Predictable and repeatable

I was thinking about how much coffee I've drunk in my life and whilst I can't put a number on it I'd say it's a lot. Like most of us, coffee starts my day, fills up a good proportion of the middle of it, and even ends my day sometimes.

I've drunk coffee all over the world and, whilst most has been really great, some has been decidedly awful. I don't just mean instant coffee either, that disgusting granulated shite I call, instant disappointment, due to the emotion of 'instant disappointment' it inspires in me. There's been times I've not had a choice though and so, instant disappointment it is.

I spend a fair amount of time in café's so generally enjoy good quality coffee however even then I've been subjected to terrible coffee which, considering the price of it, some $5.00 AUD for a small cup of flat white coffee these days, it's left me disappointed, and it's not even instant coffee!

I drink a lot of coffee at home also and back in the day transitioned from instant to ground coffee made in a plunger or an Italian style stovetop coffee maker called a Moka pot. The problem is there's still room for failure. A bad batch of beans, an incorrect grind, too fine of course, bad roasting, too much compaction or not enough during the preparation phase...it's not consistent.

Back in 2007 I moved into a brand new house and spent some time working on decorating it, buying furniture and appliances and basically making it a home. It was pretty nice and, because I'd worked so hard at my job, I was able to afford nice things to put in it, one of which was a coffee machine, my first ever.

Rather than go for a traditional ground-coffee machine I opted for a Nespresso pod machine by DeLonghi.

I'd never had a pod machine before but in my research had come to understand they were very good with great consistency; the coffee tasted the same every time. There was the flexibility to choose long-cup or espresso pods and they came in various intensities and strengths. At 0.68 - 0.74 cents per pod they were also significantly cheaper than café-bought coffee. The machine was super-expensive, but still far cheaper than most of the ground-coffee machines so I forked over the money, took it home and the rest, as they say, is history.

I've enjoyed so many great cups of coffee since, at least one a day, usually more, since I got it, excluding when I've been away from home for business or vacations and it's performed faultlessly. I've also spent a lot less money at café's due to having such good quality and consistent results at home.

I've cared for the machine, de-scaled it with the proper stuff from Nespresso, run clear water through the system after I make my coffee so it's kept cleaner internally and generally just looked after it and now, fifteen years later, it still delivers quality coffee with repeatable results. I'd say that's a fairly good value for money purchase right?

I know how popular coffee is, how crazy people get for it, myself included, but it's not always good. As much I hate to admit it, bad coffee happens. I'm fortunate that my home coffee is always predictably good but when out it's somewhat of a lottery.

What about you? Tell me in the comments, should you wish to, about your good or bad coffee experiences. If you don't drink coffee and prefer tea tell us about those experiences if you have any.