to wipe it down when I descale.2. When brewing on the 1 to 4 cups setting with the small basked, it doesn’t heat the water in the tank for as long as the other brew settings. I’m going to try using the large brew basket and the 5 to 8 cup brew setting to heat the water longer. I like piping hot coffee. There should be more control in the settings for water heating.3. OXO should include a second lid to help keep the coffee hot longer. The lid that’s used for brewing has openings in the center for brewing and on the side for pouring. Neither opening can be sealed closed after brewing, so the carafe loses heat. Other machines, like Bonavita, include a second lid that is sealed. You push a release button to open the spout to pour into a cup. OXO please make this lid for this brewer and send it to everyone who already purchased, The dishtowel described above is a lame work around for brewer at this price point.4. It’s a 12 cup machine, but I wish it were a little shorter and slimmer. It’s on the larger side. It still fits fine under the upper cabinets, but has to be slid forward to fill the tank and to brew. It emits a small amount of steam and that might deteriorate the upper cabinet bottoms over time. Side vents and a less tall brewer would address this.None of the cons are a deal breaker. If you want a SCA compliant, great tasting, piping hot cup of coffee, this brewer is worth it. More so if you can find it on sale. If reliability becomes an issue, I will update.Lastly, this machine is 1400 watts, not 1000 watts as stated in the Amazon product page.