Coffee & Espresso Makers Tips

Lello Ariete 45900 Espresso Machine Product Technical DetailsAriete 45900 Key FeaturesTypeEspresso MachineCapacity9 Cu...

Low priced Gaggia killer Lello Ariete 45900 Espresso Machine The Lello Ariete espresso machine appears to be in high demand. There was nearly a 3 month wait before I received ...

I got this machine for Christmas on Christmas Morning, Monday Dec 25th, 2006. It quickly opened it and set it up. It was easy to setup, and it took a small amount of rubbing alcohol to clean off the residue from the tape that held the pieces together, such as the water tank to the machine. I plugged it in, and the power and heating light came on. The pump worked, and I was able to prime it, by turning it one, once I added water to the tank by turning on first the steamer and running it for a minute, then turning it to espresso mode for a minute and allowing it to run. However, after I did this, the machine did not heat at all. It never heated up. Also, one of the brackets on the back of the machine that held the water tank on was partially broken. I concluded that the machine must have been mishandled in the shipping process. I went to www.amazon.com and logged in. I clicked though the customer service stuff and chose the appreciate options to tell them it was broken and it needed to be returned. It gave it numerous options as to how to ship it back, and I choose to have UPS pick it up and have a replacement unit sent. While I was a bit disappointed that it didn’t work right away, I anxiously awaited the arrival of the new machine, not really knowing how long this whole process would take.

Promptly, on December, 26th, UPS showed up and picked up the broken item from our home where it was shipped to. Impressive Amazon.com was able to take the request that I placed though there web site on Christmas day, and get UPS to come to my home the very next day to pick up the defective item.

Then even more to my surprise, on December 26th, we get a e-mail from Amazon.com, saying they were sending out a replacement unit Next Day AIR. AS PROMISSED, THE NEW MACHINE SHOWED UP ON DECEMBER 27TH!! It came around the middle of the day! The new machine was not damaged in any way and worked perfectly right away! I was so impressed with the customer service. We did not pay for next day air the first time it was shipped, yet they sent the replacement machine next day air at there expense. They deserve a A+++ in customer service! This next day replacement service is far more impressive than any level of customer service I have seen from any brick and mortar businesses in a long long time. GOOD JOB AMAZON.COM!!!

Now on to the machine. Today is Friday the 13th, so I have had the working machine for a bit over 2 days now. Last night I had a dinner party for 6 people and used the machine extensively.

I have not used a espresso machine myself before, but have seen them used, and I have had a number of cappuccino drinks from places ranging from small local (Appleton, Wisconsin are) coffee shops, to Starbucks, restaurants, coffee shops, and expensive fancy French cafes in Quebec Canada. While I am not coffee expert, I do have some experience with quality taste. My brother, from the larger Madison, WI area is more of a coffee connoisseur, and he had several drinks from this new machine, and he completely approved of its performance and quality.

Here is a run down of how I used it from the start…

1. I unpacked the unit from packaging that seemed sturdy. I believe the first unit was grossly mishandled by UPS, which can happen fairly frequently and is not the fault of the shipper (amazon.com) as it was properly packaged.

2. The unit was very easy to assemble and clean off. I used a small amount of rubbing alcohol to clean off some residue from where tape held item such as the tank in place during shipping. I wiped down the whole machine with the rubbing alcohol to revel a clean bright shine. The entire machine is very sturdy, and heavy, I would guess around 20 pounds. I would say that you want to be able to put it machine in place and leave it. You most likely won’t want to be moving this in and out of a cabinet because of it weight and size. It is not overly large in size, but I would find it inconvenient to put in a cabinet in-between uses. It seems very sturdy overall, and the appearance in top notch. It looks just like a small version of a commercial machine in a cafe.

3. I easily added water to the unit. The unit does not appear to leak, and it appears that you are able to leave water in it all the time. I placed the unit close to my sink for easy cleaning. I am also easily able to add water to the tank with the sprayer hose from the sink. The tank holds a large amount of water, 70 ounces. This is enough water to make a number of drinks and froth a large amount of milk.

4. The filter basket and handle are well made and sturdy. It also comes with a nice scoop and tamper in one easy to use tool. There is a waste water tray / shelf to set below the filter handle that you set your cup / glass on. It is well made, metal, and easy to remove for cleaning and emptying. There is a shinny metal shelf that sits on the top of this bottom collection tray. Easy to clean.

5. The filter unit connects to the machine by holding the filter in a upright straight position with the handle toward your left angle of about 225 degree based on degrees on a full circle (i.e. http://mathforum.org/~sarah/shapiro/degree.circle.small.gif ), the handle is the Italian / European style that does not lock in place, it is put in place by raising it up tight to the machine at the 225 degree angle, then rotating it towards the right until it is close to a 135 degree angle. Once it has coffee in it, it will not be pulled all the way to the 135 degree angle, perhaps closer to the 150 degree spot. Basically, you pull it in place until it is firm, but not until you break it. Some people in reviews complained about this unit exploding and causing burns. The only way I can see this happening is if you do not pull the handle in place as I have described above. If you for example, only pulled the handle to a 200 to 180 degree position or so, I can see it perhaps working its way lose. Just pull it in place when you put it on the machine and I can’t see how you will have a problem with it at all. After you “pull” a shot, the machine, releases a discharge of steam and water to clear out the pressure. This release of water and steam goes into the tray I described earlier at the bottom of the machine. There is a small amount of steam discharge, but not enough for me to worry about it burning me. Once I remove the glass from under the filter, I rotate the filter handle back to the 225 degree position and remove it. It can have a small splash of steam / water, but nothing powerful enough to throw water on me or to burn me. Sometimes it splashes enough coffee onto the back wall of the machine and the drip tray that I need to wipe it off with a rag, but that is all. One note with the filter basket, there are 2 filters that can do into it, a “single shot” and a “double shot” filter. I think that you would normally always want to use the double shot. It seems to be the right size even for a small cappuccino.

6. I got a small Black and Decker grinder. The grinding and tamping of the coffee is the hardest part to get right. It is not hard to get it to work, but to get it to be consistent, well that takes some work. Thus far, I am finding it hard to grind my own coffee, and I purchased some coffee from local coffee shops and had them grind it. The disadvantage to this is that coffee loses it freshness very very rapidly once it is ground. However the advantage to this is that you will be able to get yourself up and running very quickly and be able to get fairly consistent results just about right away. If you buy coffee and have it ground for you at a coffee shop (I would not use anything from a grocery store, even to my inexperienced scenes, at least towards coffee beans, there was a huge difference between the grocery store beans and those from a local coffee shop. It was like comparing boxed wine to something that is $20 a bottle.) then all you have to do is scoop it into the filter basket, and tamp it down. With the double shot filter, I put about a scoop and a half of coffee into the basket. The about is going to vary a little bit, depending on how finely your coffee is ground and how firmly you tamp it down.

7. Once you put the coffee in to the filter basket, you want to use the included tamper to tamp it down. You use a fair amount of force to tamp it, and you slightly rotate the tamper while tamping it. However you don’t pound it in there or it is not going to work well. You will know if you have the right amount of coffee, have it ground properly and tamped properly if the machine pulls the shot in about the right amount of time, around 25 or 30 seconds for a shot. For a shot, I got some insulated glasses ( like these http://www.amazon.com/Bodum-Assam-Double-Espresso-Glasses/dp/B000A5CLCK/ref=pd_lpo_k2_dp_k2a_1_txt/102-1798702-3219342 ). You want that to fill in about 25-30 seconds. If it takes too long it will be too strong and be bitter and taste wrong, and if it is too short, it will not be strong enough to taste right.

8. Once the filter basket is filled and tamped down, and you put it in place as I describe above, then you put one of the shot glasses (as I listed in the previous paragraph) under the filter head, then you turn the dial all the way to your right. Then within a few seconds espresso will come out of the filter head. If it doesn’t come out, it is ground too finely and or packed too tightly. Once the glass is close to full, you turn the dial back off to the center position. (before you make the shot, you need to have the machine on, turn it on by simply flipping the switch on the front of the machine and allowing it to warm up. It warms up very quickly, make sure the top orange light is turned off before you pull the shot).

9. Once done, you can remove your full shot glass, and remove the filter head / arm. Hold the filter under running water near the bottom of your sink and rinse it out. It can splatter a little bit if your not careful, but it easily washes out. Now you can repack the filter and make another shot. The machine stays hot and will be ready to use right away once you get the filter basket packet and back onto the machine again. So you can pull a shot again right away, you may want to do a second shot to make a decent size cappuccino.

10. Once you have the espresso make in your glasses, you dump it into your mug / glass. Now, what you need is a frothing pitcher, I hear you can use a glass measuring cup, about 2 cups in size. I bought a frothing pitcher from linens and things, it is a 20 ounce size. I find the 20 ounce size is a bit larger than I like. I think the 20 ounce size is a little hard to move around the frothing wand. I would like to find something that is shorter, perhaps 14 ounce or so, or something that is shorter and wider. Once you put the milk into the container, you hold the container up to the machine with the frothing wand in the milk, close to, but not touching the bottom of the frothing container. To heat the milk, you will need to hold the container with the wand in place near the bottom of the container, moving it around a bit to heat all of the milk for about 60 - 90 seconds. Once the milk is very hot, you will want to move the pitcher down lower and have the tip of the wand near the top of the milk in the container, hold it hear for about 20 seconds or so, it will rapidly froth the milk. The metal pitcher is the best think to do this with in my opinion, as you can feel the pitcher to tell when it is nice and hot. You can also use a thermometer to know that the milk is up to the right temperature.

11. Now, pour the milk into your glass with the espresso to make cappuccino, use about 12-14 ounces of milk with the 2 shots of espresso. Once the milk is poured in, leave a little room at the top of the glass, now, use a spoon to scoop a little bit of the frothy milk from the hot milk frothing pitcher into your glass, this will give you a nice white frothy / foamy top to your drink.

12. Now you can sprinkle cinnamon / and or nutmeg on the top of the drink. You can add a flavored syrup if you like.

Clean up is easy. As stated earlier, wash out the filter basket in the sink. Wipe down the unit. Dump the waste water out of the tray at the bottom of the machine. Take a rag, and wipe down the area on the machine where the filter basket meet up with the machine, there will be some coffee grounds found there. With the filter basket clean, put it on the machine, run the machine for a few seconds, remove the filter basket, and again wash the filter basket out in the sink. Repeat this again. The wand needs to be cleaned if you use it. You will want to remove the rubber piece from it by gently pulling it off of the metal wand. Now you need to wash the wand off with warm and a rag, you may need to scrape it a little bit to get the film off that is left by the milk. Once the metal wand is clean, replace the rubber boot / sleeve. Now the machine show be clean.

An additional nice feature is that on the top of the machine there is a warming plate for your mugs. It gets nice and warm, but doesn’t really get your mugs all that hot. I used it during my dinner party to keep mugs warm and it helped keep them a bit warmer than room temperature and helped them dry after being washed. I left the machine on during the entire evening with no problems, this also kept the warming plate on.

The frothing wand can also be used to heat and create some foam for other types of hot drinks, like coco, chi tea, etc. The machine when run with the filter basket off will simple pour out hot water, you can use it hot water for any hot drink like tea. Since the machine heats up so fast, it is easy and convenient to use for any drink that you need hot water for.

Overall I highly recommend this machine to anyone that wants a home machine. I simply can not see any advantage to buying a more expensive machine. The only possible downside I can see is if this machine burns out or otherwise fails prematurely, however I have not read any reports of such problems nor do I have any indication that this will happen. Very expensive professional machines may give you control over how much pressure to use to make the espresso shot, however this is going to be unnecessary for all but the very pickiest users. It could be nice if the machine offered a direct hook up to tap water though hard plumbing, and a hook up to the drain, however this is completely unnecessary for most users and would be more expensive to install than what I feel most people would tolerate. Other than that, I cant think of anything this machine is lacking.

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