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It's a good presentation, but it's not sufficient as a sales pitch. A non-staged video of both the grinder and the machine in use would be required to place an

• N-Krause 2y ago
  It seems to go where ever you like it to go. > The result is a freedom to use a far more thermally stable source of hot water - like the kettle you already have. And because no water is stored in the machine - it’s fresh every time. Seems like a interesting idea, but I feel like there is a crucial point missing. What if I do not want a random water tube hanging into my water kettle? Feels like that is a big hole in a otherwise great thought through product.
  • paulluuk 2y ago
    Also, having to boil water in a water kettle first is a minor, but significant enough, inconvenience. It's why so many people now have hot water taps for tea, and use espresso machines instead of filter coffee.
    • michaelmior 2y ago
      > so many people now have hot water taps for tea I know they exist but I've only ever seen one house with such a tap and that was a very well off family member. I don't think these are terribly common.
      • noduerme 2y ago
        They're not so wildly expensive. a couple hundred bucks maybe. My mom got one years ago, and it's really convenient for quick pour-over coffee. Great if you're in a hurry. I use a moka pot at home, but the 10 minutes it takes to boil while I putter around the kitchen trying to remember my name are really the most worthless of the day.
        • GTP 2y ago
          Minor nitpick here, but it's a fact I found interesting when I heard about it. The water inside a Moka doesn't boil, you can indeed observe that the water coming out from the top isn't boiling. What happens is that the air that is left inside the bottom chamber expands due to the heat, pushing the water upwards.
      • alias_neo 2y ago
        We have a Quooker and I recommend them to all our friends who ask, it's more expensive than others (starting at around £1200) but it's incredibly well built, designed/created in an era of making things to last, and they seems to stand by that; you can get spare parts and they sell a service kit for £25 (last I bought it) with the filter that you can replace every few years if you want, but you can also buy the individual parts of system like a new tank, just the core/element, etc.
        • dsego 2y ago
          Seems like good way to get third degree burns if you're not careful? I just put my water filled mug in the microwave (with a spoon in to avoid superheating).
          • alias_neo 2y ago
            I've put my hand under the boiling tap once, it hurt a bit but I wasn't burned. Someone told me it has some sort of atomiser mechanism in the tap when the water is ejected to reduce the chance of burns, but I haven't looked into it and I'm not sure how true that is. It's a quite deliberate and slightly difficult action to activate the boiling water, there's a ring around the base of the spout that you have to double-press and twist on the second press, completely independent of the normal cold/hot water. I have two young children and honestly, I'm not concerned either for them, my wife, nor myself that there's any risk. Using the microwave is a perfectly good solution I think, but I don't know many people who do that, and although it's fine for tea etc for one person, it won't do a house-full of cups of tea in seconds, nor fill a pan with boiling water. I wouldn't dare to suggest that it's the best thing for everyone, but we are extremely happy with its utility in our home. EDIT: Typos
        • oigursh 2y ago
          "starting at around £1200"! It would need to bring it to my chair for that price.
          • OJFord 2y ago
            I wanted one but also baulked at the price, got a ~£200 drop ship special instead. I might actually prefer it to the Quooker tbh - it doesn't spit. (The spitting is apparently a safety feature, but guess which one I've burnt myself on...)
    • globular-toast 2y ago
      Yeah, you would have to really like espresso for this to be worth it. Personally I don't like espresso. The only thing it's good for is the milk drinks, which I also don't particularly like, and being a lazy "push button" coffee. If I'm going to put effort in, filter is the way to go (I use a V60). I reckon hipsters will be drinking filter in a few years' time, if they aren't already. As for hot water taps for tea, if you are brewing black/red tea that is usually not good enough as they don't produce truly boiling water, although some do claim to.
      • pm3003 2y ago
        Cold Brew is glorified filter coffee, especially when made with ultrasonics. It can even simulate the feeling you get when you go back to work while waiting for your coffee to be at drinkable temperature only to find it cold an hour later.
        • globular-toast 2y ago
          Cold brew coffee and cold filter coffee are two different things. Brewing at a cold temperature for a long period of time results in a very different taste which some people like and some don't. Note that the brewing temperature and drinking temperature are essentially independent; you can heat up cold brew and you can cool down hot brew.
    • ndsipa_pomu 2y ago
      Here in the UK, I only know one person who has a boiling water tap (they've been renovating an old cottage and are a fan of tech) though I wasn't a fan went I went to visit and tried it out (not why I went to visit). I'm more of a fan of the Unix/Linux philosophy of "do one job and do it well" as appliances are more likely to break when they have multiple jobs to do, so I was slightly against the idea of it anyhow. The main criticism I have of it is that it's far more likely to cause scalds/burns as you have to bring the container to the tap (specifically an Aeropress) and it's more difficult to control the flow of water. With a kettle, you can move the kettle to the container and it's far more controllable in terms of water flow. I'm also not a fan of the tap needing to keep pre-heated water in an insulated container all the time - only a small use of energy, but it seems unnecessary to me.
      • teruakohatu 2y ago
        Here in New Zealand they seem to be installed in every new or renovated office kitchen. Prior to that a boiling water tank that is mounted on the wall and allows instant near building water for tea. Those boiling water tanks would be very hard for a child to access without a lot of effort. Those boiling taps are sometimes close to the cold/warm water tap.
        • ndsipa_pomu 2y ago
          The ones that I'm referring to are a single kitchen mixer tap that does the usual cold and hot, but also a boiling option.
      • frereubu 2y ago
        I'd be interested in an overall energy use comparison between a kettle and a hot water tap. I know lots of people who boil far too much water for a single cup of tea or coffee (partially due to kettle designs).
        • TheSpiceIsLife 2y ago
          <opinion> This problem is solved in its entirety by simply microwaving a cup of water. No wasted water. If the same / similar cup is used, one can choose the desired temperature of the resultant hot water simply by varying the time. Seasonal variation of ambient water temperature may need to be taken into account. I tend not to drink coffee, and I prefer to make tea with less-than-boiling water. YMMV </opinion. Now that I’ve written that, I’ll have to put a power meter on the microwave and a kettle and report back with the results. My kettle recently broke and I hadn’t intended to replace.
    • brynx97 2y ago
      I wouldn't consider it an inconvenience in my kitchen. I'm highly interested in this. However, $700 is a lot. So, like others mentioned, I'd first like to see a demo video at the very least of it in action. Different teas require different and specific temperatures for optimal results. A hot water tap cannot do this. I love the minimalism in the product design for this!
    • flakeoil 2y ago
      How much energy is that hot water tap wasting by keeping some tank with water hot throughout the day (and maybe night) for just a few cups of tea/coffee?
      • OJFord 2y ago
        Not a lot actually, and there's the space from not having a kettle any more; filling pans for pasta/rice/etc. too. The cheapest ones are about 10x the cheapest kettles. Can't imagine wanting to go back to a kettle personally.
    • BrandoElFollito 2y ago
      > so many people now have hot water taps for tea I have never seen that anywhere at houses I visited in France, Germany, Italy, Poland, a few US. I am not saying that this is not a thing, it is just that "so many" depends on the demographics.
      • paulluuk 2y ago
        Sorry, I meant that they are installed in nearly all newly built houses, at least in my country. I don't imagine you'd find many in older kitchens.Sorry, I meant that they are installed in nearly all newly built houses, at least in my country. I don't imagine you'd find many in older kitchens.
        • BrandoElFollito 2y ago
          Out of curiosity - which country is it?
          • paulluuk 2y ago
            The Netherlands
    • tashoecraft 2y ago
      I disagree. There's a very large espresso market for those who want a cheaper device that doesn't have the complications of a boiler. I have a flair espresso machine myself. Adding a boiler I'd guess would double the price, so I think it's a good decision to leave off.
      • 0xffff2 2y ago
        This isn't a cheaper device though.
    • shermantanktop 2y ago
      “So many” should be heavily qualified. It’s nowhere near true in my experience (in the US) and I suspect this may only be true in specific places, or economic classes, or maybe it’s just you and two friends.
    • klausa 2y ago
      One of us is making their coffee wrong, because my espresso making is definitely more inconvenient than a pour-over.
  • grues-dinner 2y ago
    Is it still thermally stable after a low-speed journey through a long (? Hard to say how long it is, or if you just plonk it into an open kettle of water as there are only close ups) narrow plastic tube? And what about cold water already in the tube? If thermal stability is important enough to make such an advertising claim, you should probably show a comparison of input temperatures where the water meets the coffee over the course of multiple cycles against a representative competitor. With actual data rather than stylised cartoon graphs like in TV adverts for washing powder or whatever. Woolly claims like that without clear evidence really make sound like audiophile woo territory, which would be a shame if you've actually done the research!
    • enjo 2y ago
      In addition I would need to some justification for the idea that water stored in a clean tank without access to light is somehow worse than fresh out of a filter.
    • spressoe 2y ago
      Thermal stability is arguably one of the most important aspects of espresso machine. If the water in the espresso machine boiler is sitting at 95°C, by the time this hot water reaches the group head it will lose some of the temperature. Lose 2°C and you're good. Lose 5°C and you still might be good but already at the edge of getting the crap out of the machine. Lose more than that and you're not gonna want to drink it. Traditional E61 espresso machines whose water boiler is at ΔT cm's away from the group head, solve the problem of temperature surf with heavy duty pipes, boilers, isolation and materials to keep the temperature loss at the minimum. More modern espresso machines place the water boiler just above the group head so they're basically solving the problem other way around: keeping the ΔT at minimum so giving no or minimum space for temperature loss. As for this design, I am not sure how does it solve this problem.
• ivanvanderbyl 2y ago
  Get this in the hands of James Hoffman, I’d love to hear his take on it
  • simonjgreen 2y ago
    It’s fascinating how he has become to coffee as MKBHD has to technology. The kingmaker of coffee gear.
    • petepete 2y ago
      Thankfully it's quite difficult to grind and brew coffee dangerously.
      • tpm 2y ago
        Not really, moka pots are known to explode.
        • GTP 2y ago
          Source? I'm from Italy, where everybody's using them, but never heard of a single one exploding. Maybe you can find an isolated case, but I'm confident it's extremely rare. There's a safety valve to release pressure after all, and if you use the Moka correctly the valve never has to engage.
          • K0balt 2y ago
            I’m in the Dominican Republic, and moka pots are 99 percent of the market here as well. Everyone warns me about moka pots exploding, but I’ve never met anyone (15 years here now) that knows of one first hand that actually exploded. But everyone is terrified of mokasplosion. I’ll admit, the prospect of a pressurized vessel of boiling water is a potent reminder for precautionary thinking.
            • GTP 2y ago
• prmoustache 2y ago
  > Also, for $700 independent reviews are also a must. Also for $700 you don't want to be the guinea pig.
  • IAmGraydon 2y ago
    Honestly, $700 is considered a very inexpensive price point in the espresso world.
    • prmoustache 2y ago
      Not if you have used the same bialetti moka pot for decades, only replacing the rubber seal once every year.
      • robocat 2y ago
        Costs at least a few minutes a day, which works out equivalent to plenty of dollars per year if you make it at home and have a well paying job. Works well but I hate cleaning it after making coffee.
        • prmoustache 2y ago
          I am more of a tea guy but I think you can totally cancel the cost of preparing and cleaning it when considering it becomes part of a package of daily movements you should do to stay healthy. Also you can totally work while the pot is getting to temperature.
        • wsc981 2y ago
          I hardly ever really clean my Moka pots. Usually, it's just a quick rinse with water. Is it really required to clean a Moka pot often?
          • robocat 2y ago
            Just washing the grounds out but takes time to cool the moka down. I guess I could leave the grounds in and clean it the next day but that idea is icky to me. I preheat the moka with hot water and fill it with hot water from jug to reduce time to brew (necessary due to stove setup).