Sage the Dual Boiler Espresso Machine, Coffee Machine with Milk Frother, BES920UK - Brushed Stainless Steel, Silver

Product Information

There are single boiler machines, heat exchanger machines, and dual boiler machines. Single Boiler The Sage Barista Express is a single boiler espresso machine. So the advice here is to regularly change your water filter based upon your water hardness, and also ensure you follow the descale schedule also depending on your water hardness. If you look after your machine and avoid severe limescale, it's very unlikely you'll encounter this issue. To someone who hasn't caught the home barista bug, or to someone who doesn't even drink coffee, spending hundreds or even thousands on a coffee machine must seem very odd, I get that.

If you want a bean to cup machine but you don't have the budget to stretch to the Oracle machines, there are plenty of “normal” bean to cup coffee machines which are available at much lower prices. So unless you get one of the fully assisted Sage machines, you may in some cases actually end up with worse-tasting coffee from using a non-assisted manual espresso machine as if it were a bean to cup machine. The Sage Vs Breville Confusion One other option is a capsule machine. Some high-end models add a milk carafe for one-touch cappuccinos and so forth, while others add a steam wand to provide manual or semi-automatic milk frothing so that you can feel more like a barista in your own kitchen. Cheaper models, however, effectively bolt on an aftermarket milk frother so that you can pour an espresso, then add frothed milk yourself. If you already have a basic capsule machine, then buying a milk frother is a cheap, easy upgrade. Manual or automatic milk frother? HX machines use slightly less energy (hence slightly cheaper to run) than dual boiler machines, as there's only one boiler being heated.Other well thought-through features include a push-to-open used capsule receptacle, roomy drip tray for bigger mugs, and sizable 1.5-litre water tank. Even coffee aficionados might want to find room on their kitchen worktop for this one. Re seeming too good to be true, the Sage Dual Boiler is a dual boiler machine, with a PID, with a heated group, and with a lot of other features, for around the price of an entry-level heat exchanger machine. This means you can just press the milk icon first if you want the espresso to pull after the milk steams, or do it the other way around, and in either case it means you don't have to stand in front of the machine for a minute or so. Timed auto on (via LCD) | This Means you can have your machine heated up and ready when you wake up

Very visible, LED lit water level indicator | Again, why this isn't standard I don't know, but it's great to be able to see when you need to refill the tank Burton, G. (2011, January 11). The E61 Group Head: An Oldie but a Goodie. Retrieved from https://fivesenses.com.au/blogs/news/the-e61-group-head-an-oldie-but-a-goodie Some will say they look cheaper too than other dual boiler espresso machines – but then, they are ;-), and they don't look cheap to me, I've always really liked the look of Sage machines. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder I think they say.As we’ve already mentioned, pricier bean-to-cup and capsule machines provide a completely automated alternative: the milk carafe. Fill the carafe with milk, and these coffee machines can pour an espresso into your cup then steam and froth the milk in the carafe before adding it to your coffee. This is the least effort-intensive of the various milk frothing options, and the large capacity of a milk carafe versus a jug means that you can serve up several drinks before needing to refill it. How much should I spend? The Barista Touch Impres, though, really does assist the user, and it does it in a way that I think is genius! It doesn't stop there, either. Something else Breville did which is really big, is when it comes to pump control. I've found myself becoming (or at least trying to become) a bit more organized when it comes to when I make my coffees, by using the auto on, and then changing the auto-on after making my first coffee, so it'll be warmed up and ready to go when I come to use the machine again.

The Sage dual boiler, for me, is one of the most capable yet one of the most underrated espresso machines currently available in the UK. Why this is, well there are probably a few reasons, but I think the main things are: How easy they've made everything via the LCD, such as changing brew temperature, setting the preinfusion time and power, re-setting the shot button times or volumes if you choose to switch it to volumetric. It's unlikely you'll use a Sage machine and think “hmm, It would have been better if they'd done this…” because if there was any better way of doing something, they'd probably have done it. Bigger things How to choose the best coffee machine with milk frother for you What kind of coffee machine should I buy? All of these settings means that you’ll need to make quite a few shots of espresso while you fine-tune your machine, but it’s totally worth it. Once we’d got The Dual Boiler set up properly, we got, hands-down, the best results we’ve had with any espresso machine so far. Perfect, red-brown crema sat on top of our shot of espresso, which is dark and rich in colour showing excellent extraction from our ground coffee. At 68C, the shot was just about perfect temperature wise, with additional shots coming out at the same temperature. Sage has used PID (proportional-integral-derivative) controllers for its boilers, which ensure that they deliver at a consistent temperature.Dual-boiler espresso machines are inevitably large. The dual boiler design guarantees it. But they still come in a wide range of sizes. The coffee grinder is incredibly important, anyone who knows their stuff will tell you that, so if you're thinking of buying the Sage Dual Boiler, you'll need to carefully consider which grinder to pair it with. The Dynamic Duo