As I blogged in the past, I am a quality coffee convert and find it difficult to carry on without a great cup of coffee in the morning. I only drink 1 or 2 cups a day – so it needs to be good.

The last few months in the UK have seen our family revert to the old style of coffee (in this case, using a French press) and it was rather awful. This was further exacerbated by our confusion over cream. You see, the British LOVE their cream but they love it for their food – not their coffee.

In fact, if you walk into a shop and ask for a coffee with cream they grab some monster 50% clotted cream and drop it in. The supermarkets are not much better, shelves and shelves of creams but which to use? Finally, at the Waitrose where we have decided to shop thanks to their great selection of specialty products, we found it – they call it ‘pouring cream’ which I believe is around 10%.

But after a month, it was decided that a new coffee maker was needed (We sold the old one in Canada as the power transformer it needed would have taken up half the kitchen counter – they draw a ton of power!). After much research I settled on the Jura Impressa F70 which the guy at UK Coffee called a good ‘compromise’ between the high end and mid range. I guess that my handing over an arm and a leg was also a good ‘compromise’.

Despite the high price, I have to admit that I am BLOWN AWAY on two fronts:

1. You can adjust everything with a simple flip of the dial. I love that a dial allows me to control how many ML goes into every cup.

2. It comes with an automatic milk frother. This contraption is quite simple – put a cup of milk beside the machine and turn the knob. The steam builds and through a vacuum sucks the milk up the tube and fires it out of the nozzle frothed. Now, do I get the satisfaction of making the perfect frothed milk? No. But if I a wanted, I could, it has the same attachment. But what I do get is a simple system that provides amazing froth in seconds and candidly, it has a much better touch than I ever had. Amazing – and yes, my coffee does look like that (wink).

Now I know you are saying, it is mad to spend that much on coffee. I look at it this way – $3 per day at Starbucks adds up really fast. This thing will pay for itself in about 2 years .. and in the meantime, if I want a GREAT cup of coffee, it is 1 button away. Plus, I love a great cup of coffee and if you cannot indulge here and there, why work so hard?

Cheerio.