First of all let’s talk about the flavour of the coffee this machine produces. Even though this unit is very cheap, it produces good coffee and brings out subtleties of flavour. You can distinguish between different blends as you could with a more expensive model. Some people, however, report that their coffee is not hot enough. My experience is that if you take you coffee to drink right away after it’s prepared, there’s no problem. But if you wander off and let the finished coffee sit, then it may not be hot enough to stay hot until you come back. But basically no problems with the coffee itself.

Now onto craftsmanship. This is where this Mr Coffee espresso machine loses some points. The knobs and attachments can be a little awkward to manipulate, and buttons have been known to break off. Typical time of use before breaking down is somewhere in the range of a year, according to a cross-section of consumer reports. That’s not terrible for such a low price, but you may find it troublesome to have to go shopping for a new machine in a year. Some consumers also complain about the quality of the milk frother, though I thought it was of decent quality.

One last thing to note is that true coffee fanatics are unlikely to be impressed by this espresso machine because it doesn’t make true espresso, it makes moka. If you don’t know the difference then you probably won’t care, but needless to say that coffee snobs will frown down upon this machine.

But who cares what the coffee snobs think. If you want espresso but you’re a bit short on cash, this machine will do the trick, at least in the short term. Then you can always buy a higher quality machine as your tastes develop and mature.

Learn more about the ECM20 Mr Coffee Espresso Machine

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