In The Kitchen: Reusable Nespresso Coffee Capsules – Fussy, but usable
We were recently gifted a Nespresso coffee maker and while I do enjoy the convenience of it, I prefer to use my own coffee purchases rather than rely on those provided by Nespresso or, as in my case, Amazon.
For my morning coffee, I still use a standard Bialetti Moka Pot for my morning coffee but find I use the Nespresso for afternoon and evening coffee when I desire it. it is simply quicker and easier to use.
I decided to research some reusable pods in hopes of making better use of the machine and keeping my costs down. After poking around on Amazon for a while I came across these Reusable Nespresso Coffee Capsules.
While they work ok, they can be a bit fussy to use and it has taken some time to learn the optimal settings for coffee roast, grind, amount of coffee to use and how tightly to pack the coffee in each capsule.
First, unless the coffee roast is fairly dark i.e French roast or Italian Roast you will get a somewhat weak cup of coffee. As for the grind, I find an espresso grind works well, but unlike a pressure espresso machine, you will not want to tamp the coffee at all. Simply fill the cup, knock off the excess and close the lid. If I tamped the coffee at all, it would often fail to brew, simply dumping the water into the capsule holder on the machine and making a mess.
I have also crumpled 2 of these capsules in the machine when closing the top lever. I have not figured out exactly how I did this, but after taking more care to position the capsule it hasn’t occurred since.
So, if you want to gain a little of the convenience of a Nespresso machine without limiting your options to pre-packaged coffees — and you’re willing to fuss around a bit — these capsules might be a place to start. The fact is, there are a host of different designs for these capsules so there might be those that work better, but I haven’t felt the need — or had the attention – to pursue it further.
Finally, if you just want the full convenience of Nespresso machine without the hassle, here are some third-party, pre-made, coffee capsules that I have purchased from Amazon. the quality is pretty good and yields a decent cup of coffee in just a minute or so.
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