Gaggia Classic Espresso Maker

by Vinny
( State - Illinois, County - Cook)

I own a Gaggia classic espresso maker. It is capable of making one cup of espresso at a time, with a steamer spigot for steaming milk.

I love the richness of espresso it provides over my previous Krups machine. In all fairness, the quality of coffee also imporved dramatically when i went from a 'cutting' style coffee grinder to a Solis grinder that 'crushes' the coffee beans. So i'd highly recommend that people buy a quality grinder to go with a good espresso machine.

The gaggia, while significantly better than the Krups is much more sensitive to the quality of water. Using hard water will calcify the machine pretty quickly. In addition, it is sensitive to how tightly you pack the coffee and expects about 30 pounds of pressure in packing down the coffee grinds. Other problems i've had is a tendency for the machine to overheat after 3-4 cups of espresso made back to back, and the time it takes to heat up for the first cup. I'd willingly trade up for a Jura 'one touch' espresso maker but for the substantially higher cost. Despite the manual steps, i don't know of a better machine in the $300 range than my Gaggia.