rharlow wrote:In the end, I will avoid "buyers remorse" if I can pull 2 shots of espresso and steam 12 oz. of milk within, both of good quality (not necessarily great quality) within 3 or 4 minutes and REPEAT. All for under $1,500.

Here is the trouble with the internet: We all have different tastes for what is "good" and "great." Marshall suggests you won't notice much in 12 oz. of milk--to the extent that he suggests stale coffee (pods). I have never tried pod lattés, so I can't say for sure. However, true story: I was in St. Louis, and I entered the sham of a coffee shop that is Kayak's Coffee. From the window, I had seen that they had a LM Linea, and a LM Swift. This was encouraging to me (these are nice machines, usually too expensive for people that don't know poop from coffee beans), so I went in to order. I looked at the menu, and this was the first sign of something horridly awry: The cappuccino came in 3 sizes: 12 oz, 16 oz, and 20 oz. Hmm, that's funny, none of those sizes corresponds to a cappuccino. Well, I don't know why I did it, but I ordered a small cappuccino. What I received was a 12 oz. drink in a to go cup (to hide the crap foam job). I drank it, and I guess at first it didn't make me wish death upon myself, but by a few more sips I was feeling ill. This was some of the worst coffee I could remember! In 12 oz. of milk! By this time, my friends and I had driven to the other side of Washington University, and we were at Kaldi's Coffee shop. I poured the remainder of my 12 oz. of trash out into a drain, and threw my cup away, ashamed to bring it into the shop. We went in, and I got a real cappuccino (From a Robur, GB5, and a guy that had much more than just a clue), and it was excellent. My friend's latté was also superb.

I have no idea where your taste buds are, but I am with Mike: You aren't going to make good lattés with bad coffee. 12 oz. of milk will hide plenty of mistakes, but it's not going to hide stale coffee. Now, if you have a taste for bitter, black coffee, you may enjoy it. But it won't be what most of us would consider great coffee, and I can all but guarantee you that if you learned to make a decent shot of espresso from fresh, pro-roasted beans, with a good grinder like the Vario, and a decent espresso machine, you will enjoy your lattés more. They will be a lot better than pod lattés and pre-ground coffee lattés in the best way: they will actually have a candy taste to them, be that a "ripe fruit" milkshake, or a "chocolate hazelnut" milkshake, depending on the beans you use (note: they still do taste like coffee ). With pod or preground, you're going to get a bitter-coffee flavored milkshake. It won't overwhelm your palate the way a bad espresso would, but I don't think it will be anything like good after you've tried good lattés.

That's just my opinion, of course, take it for what you may. If your budget really is $1500, I would echo the suggestion for a HX machine--learn to flush till the sputtering stops + a few seconds before making your shot, and you will make perfectly good espresso to have a very nice latté. Occasionally, the stars will align, and you will make a great espresso, and it will still be awesome in a latté. I think the Vario grinder you were considering would also be a good choice for starters--it will be small and tidy, and highly usable.

uscfroadie wrote:I'm sorry, but I have to ask, wouldn't the OP be better off with something like an Expobar Brewtus as opposed to say an Alexia w/PID and a separate milk frothing device? When totalled up they'd cost the same, but the Expobar would take up less space on the counter.

That's purely a matter of taste. I would prefer the HX, myself, but I could see the convenience value of a separate frother, since it makes it trivially easy to get decent foam.

shadowfax wrote:I have no idea where your taste buds are, but I am with Mike: You aren't going to make good lattés with bad coffee. 12 oz. of milk will hide plenty of mistakes, but it's not going to hide stale coffee. Now, if you have a taste for bitter, black coffee, you may enjoy it. But it won't be what most of us would consider great coffee...

If all you've had all your life is McDonad's food, then more of the same will go down nicely. But once you've experienced food prepared by a skilled chef, the good 'ol Big Mac doesn't taste as good as it did. I have friends who were diehard Starbucks fans; their taste for the Green Mermaid was "ruined" when I served them a genuine cappuccino made with Intelligentsia's coffee.

rharlow wrote:In the end, I will avoid "buyers remorse" if I can pull 2 shots of espresso and steam 12 oz. of milk within, both of good quality (not necessarily great quality) within 3 or 4 minutes and REPEAT. All for under $1,500.

Or enter the Wish List Gifts contest and potentially cut your outlay in half (Mazzer Mini Electronic, Le'Lit PL53, Compak K3 Touch and Baratza Vario are among the prizes).

Marshall: that's fair enough. The Nespresso looks like it'd be worth the look. I'd still say that an HX and a simple flush routine, while more work, would get you better espresso than any pod most of the time, with blips of awfulness (dialing in) and blips of greatness (stars align sort of thing). But, if you're into coffee, but not into it like us (many of us probably ought to consider spending some of our coffee money on a psychiatrist, right?), Nespresso may well be worth a look.

One advantage of Nespresso is that I'll bet any money that you can find a retailer that will let you sample the goods... I would suggest doing this before spending the money. I think they have these pod systems available to sample at my local Williams Sonoma... I'll have to check it out now.