Froffy Coffee, Here I Come! (Morphy Richards 47505)

Member Name: Nibelung

Product:	Morphy Richards 47505
Date:	28/09/03 (2728 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Well made, Smart

Disadvantages: Short Mains Lead

We don't normally go in for electrical kitchen gadgets that will only perform one task; even our toaster has a defrosting rack too. Yes, I know kettles only boil water, but ours is also a filter jug, so there!

It therefore comes as some surprise to me that I'm writing about something that will only make coffee, but it's the nature of the coffee that counts here.

Both Ruth and I love our coffee; maybe in some past life, we weren't English, as our tea use is only about 1/10th of our hot drink consumption.

When eating out, I frequently opt for a cappuccino style coffee, either dusted with chocolate or sometimes cinnamon. As you can imagine, something that's had steam forced through it with enough force to both heat it AND froth it up is a bit difficult to re-create at home without the right kit. Bubbles in the bath, I can manage without any help, but in coffee........?

I tried a so-called sachet of 'cappuccino' once and it was disgusting, tasting more like Ovaltine, not that I've got anything against the latter, but it's just not coffee.

JOKE BREAK

A man asks why his father, newly admitted to a nursing home, is being administered Ovaltine and Viagra just before bedtime. 'Well', says the nurse' 'one helps him sleep, and the other stops him rolling out of bed!'

Back to the plot......

WHAT WE BOUGHT

The Morphy Richards Roma (Model 47505) is what we ordered to appease our habit. OK, it would have been nice if it said 'Gaggia' in gold letters on it but it doesn't.

It cost us £89 from my wife's Kays catalogue. By some strange means of creative accounting known only to ladies (or Kay's agents), it appears that this was made even cheaper from her cashing of £30 'commission*', and given that it would run up some more commission of its own, it sounded as if Kays were going to give it to us, or at least
that's how the deal was sold to me! If we were buying a washing machine, would this be called money laundering, I wonder?

* I call it 'commission' in inverted commas because this was all generated from our own spending anyway. 'Cash-back' is probably a more accurate term.

As you can see form the thumbnail sketch above, it's clad in stainless steel, and to my mind feels very well made (if its weight is anything to go by - getting it out of the packaging was a two-person job).

In appearance, it looks a little like a coffee filter machine that's wide enough for two jugs, with the usual base plate and an overhang, in which lies the gubbins to make coffee. At the back lies a transparent removable 1.7 litre tank for fresh water.

The front panel to the overhang contains pilot lights to show whether the power is on, and whether the water is yet to working temperature. There is also a two-way switch for dispensing water or steam.

Indeed the relatively short instruction book breaks down the machines operations into two clear functions; espresso and steam.

ESPRESSO is largely the same process as for a typical coffee filter machine, the major difference being the method for extracting coffee flavour on its way to the cup. A filter machine uses gravity. This job uses a 15 bar (1 bar = 14.7 lbs/sq inch) pump to force hot water through a coffee filter which has been designed to take one or two cup-loads of ground coffee. Since this is done under great pressure, the filter has a strong bayonet fitting to hold it in place. The two-cups version has two outlets, which allow for each cup to fill simultaneously. Underneath the cups there is a drip tray which has an indicator to show when it's about to overflow.

STEAM - This really splits down into two sub-categories depending on whether the rubber 'frother' has been fitted to the end of the steam pipe. This is a chromed affair cranked
to enable it to swing out from the right-hand side of the machine. This gives extra headroom for the sort of jug you might want to place under it. As you can imagine, piping steam through a liquid will heat it pretty quickly, although be prepared for a certain amount of dilution to take place as the steam condenses. With the frother attached, it's easy to get that 'froffy coffee' look with any milk based drink. Frothing is the second stage in making a cappuccino from a basic coffee as produced by the espresso filter.

Although no receptacle is provided, Morphy Richards recommend the use of chilled milk and a stainless steel jug for the production of frothy milk. Cold milk makes it less likely that you will accidentally boil it by overdoing the steam process. Good news for health freaks - skimmed milk froths better!

USING IT

Before first use, or whilst de-scaling it after about three months use, you need to pass water.........errr....through it, that is!

To actually make some coffee, you switch it on with enough water in its reservoir, and wait for the heater indicator to go out. Then, using the scoop provided, you pack the filter with coffee, tamping it flat with the other end of the scoop, which has been specially flattened for this purpose. Then the filter is clamped in place with a circular motion, coming to rest when sufficient resistance is felt. You are warned not to use too much force. I assume that this could cause premature ageing of the pressure seal. With one centrally placed (or two side-by-side) cup(s) in position below the filter, you turn the main switch to the 'make coffee' setting, and listen whilst the pump forces high pressure hot water through the coffee. How long you leave it running will dictate the coffee strength. A half-depth cup will give you one of those single espressos rather like a Greek coffee without the 'mud'. Leaving it running until your cup nearly runneth over will g
ive you a typical cup of filter coffee as the initial stream gets somewhat weaker.

By this time, the warning indicator will have come back on again, but it's only a few seconds before its back up to temperature, ready for the next batch.

GOOD POINTS

Smart functional design out of what appear to be high quality components.

Running costs similar to filter coffee.

Steam function can be used for other liquids (just don't leave any traces of tomato soup on the nozzle before you froth up some milk - I've come across multi-drink dispensers that leave you with a hint of whatever was last requested in your own drink and it's not nice!).

Easy to clean thanks to a large expanse of stainless steel and other rust free parts which come away for separate attention.

SNAGS

The mains lead isn't very long.

We've had to buy a whole new set of lower wider coffee cups. There is no way any kind of mug is going to fit in here, and even our best 'tea set' needs tilting before a cup will fit, which tends to limit how deep a cup of coffee you can have.

The steam action adds some water to your milk.

Removing a used filter nearly always involves a spillage of grounds into the drip tray.

No so much a snag, as something to bear in mind. When 'pumping coffee' there is a small amount of vibration. If you don't site the machine on a perfectly level surface the vibration can make your cup(s) start to 'walk', leaving coffee going straight down into the drip tray.

CONCLUSION

Definitely one for coffee lovers only, and even then we shan't be using it to the exclusion of everything else. If we have friends round, we'll still use the cafetière as it holds enough for four cups, but it's ability to make cappuccino too gives it a specific purpose in life.

Trouble is, now I need to go and find a chocolate powder di
spenser and a cheaper supply of amaretti biscuits.

Summary: