Features Of The Best Coffee Makers

The best coffee makers have had a long history with which to find the essential features. Coffee brewers for this essential beverage have been around as long as coffee has. The first was a copper container with a long handle and a grooved tongue from Turkey. It was called the Izbrik. As a mark of good workmanship, this type of coffee maker is still used in the Middle East. However, as it has no filtering, it produces a very strong brew - designed to put hairs on your chest!

The most common type of coffee maker is the drip model. You are probably familiar with it - water is poured into the top, and it is heated by an electric coil. The water passes through the coffee grounds fairly slowly, infusing flavor. It goes into a glass pot usually sitting on a heat plate.

Whilst this is the most common type of coffee brewer, the best coffee makers incorporate additional features, designed to control the temperature, how long it takes to brew, and other features. The benefits, of course, are in a cup of coffee that is geared to your own tastes.

At the least, you would want a coffee maker that allows you to set how long you would like the coffee to brew. That gives you a lot of flexibility with the different types of coffee beans available.

Auto-shutoff is another feature that is important. This benefits a couple of ways. It leaves you free to continue other activities without haveing to be a 'wet nurse' for your brewing coffee. So, even if you forget to turn it off, your coffee won't be overbrewed. And, if you remove the coffee pot, water won't keep dripping down onto the heating plate, leaving a mess to clean. With auto-shutoff, as soon as the coffee pot is lifted up, the water flow is stopped.

Some of the best coffee makers have a water filtering system, which is great if you live in a city or drought affected water where the quality of the water is a bit dubious, and where extra chemicals are added to the water supply to compensate. This does increase the price of a cup of coffee, however, but if quality is important, then this is an ideal feature.

An interesting innovation that really helps with cleaning is the availability of coffee 'pods'. These are pre-measured pieces of paper that water flows through. They filter coffee grounds, and you just remove them at the end and throw them away. So, if you don't have a lot of time, or really dislike cleaning, you'll love these.

Some people don't like the taste from the pods, however, and prefer a brewer with a permanent filter.

Sometimes bean grinders are integrated into the brewers. This may make cleaning more difficult, but it also means one less thing to clutter up the kitchen.

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