The twist – my parting shots.

The twist – my parting shots.


I am quite pleased with this machine.  It is amazing if you want to judge it by the quality of the shot, which is the most important criteria.  I will be sad to see it go and may pick one up for myself although I will have a hard time justifying it since I already have enough great equipment and it would only be for travel.


The main pro for the machine is taste.  The second best trait is the form factor.  It is easy to cart around on trips or to work.  Although to work very well, you need an equally portable grinder.  The final major plus is that it is amazingly cheap.


It is not without its faults.  It needs cartridges.  This mean that you pay a lot for these little guys and you waste some shots when you pull the shot expecting the cartridge to work and it doesn’t have enough mojo left to pull the entire shot.  I lost two shots this way, perhaps you learn how to avoid that with time. I also felt guilty every time I used it because of the cost of the gas used, which is silly since it would be cheaper to do that than buy a more expensive machine up front, but that is the way I felt.  


There is, of course, the other major restriction that you cannot steam milk with it, but that is only a problem for some.  I would not mind that aspect since I drink most of my shots black.  Also there was a glitch when I poured the excess water out and didn’t notice that I’d dumped the gasket out with the water.  Then the next time I went to pull a shot the gas slipped right on out without pushing the water through ruining another shot.  All of this would make it frustrating as a main machine, but on the other hand I never got a bad shot off of it when the cartridge had gas in it and I didn’t make a mistake and that goes a long way.  I can’t think of another machine for which that is true.  It is an amazing bargain and I'll be sorry to give it back today.

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