It must be a pretty smart coffee if someone so irritatingly handsome and wealthy as George Clooney is prepared to endorse it. And yet Nespresso, the self-styled premium brand from the Nestle stable, has been using Clooney as the face of Nestle to the world since 2007. If the big guy goes for it, then it must be surely worth a look just to see what all the fuss is about.

The Nespresso machines come with a wide range of functionality from the simplest basic espresso maker to a full featured machine that assembles the most amazing cappuccinos without any human intervention whatsoever. Literally, it’s like having your own coffee bar at the press of a single button without all the irritation of having to wait for it to be made and the shame of ordering a dangerously fattening chocolate muffin that lies in wait at the local coffee shop. And there is no noisy bean grinding, spilt coffee grounds and the like to mess up the surrounding area either. At the press of just the one button it all just happens by itself.

And the coffee? Well, it really is to die for!

Absolutely amazing quality, smoothness and consistency when compared to the traditional handmade espresso machines. A real mark of a great espresso is the thickness and quality of the crema, the golden oily top which should float on any well made cup. With Nespresso it just appears every time with every cup – the perfect consistent crema.

There are a wide range of different flavours including de-caffeinated and those specially formulated for those who like their coffee long.

So, what’s not to like?

The coffee itself has to be purchased from Nespresso and they are the only suppliers of the little pods which contain the precious vacuum packed coffee. The cost of the coffee – it is not cheap when compared to a teaspoon of instant coffee and more expensive than grinding your own coffee and using a traditional espresso machine. But to my mind the quality of the coffee combined with the convenience of the pods make the difference well worth paying.

Another feature which concerns some customers is the environmental impact of all those little pods. It is true that in Switzerland there is a recycling scheme where the pods are collected in particular locations and then melted down so that the plastic and aluminium can be reused and the grounds turned into fertilizer. In most countries however, these pods are just dumped into bits for disposal in dumps and landfill. Competitors to Nespresso offer much more environmentally friendly recyclable pods and it is likely that consumer pressures may force Nespresso one day to review its manufacturing methods.

Finally, a complaint of a number of Nespresso users is that there is nowhere on the machines that really warms the cup into which the coffee is poured. Some of the more sophisticated machines have a warming plate but it does little other than take the chill off the cups. It is of course a problem shared with many espresso machines but it seems a shame that this feature has not been fully considered.

Overall however, for the coffee fan there is much to recommend these machines and a tasting at one of the large stores near you is strongly recommended.

For further information on Nespresso machines visit www.armorica.co.uk

World’s most expensive coffee arrives in UK

The world’s most expensive coffee has finally arrived in the UK and the high prices charged of over £50 per cup reflect its extraordinary origins.

The coffee is a mixture of traditional Jamaican Blue Mountain Coffee and Kopi Luwak, a bean that comes from south east Asia and is collected off the floor from the droppings of civet cats. The civet cat apparently eats the beans fresh off the plants, partly digests them, and then excretes them in the usual way. It is no surprise that this coffee is rare and costs over £350 per kilo!

The digestion process apparently does change the whole nature of the bean to give an entirely different perspective on coffee. Available online and from the top people’s store Peter Jones in Sloane Square, the coffee is said to be dark and very smooth.

Expert coffee maker Bill Brown from kitchen shop Armorica is excited about this new arrival.

“It is obviously a very different type of coffee that requires a very special preparation technique.” says Bill. “We would strongly recommend a coffee machine that is able to cope with the subtle nature of these beans – a fine ground, water temperature of between 85° and 92°, and pressure in the espresso machine in excess of 15 bars would be ideal. This would ensure that every little bit of flavour and its subtlety is extracted from this precious bean”.

At the sort of prices mentioned it is no surprise that this coffee has become a big hit with the rich and famous, a new designer label to add to the collection.

Contact: Bill Brown
Armorica
19 Rams Walk
Petersfield
Hants
GU32 3JA

Tel: 08456 017 262
Fax: 01730 269 699
Email: enquiries@armorica.co.uk

Celebrity Chefs Conquer the Household Kitchen

The celebrity chef is here to stay and these personalities have made their presence felt in every kitchen in the land.

Led by Fanny Craddock in the 1960’s, followed by the Galloping Gourmet Graham Kerr in the 1970’s and then by Michel and Albert Roux in the 1980’s, there is no doubt that the current huge proliferation of celebrity chefs is a sign of the times and evidence that they are here to stay.

Our current celebrities in the 2000 s are a mixture of memorable personalities and completely cooking different styles. From the Gallic charm of Raymond Blanc to the crude rough edges of Gordon Ramsey, the technical scientific precision of Heston Blumenthal to the casual, relaxed style of Jamie Oliver, your favoured celebrity chef is strictly down to you.

One characteristic they all share is the requirement for more and more kitchen equipment. If the domestic gods and goddesses of the amateur kitchen are to keep up then they are often obliged to spend money in buying not just the freshest ingredients but also the latest equipment which might be needed to cook those ingredients. The kitchen worktop seems to have less and less space occupied by more and more gadgets and gizmos.

Exotic equipment, until recently completely unheard of in the UK, has now become common place in many of the UK’s kitchens.

For example, the coffee machine 30 years ago was at best a machine which boiled water at one end and dripped coffee through a filter paper at the other end. Today the consumer has a massive range of machines to choose from – from the simple percolator to the most complex espresso and cappuccino “bean to cup” machines which grind the beans, boil the water, pressure-pumps the water through the coffee, to produce exquisite espresso and pours the coffee into your cup for you. Much of the reason for this change is not just that there is more high quality coffee in restaurants, but that the consumer urged on by celebrity chefs is pushed to go for quality.

Another example is the humble kitchen knife. Time was when the ordinary kitchen just had a carving knife and a chopping knife. Chefs have shown us their remarkable dexterity in chopping food using specially designed knives and in order for simple folk to do the same…. they also need to have their own range of knives. As we all know, these knives can range in quality quite dramatically – some of the more exotic knives from the Far East are painfully expensive but seriously impressive and very sharp.

So what is the amateur chef to do? Well, carefully think about what you do and don’t need and then find a really good kitchen shop that is full of information and content that can really help you make the right decision.

For more information on kitchen equipment as well as a huge raft of valuable information visit www.casawares.co.uk , an online Cookshop that stocks both the common place and the exotic in kitchen equipment.