We couldn't be more thrilled with our new (to us) Vesuvian Electric Coffee Maker. We got it for a song at a lawn sale!!
We don't have a lot of room in our kitchen for gadgets and weren't sure where to store this. Then we realized the top of the fridge is the perfect location! The coffee maker is out of the way but still on display.
We realized that it would be better to store the basket in the open and put the carafe on its stand.
Room had to be made for a wooden box for the coffee grounds too. Oh oh, pretty soon there will be no more room on top of the fridge!
It's very simple to use; the only drawback we have found so far is that there is no "on/off" switch. After filling the reservoir with water, the Vesuvian is simply plugged in to get it started.
The coffee maker didn't come with a tamper. We looked in several kitchen stores for an actual tamper but the Vesuviana basket is slightly larger than standard baskets. We were going to compromise by using the bottom of a wine glass when I suddenly remembered a set of tea light holders we had been given. The bottom of the candle holder fits exactly! And it is the perfect weight and size.
Tamping the coffee
In about 5 minutes, the water reaches the correct temperature and is pushed through the arm over the ground coffee and into the coffee pot. This photo was taken before we had a tamper. We had simply used a spoon to tamp the coffee down.
Here is how the water is pushed through the arm when the coffee was tamped with our candle holder tamper.
There is a sensor in the reservoir that tells the coffee maker to stop sending hot water into the coffee pot, leaving water in the reservoir for steaming.
When we first tried the coffee maker, we didn't have any milk in the house, so steamed cream instead.
Even with cream (especially with cream??), the coffee was fabulous!
Never the less, we went out immediately to get milk.... There doesn't look to be that much difference when steaming cold 2% milk (apparently, it foams better if it's cold) but it did definitely work better.
Pouring the coffee into the steamed milk.
Closer view of cafe latte (or is it café au lait?)
Adding a little cinnamon makes it even more fabulous. Or for those who like it, stirring in a little sugar.
It takes only about 6 minutes to make the most fabulous cafe latte. (Cafe latte is great with plum pie....)
Emptying the basket into the coffee box
Our wonderful neighbours gave us a bag of delicious Kona coffee "Wings of the Morning" after going to Hawaii for a holiday! The brewed coffee has a slightly dark warm flavour.
We made a video to show how fabulously the coffee maker works.
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cafe au lait (or caffe latte, if you think the Vesuviana Police will come after us for making cafe au lait in an Italian coffee maker)
(The thumbnail image appearing on links to this page is housed on Flicker: etherwork photostream.)
