G'day to you my fellow HB's
(listening to OMD's "Electricity" while typing this, you may wanna check them out on YouTube, awesome song to go along with the caffeine kick)

After doing this espresso-thang for the past few weeks, at home, I have come to the conclusion that it may be a bit impractical as well as expensive! This is written just for fun so please don't unleash all the coffee wrath upon me

The average espresso in Croatia, in cafe's, costs about $1.6. If you add milk to it it's $2. Thats 7-8 grams of coffee for $2. And mostly, it sucks. Rarely will you find decent equipment, barista skills and of course, good, fresh beans.

On the other hand, I have already spent around $400 on a machine, borrowed a grinder but will eventually have to spend about $200-300 on it and I have to buy beans that cost me $20 per pound (excellent ones). 7g of grounds costs $0.28 in this case. Since I cant pull decent singles, I need to waste a lot of coffee and do doubles or overdose on caffeine . Now my home espresso is about $0.6. that's 1.4 advantage over the cafe-made one.

If we take the initial costs into consideration, it takes about a year or two, depending on how often you make it at home, to recover the initial set-up costs. This wouldn't be such an issue if there weren't for the annoyances of making an espresso at home - it is a technology that likes high output.

Grinders are huge, hoppers and dosers are large, you need to frequently make coffee or clear out the stale grounds pretty quickly, the best espresso machines are double boiler monsters that are both expensive and large, singles are difficult to pull so you make doubles and waster half of the amount... and just to be able to have a decent cap or espresso when you wake up

Of course, it's a hobby so nothing that I just wrote matters (I should know, just don't ask how much I spent on my photo lenses that i absolutely "need"), but I'm just curious to hear your thoughts.

Cheers and happy grinding!

Another enjoyable "hobby"
Reduce costs and roast your own beans

KK

Espresso isn't cheap compared to other coffee preparation methods (drip, French press, vacuum pot, etc.). For espresso on the cheap, a manual grinder ($60) and mypressi TWIST ($150) are the ones to beat. Otherwise an entry-level Gaggia like yours is frequently recommended. That said, espresso equipment is not an outrageous budgetary expense compared to other culinary tools. For example, outfitting a high-end kitchen would cost 10x what all but the most fanatical espresso aficionado would spend.

HB wrote:Espresso isn't cheap compared to other coffee preparation methods (drip, French press, vacuum pot, etc.)

+1. You can buy a Yama vacpot for $30 USD, a FP for $20, or a Melitta manual pourover for $10, any of which are capable of producing good results. But we're not talking about that; we're talking about espresso, and when it comes to espresso I'd differentiate between "impossible" and "improbable".

A notion of "Good, fast and cheap. Pick any two of the three" is used in software development (and in other fields, I'm sure). IMHO this can be translated to espresso as "good, consistent, and cheap". You can get 'good' results for a low investment, but it's not going to be consistent. What more expensive equipment buys you is consistency & forgiveness.

It's possible to have "good" espresso on the cheap, but it will require a lot more work on your end to both produce the result and to concentrate enough to do it again and again. Whether you enjoy hand-cranking your grinder or boiling your own water and claim that it's "free because I love doing it" isn't necessarily relevant.

Regarding the Twist, don't you have to re-up for cartridges, in effect making it a "razor-and-blades" model where the cost is ongoing? Hmm... Amazon lists iSi 24-pk chargers for $16.99 USD. At 4 shots per canister x 24 canisters / $17, that comes out to $0.05 per shot. Then again, maybe my math is off.

but the other factor to consider is that we're talking about something that is based entirely in the realm of subjective score. If you spend $50 on a hand grinder, another $150 on a MyPressi, and you think that it's the best thing in the world, then there's your answer. It's good, it's cheap, and it meets your needs.

-s.

I know, Sherman, I own a small IT startup .... "Good, fast, cheap"... you totally nailed a nail on the head.

I don't brew espresso at home to save money. I do it because I enjoy the process, and because it's so hard to find good espresso in my local shops. Trying to make espresso at home to save money is often a fool's errand, since you have to spend so much money up front to get to the point where you can make decent shots on a consistent basis. By the time you've spent $1,000 or more on the machine, grinder, tamper, beans, cups, etc. you start to question whether you're really saving money or not.

So don't do it to save money. Do it for the love of the coffee, and for the experience of pulling a great shot in your own kitchen.

Sherman wrote:Regarding the Twist, don't you have to re-up for cartridges, in effect making it a "razor-and-blades" model where the cost is ongoing?

That's true. In bulk, the cost per cartridge is around $0.40 each (search), or a dime an espresso. Although the cartridges are made of recyclable steel, there's also the environmental impact of manufacturing I cannot quantify.

I view the TWIST as a "convenience" appliance, e.g., espresso on the go or at the office. But for someone thinking of trying home espresso at relatively low cost, it's worth considering, especially given that it's far more forgiving than more expensive non-portable entry level units typically purchased by newbies (e.g., the overpriced, ever-popular Rancilio Silvia).

Anyone who justifies making espresso at home as being more affordable is either lying to themselves or bad at financial modeling.

Espresso at home is:
a) fun
b) depending on where you live required if you want good coffee
c) sociable
d) enriching

But it's not economical.

Will add this bit of info for those that need the nitrous chargers... I recently bought a box of 144 iSi brand charge cartridges for $79 with free shipping from a supplier on ebay. No this isn't a plug for anybody, simply to let others know cheaper alternatives exist for these things. Amazon was way too much IMO. I use them for an iSi whipped cream dispenser and wanted to find the cheapest supplier that sells the iSi brand. As with most things in life, bulk prices are cheaper.

HB wrote:That's true. In bulk, the cost per cartridge is around $0.40 each (search), or a dime an espresso. Although the cartridges are made of recyclable steel, there's also the environmental impact of manufacturing I cannot quantify.

I view the TWIST as a "convenience" appliance, e.g., espresso on the go or at the office. But for someone thinking of trying home espresso at relatively low cost, it's worth considering, especially given that it's far more forgiving than more expensive non-portable entry level units typically purchased by newbies (e.g., the overpriced, ever-popular Rancilio Silvia).

*sidesteps the how "green" is espresso discussion* . Your point is well made and taken. $150 is a helluva lot less to spend than $600+ for Silvia, regardless of grinder, and it's a great entry point for relatively little buy-in. Given the level of finagling and effort required to produce decent results on either the Twist or Silvia, I can see how the scales would tip toward the Twist, and both yours and Abe's review lends credence to its ability to produce solid shots.

-s.