For a few years, I have been making a cup of coffee every morning with a Hario Coffee King. I bought it because it pulses water into a V60 dripper, so I am getting a pour over cup without having to do a manual pour over. Lately, however the coffee seems thin and watery. I checked and the brew water is 180F. I asked Laura to double check, and she agreed.
I checked Hario sites, and they are not offering any fixes for low temperature. So, I looked for a new Coffee King. However, the Coffee King is no longer sold.
I decided to check out what else is available. I wrote down the attributes I want.
The brewer must:
- Brew consistently at 200 ±5°F
- Preferably not have a thermocouple that could wear out like the Coffee King.
- Prewet the grounds
- Pulse the coffee into the brew basket (like a manual pour over)
- Brew the coffee automatically.
- Have a reasonable price.
There are a lot of coffee brewers that have some of my parameters but only a few that do it all. The prices I found ran from $139.99 to $6,297.00
I started with Hario because I liked the Coffee King. Hario is offering a V60 Auto Pour Over called the Smart 7 BT. However, it a Japan domestic product (No UL for you) and it ships from Japan for $631. I kept looking.
I then bumped into the Marco Beverages SP9 Commercial Pour Over Brewer. It looked great and could also fill a Chemex for visitors, but it has a price tag of $6297.00. That comes out to $17.25 per cup if I use it for a year once every day. I knew it wasn’t going to fly with Lee, so I moved on.
Another brewer is the Hiroia Samantha coffee maker. You use a Bluetooth app on your phone to program the brewing including water temperature, water volume, water flowrate, number of water pours, and the time between pours. In addition, it has a built-in scale. It is imported from Japan. (No UL?) Regular price is $999.00 but Volcanica is selling it for $540.00. It looked good but no one else in the USA was selling it. Why the steep discount? It made me suspicious.
Then there is the KitchenAid Custom Pour Over Coffee Brewer it brews 2 to 8 cups (6 fluid ounce cups). The user can select one of two water temperature settings. Brewing water is pulsed over the grounds like a manual pour over. The price is $139.99 at Walmart. It looks like a great deal but having only two prefixed temperature settings doesn’t look so good. Also, it appears to have a thermocouple that will wear out. Of course, for the price I can buy 4 of them and toss them out one at a time as the thermocouple blows.
Another choice is the Ratio 8. It looks like an something you would see in an art gallery. If you can appreciate great art at 6am this may be for you. It sells for $795 with a waiting list. The water is delivered like the MoccaMaster by percolating 200-degree water in a tower over into a crossover channel. There is a smaller brewer without the artistic flair, the Ratio 6 for $365. Both brewers have a bloom and pulse cycle, are made in the USA and have no plastic parts touching the coffee. I didn’t like the one temperature fits all feature.
The Behmor Brazen 3.0 may be close to the perfect choice. I can set the brewing temperature, the bloom time, and the pulse intervals. It will correct the temperature for my elevation. When the PID controller senses the temperature I set, the water is pumped to the brewer. There seems to be an availability problem. Amazon doesn’t have any. However, it is available at Coffee Bean Corral and Sweet Marias for $199.00. MSRP is $229.95 There is or was a Plus version that connected to Alexa so you could talk to your coffee pot. It was $329.95 but I couldn’t find any available to buy. I didn’t want to talk to my coffee pot anyway. The downside are plastic parts touching the coffee and it is made in China.
So, I bought the Behmor Brazen 3.0. Time will tell whether I made a good choice or not.
