Smart Choice on Coffee Grinders.
Maestro Plus Conical Burr Mill
The Maestro Plus Mill is a great all-around conical burr and a good quality if you mosstly drink french press or filter drip, with maybe an strong espresso. Maestro Plus Conical Burr Mill is also a well all-around mill but a better quality for espresso with commercial grade 40 mm conical burr set. In our proves it produces a more unchanging, even fine grind. Both mills carry the Baratza name but are manufactured by Solis for Baratza who has sold the grinder for years and knows it well. Both mills have the following features:
- grinds selector dial features 40 numbered stops for grind repeatability
- a powerful DC motor
- an improved and expanded manual
- unique gear reduction design that produces slow rotation of the conical burr, ensuring the retention of the aroma and flavor, and helping reduce static
- whole bean hopper can hold 1/2 pound of beans
- timer knob for repeatable coffee dosing
- pulse button in front for grinding directly into portafiler handle
- small cleaning brush included (looks like a tiny pine tree)
The Maestro Plus has the fancy new base- a solid chunk of polished metal that gives the mill stability, helps reduce static transfer, and doesn’t look bad at all. The Maestro Plus burr set is housed in very tough high density polyethylene (same heavy duty plastics used in commercial cutting boards). It is easy to access and clean the burrs: you turn the grind hopper to the coarsest setting, lift it off, then lift out the top burr. The burrs are tool grade steel.
Compak Espresso Mills
Compak K3 Touch
The K3 Touch is Compak’s doserless model. This implies that, more or less, the grinds fall straight from the burrs into your portafilter. The advantage here is that there’s no doser to trap old, stale grounds. Also, it’s much simpler to grind into a container (if grinding for brewed coffee) with this machine than with the K3 Elite. The tradeoff is that your espresso grind will have more clumps than with a doser grinder, so you’ll have to be more careful to properly distribute grinds in the portafilter basket. Features:
- A doserless design, for easy cleaning and dual espresso and brewed coffee use
- An optional-use timer. The grinder has a manual mode and a timer to automatically control dosing. The timer isn’t perfect (less dense beans will grind faster, so time doesn’t equal dose), but it’s a good start.
- 0.6lb / 275g hopper capacity
- Commercial 58mm flat burrset, with a grinding rate of 11-15 pounds/hour
- Stepless, micrometrical grind adjustment
- 16.5″ height: fits easily under standard American 18″ kitchen cabinets
- Attractive, comes in black or polished aluminum
- 1 year warranty on parts and labor.
Compak K3 Elite
The K3 Elite is Compak’s doser model. Ground coffee flows into the “doser” on the front of the machine, and you pull a level to push grounds out. What a doser will do at home, though, is break up clumps. Static in the grinds causes them to clump together at finer grind levels, and these clumps can be a headache when trying to achieve a perfect espresso. The action of the doser hitting the grinds tends to break up the clumps. Features :
- A doser design, for dedicated espresso use, with a 0.45lb / 200g capacity doser
- 0.6lb / 275g hopper capacity
- Commercial 58mm burrset, with a grinding rate of 11-15 pounds/hour
- Stepless micrometrical grind adjustment
- 16.5″ height: fits easily under standard American 18″ kitchen cabinets
- Attractive, available in Black or Polished Aluminum
- 1 year warranty on parts and labor
- More images and commentary of the K3 Elite
The Rancilio Rocky grinder
Available on Rancilio Stainless Steel Rocky without doser and Rancilio Stainless Steel Rocky with doser. You can find it as an all-around mill, with a favorable front-mounted switch, or as a dedicated espresso mill, dressed up with a doser and coffee handle holder. It has commercial grade 50 mm flat burrs and 55 grinding adjustment steps, enough to pinpoint the exact grind requirement for the most specific espresso machine. And it covers a full range of grinds from fine to coarse, from Espresso to French Press. It’s right as a French Press grind but really the Rocky excels in the medium to fine to ultra-fine grinds; filter-drip, vacuum pot, espresso, and Turkish). Be aware that new Rocky mills are tested at the factory, and you might see a little grind residue on the burrs or in the doser.
The Mazzer Mini Espresso Mill
The Mazzer Mini is merely the best home espresso mill you can buy. The 58 mm hardened steel grinding discs are blowed in a mount by 3 high-tensile springs. This grants for seamless, continuous grind adjustment. I have found there is no static electricity in the grinds, and the doser is sturdy, easy to use, and easy to adjust. They call this color Aluminio in Italy, but it is not made of Aluminum – it means silver. The newest version of the mill features the “shorter” hopper – total height is 17″ from base to top of hopper. The new models also include a stainless steel grounds tray and a power cord that comes out the bottom of the machine.