The more I look at their products, the more I think Breville is trying to be the Apple of small appliances. They clearly research how products are actually used, and then try to improve. The YouBrew has some innovations that I really like and then I must ask: why are they the only ones who seem to care.
Here are the features I like best:
#1: Useful LCD display. Every other coffee machine I have tried has at best a couple of flashing lights and a simple clock display. The Breville has an backlit LCD display that actually tells me something beyond a flashing ''12:00'' !!! At first, the display seems overly complicated. You quickly discover that the information is useful and logically presented. I personally would have programmed the buttons a bit more consistently and would have used the up and down buttons with more functions (like setting carafe size) Self-clean mode could also be easier to set. With that said, the Breville''s user interface is still 10 years ahead of everything else. When making coffee in the morning, I press one button and I am done. The Breville is even nice enough to tell how me how much time is remaining until my coffee is ready. BTW: The Breville clock does NOT flash 12:00 or show the wrong time when you don''t set the clock after a power failure or if like meyou rarely use the timed brewing functions. Very thoughtful.
#2: No plastic smell. I didn''t care about this until I recently bought (and then returned) a Mr. Coffee and a Cuisinart maker. Both had terrible plastic smells that you taste even after rinsing the machine several times with vinegar, soap and water. I understand that the smell and taste will diminish over time. I just don''t know how safe it is to drink even small amounts of liquid that has been contaminated in this way.
#3 Smart brewing. Being able to control the coffee to water ratio and then the steeping time for any size cup or carafe is absolutely brilliant. It allows me to make coffee the way I like it and I can consistently reproduce my results, time after time. I can also switch from single cup to 12 cups and get exactly what I expect. Outstanding!
The features I like the least:
#1 Height. At 16 3/4" tall, this coffee machine will have trouble fitting under some kitchen cabinets.
#2 Grinder Noise (minor concern): Using my trusty dB A meter I measured it at 80 db. Not a big deal since it runs for only a few seconds. To put this in perspective, it is quieter than a Starbucks store grinder (92 dB) or even my Dyson handheld vacuum (88 db).
Summary: The Breville is what I wanted in a drip coffee maker including many things I didn''t know I wanted.
We can all agree on what''s really lousy coffee (from army mess to a couple of high-end places where servers are called "baristas"), but what''s really a great cup of coffee is a matter of conjecture, the qualioty of the beans, and what we''re accustomed to. I''m no connoisseur: I know what I like; rich, a little strong, and with cream.
The Breville You Brew is nicely designed, takes a little thought, and makes a decent cup of coffee, but nothing comparable to that really good coffee one gets at a FINE restaurant (the Ritz-Carlton comes to mind). After playing with it and making everything from one cup to a travel mug to a full carafe, the end product is no better than what my Cuisinart and *premium* [Dillanos]coffee puts out.
I think what this boils down to to use a very appropriate phrase is the coffee. My wife and I think Caribou and Starbucks are bitter even though the pres. of Starbucks says that there''s no bitterness in coffee, period. Still, I think it''s important that the reader knows this because it will give a point of reference. Knowing that, here are the pros and cons as I see them in the Breville YouBrew.
Design and Pros:
Easy to Use Don''t let the "panel" with all the options put you off. The You Brew is well designed, actually very easy to use, and does everything but drink the coffee for you.
Make a Mug or a Carafe Full You can make a mug or carafe-full.
Use Ground or Beans You can grind your own beans or use pre-ground.
Fill the Reservoir with Water, and It Knows How Much to Use, and Pre-Heats before it brews You can fill the reservoir with water the night before and have the thing go off at 6 AM, and it will pre-heat the water before it starts brewing. The folks at Breville even thought of making sure that the steam that''s generated during the making of the coffee doesn''t go back into the bean reservoir.
The machine will use just the water it needs for whatever you tell it to brew, and you can fill it more easily than many machines because the water reservoir is in the middle top of the machine, though the machine is quite tall.
Insulated Carafe The carafe is heated and keeps the coffee at a decent temperature for several hours, but not the whole day as some have said. You can indeed take the carafe out and pour yourself a cup while it''s brewing without any leakage (our Cuisinart leaks badly when you try that).
Good Coffee By The Mug Disregarding making a carafe-full for the time being, individual cups and travel mugs produce the most uniform and best coffee. The water to grounds ratio seems to be best for the mug.
Easy to Clean Last, it''s easy to clean.
Neither Pro Nor Con or Both: I loved the fact that this is an insulated carafe, and that it does keep the coffee warm for several hours. However, I prefer a glass carafe because I want to know how much coffee is left without having to guess. It''s too bad that there isn''t a see-thru level on the side.
Cons:
It''s Huge and DOES Make a Difference (See Uploaded Photos Out of the Box) Again, this thing is huge, and at 16 inches is 3 inches taller than our old Cuisinart. My wife who is just a tad under 5 feet, has to stand on a step stool to fill it with water. Counter height is normally around 36" which makes the reservoir 52" off the ground, and don''t forget that the brewer is not at the edge of the counter, but pushed back. I''m 6''2" (yeah, you should see our wedding pictures), and even I have some difficulty in reaching up and over.
Can''t See If Any Coffee Is Left (a BIG deal) The carafe has no indicator to tell you how much coffee is left. This has become a much bigger issue after using it for several weeks. Just when you want a cup, it turns out that somebody''s left it empty ... again. Glass carafes might not keep coffee warm for as long a period, but I MUCH prefer glass.
Noisy The grinder is REALLY noisy, and that''s important if one person is up at 5 or 6 and the other still in bed. And yes, it is loud enough to wake somebody up!
Is Not Uniformly Hot The coffee isn''t uniformly hot, and seem to be cooler than what our other pots have produced. That can be an issue if you do use cream/milk which will make it even cooler. It''s not important to me during my "ice coffee season" which is about ... always, but I do like a hot cup of coffee at breakfast. YouBrew is best for the first few cups while our Krups and Cuisinart were much too strong until the carafe was half full.
Pricey Even at this hefty price, I''m not sure that Breville uses copper heating coils. (I think that Technivorm is the only one that does.)
Consistency Because it''s freshly ground coffee, one would think it would be stronger, but it isn''t and I haven''t found a way to override the amount of water or coffee that''s used. I have found that pre-ground coffee is stronger which is a surprise.
Summary: I do like the design, but at times I wonder why I would want to go through the decision-making and choice selection process. I''ve been making coffee by the pot for over 50 years: maybe I''m just not enough of a snob. I have wondered if Green Mountain those folk that bring you the one-cup serving container at a high profit margin isn''t talking many people into the cup-at-a-time rather than the carafe because that''s where the money is (and I see that Gevalia and Starbucks are joining forces).
I like the design, but more from an engineering point of view much more than aesthetically. It''s really too big to be beautiful ... even in the largest kitchen. That it''s stainless is only a concern when you have stainless appliances.
The coffee is good, but not fantastic. Again, I emphasize that it''s still a matter of taste. On the one hand, you can''t go wrong. On the other, there are French drip pots for a quarter the price that can produce some really great cups of coffee. America''s Test Kitchen still prefers the French drip, but then, who''s to say they have the same criteria and taste buds as mine.
While many would say that, for a good cup of coffee, price shouldn''t be a consideration. Who are these people??? This is a very expensive brewer, and for this kind of money, I really would expect the best cup of coffee.
[I used to teach management principles and psychology, and everyone whose ever been in my seminars knows that one of my two principles is, Satisfaction is a function of Rewards Over Expectations. For the price, I think that most would EXPECT a great cup of coffee. If this was $79, the coffee might be thought to be better. Subjectivity does indeed play a role. The other principle...well, I''ll save that for another review unless you want to email me.]
EW
Buy Breville BDC600XL YouBrew Drip Coffee Maker Now
This is a beautiful machine. Breville combines thoughtful industrial design and engineering together in a really nice balance of form and function in all of their products and this is no exception.
Now that I''ve used this machine for a while, I''m confounded by the other reviews that claim the coffee to be too weak or too cold. I have to think maybe they got bad products.
There really aren''t that many other product options out there for a combo grind and brew machine. We previously had a Cuisenart grind and brew, but pitched it when we remodeled our kitchen replacing it with this Breville. The Cuisinart made decent coffee, but it was loud, and horrible to clean. This Breville is leagues ahead in terms of flavor. It''s probably a little quieter because it''s a bur grinder, but you also have to set realistic decible expectations and take into account that its only grinding for a short time. In terms of flavour and strength, this is the best coffee I have ever had from a home coffee maker. I''m not even brewing the coffee on the strongest settings, but I''m tasting bold, strong coffee that is every bit as good as a cup of Starbucks. I''m not a super taster, but I am a discerning one and this really does brew an astonishingly good cup/carafe of coffee. As bonus, the machine is easy to clean (a lot easier than the Cuisinart). It is very easy to use, yet offers a lot of custom settings. I love being able to pour a whole bag of coffee beans in the hopper. And make single cups instead of a whole carafe. The carafe keeps the coffee hot for as long as any other thermal carafe I have owned. As far as I can tell, it does not possess any magic thermal dynamic powers. And, as many other reviewers have stated, it''s a bit of a trick to get that last bit out of the carafe without tipping the pot almost completely upside down (see 4-star rating vs. 5)
Another great feature is that the machine remembers your last settings, so if you brew the same size pot at the same flavor settings every morning, all you have to do is turn it on and hit the start button. This is also great when you have company over -you can set it all up the night before and easily show them the button to push to make wonderful coffee.
My 4-star rating is mostly based on the scale of the machine. It''s big. We don''t have ours under an upper cabinet -it actually would not even fit. So, measure your space before you buy. Our kitchen is also very big and open so it looks good in terms of proportion. In a smaller, tighter space it might look a little horsey.
Finally, to address the grind, and the complaints that the grind is not fine enough: With this machine, if you look at the ground coffee, you will notice that it might appear to a coarser ground, than say, store bought ground coffee -that is true in first appearance. But if you look even closer at the grounds, you''ll notice that although they are a bit larger, they are also very thin -more closely resembling very thin shavings. So, you need to approach this in terms of surface area. The more surface area, the greater the ability for the hot water to extract all the good stuff out of the coffee. This type of thinner shaved grind is actually going to give you a lot of surface area and thus greater extraction, and it''s going to stay in the filter and not form a bitter sludge in the bottom of your cup. A blade grinder (like in the Cuisinart) will inevitably produce a fair amount of powder (also lots of surface area) but the blades whirring around like an airplane engine get pretty hot in the process and can burn the grounds before water even has a chance to get to them... and then there''s that nice powder sludge in the bottom of your cup....
But really the proof is in the flavour, so I would recommend that you put away your coffee-grind-micro-calipers and instant read water temperature thermometers and just trust your built-in olfactory and taste sensors. And if the coffee really does come out cold and weak, then you probably have a dud machine that should be returned.
Read Best Reviews of Breville BDC600XL YouBrew Drip Coffee Maker Here
I really do like my Keurig and it was fine when my husband and I both drank one cup each a day, but once we started working from home we started drinking more coffee at home it seemed to be wasteful. I''m really not a tree hugger type person, but wasting bothers me. Seeing all those little plastic cups in the trash each day was beginning to bother me. And yes I''ve tried ALL the keurig contraptions that you fill yourself with ground coffee. They are all messy and gross and taste nothing like a fresh nice k-cup. I bought this because machine I wanted a coffee maker that would give me an option to make a cup or a whole pot. This seemed like a great Keurig replacement. I suppose it is for the most part. I''m not going to to over all the pros and cons of the machine itself. Most other reviewers did a great job of that and I agree with them. I''m going to focus on those who want to switch from using Keurig or other single serve brewers.
Pros:
1. Can brew cup or large pot.
2. Easy to clean.
3. Will perfectly grind and measure beans for the size you are brewing.
4. Consumables are standard filters and regular coffee, no fancy little cups or pods or buy.
5. Yummy coffee!
6. Lots of options for strength, cup size, etc. (that could be a con if you like simple)
Cons:
1. Seems to be painfully slow when you want just one cup.
2. Can''t brew any other type of beverage or use for instant hot water.
3. Is the price worth it? I''m not sure. It is expensive, you''ll have to weigh how much you''re willing to spend on a coffee maker.
4. Operation is not very intuitive. I frequently scroll through menus hitting the wrong buttons over and over again. My husband can''t do it at all, but that may be a choice ;o)
When I got the coffee maker I couldn''t open the box and set it up fast enough. I immediately popped a single mug under it and attempted to make a single cup. Programming it isn''t terribly difficult, but does require reading the manual. I have no issue with that, but it is not as obvious as my keurig was. If you''re a person that does not want to read the instructions, like my husband, you will get frustrated with it. He still can''t get it to work himself without help. Once I set it up I sat there and watched a timer pop up on the screen indicating 8 minutes or so to brew a single cup. Apparently it goes through the same process regardless if it is one cup or a whole pot. I sat there waiting and thinking I could have made a cup on my old machine in less than half that time. Then I thought it must just be the warm-up process and subsequent cups wouldn''t take as long, but even another cup immediately after took just as long. I almost wish they had not put a timer on it. It seems to exaggerate the process.
I didn''t think not being able to occasionally brew a cup of tea or other beverage would bother me since I rarely brew anything other than coffee, but I seem to miss it. Sometimes my kids will use the keurig to get some hot water for oatmeal and they miss that as well. In fact even a month after putting this in operation my keurig is still on the counter because I can''t bear to put my little guy away. My husband still uses it for tea occasionally.
The coffee from the youbrew is delicious now that I have a found a brew strength I like. This can make an incredibly strong cup of coffee if you want it that way. As far as the noise from the grinder. Well, it is loud, but I''m not sure if anyone complaining about that has had to grind their own beans before or not, but that process is just loud. I don''t think this coffee maker is any louder. We recently had guests over for a week and it was nice to brew a whole pot for everyone to enjoy. Everyone commented on how yummy the freshly ground and brewed coffee was. I could imagine we would have gone through at least an entire box of k-cups each day if we didn''t have this.
I think the machine will grow on me. I don''t want to return it, but I don''t love it if that makes any sense to anyone. I do love that we''re not buying and throwing away multiple boxes of k-cups a week. The machine is easy to clean up, not much more than the keurig. I like that you can pick which cup size you want with many more options than the keurig. I think that are ultimately 9 cup sizes. The screen shows a teacup, a mug and a travel mug. Each one has a small, medium and large option.
Want Breville BDC600XL YouBrew Drip Coffee Maker Discount?
I read every review on this and other combination Grinder/Brewers. This one had what I was looking for a burr grinder (instead of the inferior blade), and decent reviews. Although the YouBrew is almost twice the price of some of the competition, I saw a recurring theme across all the reviews You get what you pay for.
So I took the leap, and spent more on this coffee maker than I have spent on all my previous coffee makers and grinders combined,times about 4. And I''m glad I did.
Here are my thoughts after using it for a couple weeks:
Cons:
It is big. It is a beast. It weighs a ton. But it is sure a conversation starter sitting there on my counter top.
The stainless steel does show fingerprints. So I wipe it down to keep it looking nice. We''ll see how long that lasts...
Previous reviews talk about how loud the grinder is and they aren''t kidding. It sounds like I did something terrible when I push the start button and this very loud grinding noise starts up. But I''m getting used to it. Plus, I''ve been using it in program mode, where it grinds beans and brews before I get up, and apparently the grinder noise is not loud enough to carry up the stairs and wake anybody up.
I tried the gold-tone filter it came with Meh. It made a decent enough cup of coffee, but what a mess to clean up afterward. I made a full carafe using the gold-tone filter, and the grounds completely filled the filter basket, and overflowed some into the removable housing. Then I had to wait until the thing cooled down so I could dig around in the grinds for the little handle on the gold-tone filter, and then I had to dump it upside down to empty it into the kitchen garbage, making a hell of a mess. So I switched to paper filters, and it''s back to simply upending the housing and discarding the filter full of grounds into the garbage, then giving the housing a rinse.
Pros:
This thing make the most awesome cup of coffee I''ve ever made! I''ve been roasting my own coffee for a while now, so I really enjoy fresh roasted beans. This maker really does a beautiful job of grinding and extracting the coffee-goodness out of my beans.
You can make a single cup (in something like 8 different sizes, from 7.5oz up to a healthy 21oz bladder buster.
You can program the strength (amount of coffee used) and flavor (amount of time the ground beans steep in the water). Or you can program to make a carafe of between 2 and 12 cups (of course, a "cup" is really small. 2 cups = one normal mug of coffee)
The LCD screen really is easy to understand. It''s well laid out, and very intuitive.
You can turn it completely off when it''s not in use (so no little LEDs lighting up the kitchen in the dark)
It holds 60oz of water and a half pound of beans, so you can go a day or 2 without reloading (at least I can...)
There is an automated "door" that rotates closed after grinding, to keep steam and moisture from entering the grinding chamber. Great idea.
It is solid. It has a nice fit and finish to it. There is nothing cheap about it. It has a satisfying clich when you shut the filter door.
One point I found to be helpful I put little felt discs on the bottom it comes with a rubber non-skid bottom, so it stays put. But I like being able to slide it out from under the cabinet when I am filling it, or to let steam vent while it is brewing, and then sliding it back when it''s not in use. The felt pads definitely help from marking up the counter top, and makes the sliding smoother.
In summary, as I mentioned at the start you get what you pay for. And I''m happy.
Update February 2013: I have had my YouBrew for 6 months. I have read the growing number of reviews (both good and bad) and have come to this conclusion: when the YouBrew works, it works very well. Unfortunately, it appears, Breville does not turn out 100% good product, thus the bad reviews. My advice for anyone who has had a unit that does not work (i.e. does not make hot coffee, grinder breaks, water stops pumping, whatever), contact Breville and get a new one. It''s unfortunate that their output of good units is less than 100%, but it''s got to be above 90%, so your odds of getting back-to-back defective units is slim. After 6 months, I can state that I have a unit that operates as it should. I have hot coffee. The carafe keeps the coffee hot for several hours it keeps it warm for more than 12 hours. Yes it''s awkward to get that last 1/2 cup out, but I don''t dwell on it. The loud grinding doesn''t bother me it''s kind of like an alarm clock it goes off at 5:45am, and I know I will have amazing coffee in about 12 minutes. The only minor irritation I have with my unit is that it loses about 1 minute a day on the clock So I have to reset the clock a couple times a month. No big deal, it takes all of 10 seconds. Breville has stated they are aware of this issue and are working to correct it. All in all, the YouBrew remains one of my favorite appliances, and I really enjoy great coffee now.
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