Review of the Bacchi Espresso Machine.

In this review I will tell you what I think of the Bacchi and the coffee it makes. I'm aiming this review at people ,like me, who have moved on at least one step from a Moka and are wondering: where next?  The Bacchi is not so much a machine as a philosophy. As you begin to appreciate the surface so you begin to live in the shoes of its designer. And that is an experience...If you appreciate truly great design then the Bacchi will surprise you.

Normally when we think of coffee machines, things like pumps, solenoids, PID controllers, heat exchangers and pressure gauges come to mind. The Bacchi has none of these things and yet, functions exactly as if it did.

The Bacchi is a stove top machine with a boiler and a steam driven piston. That's it. It is constructed from aluminium and that has been anodised. Which makes it slightly more interesting than stainless steel. The steam which drives the piston is made from a pre-set level of water in the base. Securely seated above the base is the boiler and piston assembly. And on top of that is the group head. All components are held in place by a single bolt secured to the frame at the top.

Now this is where thoughtful design comes into it. In order to achieve a pressure of 9 bar, you need to heat the water in the base to 170 degrees. So you have superheated steam in there. When you hit a pressure of 9 bar you want the water in the boiler to be at 90 degrees. So your heat exchanger is the body of the machine that conducts heat from the (hotter) steam through the body of the machine to the boiler. This little symphony has been orchestrated to perform at between 6 and 7 minutes from a cold start. Use too little heat from the stove and you won't get the pressure. Use to much and the steam is at the right pressure, but the water is too cold. Go shorter than 6 minutes and the coffee is under extracted; go over 7 minutes and the coffee is burnt. So you have to apply sufficient heat in order to raise the pressure and the temperature such that they are both at the optimum within the 6-7 minute window. Therefore you need a control system â and you're it.

You need to experiment with different stove heat settings in order to hit the 6-7 window. But how do you know when the pressure is right? There is a valve that whistles, just like the old kettles, when 9 bar has been reached. So you are listening for the whistle, you are adjusting the energy input and you are measuring the time taken. Quite sophisticated; quite beautiful.

So what does it taste like. Well just before I get to that, there is another crucial element in this equation and that is the fineness of the grind. Too coarse a grind and even if you have everything else right, the coffee will be woeful. Too fine a grind and the machine will choke. So one more task that the controller must perform is to ensure that the shot is delivered in around 25 seconds.

For me this meant getting a new grinder. This what I mean about Bacchi being more of an experience than a machine. So you get the fine grind, the temperature, the pressure and the timing spot on and you are in for a historic treat. Not quite. The final, final aspect to consider is your coffee. If like me you have managed on supermarket beans, you will be both delighted and disgusted. Delighted when that bog standard coffee starts to sing and dance like you never knew was possible; and disgusted when the full horror of stale beans is extracted to perfection in all its gut wrenching glory. This machine gets the flavour out and does n't differentiate between good and bad. So the dull tasteless coffee of the past is revealed now to be deeply, profoundly stale. And you can taste it in techniclour.

But what of freshly roasted beans? When what you get in the cup fits the description of the bean, and does even more in the mouth, then you know you have something very valuable. The Bacchi delivers a diversity of flavour, a fidelity to the bean and reveals a panorama of detail that is just not there in lesser machines.

One last word about the design. The Bacchi has only one moving part. There are no pumps, heat exchangers, pressure or temperature gauges, solenoids or controllers to fail. But the Bacchi incorporates all that functionality in a supremely elegant way, to make truly wonderful coffee.

For £260 is there a better machine on the market? I seriously doubt it. But bear in mind you need to spend that again to get a good grinder. Even at £520 I still don't believe there is anything that can touch it.