Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion Off Topic Coffee Machine Suggestions

The original little Pixie models are excellent - super compact and reliable. In the days before the pandemic when the wife and I used to drive to the South of France on camping (well, glamping) holidays, ours also used to come with us. It had its own little spot in the boot each year which made for easy extraction (no pun intended) for morning coffee on the overnight campsite stops.

Nothing like a good espresso or two with a decent croissant or pain au chocolat before a morning’s drive down the autoroute du soleil!

These are often overlooked and genuinely meaningful features, and really worth paying more for in a machine. It’s not so much when making one drink, but if making a whole bunch for, say, two or three of friends, or a dinner party, they will definitely come into their own.

Our regular holiday rental had a Pixie: unless we used authentic Nespresso capsules the Pixie would always completely crush any third-party capsule.

Yeah, we’ve experienced this crushing of non-genuine capsules also. I think it’s because most (all?) 3rd party offerings are made from either plastic or some kind of compostable material, while the machine, being one of the older designs, was only designed to pierce the aluminium foil of the original capsules. What I like about the Pixies is the simplicity, which I think makes them relatively robust. I had friends with the Citiz and the auto-loading seemed to fail a lot, whereas the Pixie has a manual lever. I have no experience with the newer machines though, as these seem to go on and on.

When we tried them, we found a lot of 3rd party options of very variable quality anyway, plus we started recycling all our Nespresso ones, so we just kept using genuine. I think they are the best capsules for Nespresso machines anyway, apart from the excellent commercial ones you rightly mentioned. It’s a shame they don’t allow more people to buy those. I wonder how they classify a business?

There are also the refillable pods, but they don’t hold as much grinds as they need to, and then you need a decent grinder anyway, so I always thought at that point I would go back to a real machine…

My Krups branded Citiz has a manual lever and I never experienced any problems with it (now in storage since I purchased a Lattisima Pro).

Besides authentic Nespresso capsules I occasionally stock-up on Starbucks’ capsules (Italian, House, Espresso). These are very pleasant.

On recycling; to maximise on the volume/weight of sending spent capsules in the mail I use this very practical Dualit widget to extract the spent Coffee. The added benefit of using the Dualit widget is that you don’t amass a growing stash of rotting/pungent Coffee grounds until you have a sufficient quantity for recycling.

On the subject of Nespresso, I have run for many years, coupled with Cafe Pod varieties. Unfortunately I recently experienced excessive leakages using this combination. Switched to (Star Bucks Espresso strength 11 pods) from Sainsbury's to prove a point, the problem went away. I buy the 36 packs great quality and reasonable value.
Glad the switch to different pods saved me from having to buy a new machine.
FWIW Hector

That’s a very handy device, what a great idea! Currently, we live and work in Central London, so just pop the recycling in by hand to the Regent St boutique regularly, as it’s near both our workplaces. When we lived in the countryside, we used to order a recycling bag from Nespresso and they would pick up for free when delivering the next order, which I always thought was a good, and necessary, service, since otherwise they would be quite wasteful, like all other capsule based systems.

Occasionally, Nespresso display artwork, or more practical devices (rather nice bicycles!) made from the recycled materials, in store, which is fun.

Apologies, I must have remembered wrong on the Citiz. There was another machine introduced around that classic Pixie/Citiz era which had an auto pod load/dump. Several friends had them and kept having to send them back when this failed (they stopped piercing the capsules in quite short order) while my Pixie motored on. Sounds like the Citiz is similarly robust.

FWIW, if anyone lives in France (particularly in the South East) we really enjoyed a Malongo machine and pods while in a holiday rental earlier this year. I used to enjoy this brand as beans, and loose ground, when I lived there 25 years ago and still love the flavour profile of their blends. The fine loose ground (or beans ground fine enough) are perfect for stove-top moka use (which is very common down there). Can’t get the pods here, or the machines, it’s not a brand which has ventured beyond the borders of France, I don’t think…

I agree, the Pixie machines seem extremely reliable. I must admit that after around 12 years, I would imagine it may not go on forever - and the pro machine looks mighty tempting...

The Nespresso Zenius currently sells for £399.

In the recent Black Friday sale it was just £49.

Visit Hifonix in Birmingham and you will be treated to a Coffee from their Nespresso Momento (if you’re actively purchasing something from them).

That’s an incredible offer. There seems to be one where if you buy 500 capsules, you can get a zenius for £50… What do they mean by “business” - say you were self-employed with a home office…?

If you’re self-employed that qualifies as a business in my book.