Coffee requires only two ingredients to be made at home, yet the industry surrounding the world’s favorite beverage has been hell-bent on making things as complicated as possible for decades. An endless barrage of sexy gadgets promises to optimize every step of the process, and yet to many consumers, the finished product ends up tasting remarkably similar.
No shade to the people who maximize their morning ritual with aesthetically pleasing trinkets like a $2,650 coffee grinder or a $208 electric kettle, but the fact that McDonald’s sells 8 million cups of coffee a day speaks to an unavoidable truth: Most people just want to get the coffee in their body with as little fuss as possible.
Given the tension between a quality cup and the time and effort spent brewing it, a coffee machine’s ability to brew delicious coffee with as little friction as possible should be the primary yardstick…
