Coffee Pods

I bough DH a dolce gusto & their coffee tastes like coffee from a coffee shop - but the pods are expensive so only use it on special occasions . It's normally instant for us but proper cafetiere coffee on sundays

Mine was great at Christmas with lots of guests, set it up like a hotel coffee bar and left them to it. I also like it when I am not well, better then a teas made at the bedside.you can refill your own pods apparently.........no idea how

We have a Tassimo which is my husband's joy ! Because I am always trying to lose weight I don't use the creamer pods. I heat skimmed milk in microwave then use coffee pod in machine. Seems to be a better coffee flavour. Husband takes accumulation of used pods to a designated drop off for recycling.

Sorry, I must just be a pleb, I prefer instant!! I find 'proper' coffee gives me stomach ache and I cannot for the life of me find any enjoyment in drinking tes (tastes like sucking pennies!) I am happy with my douwe Egberts.

Me too missedeke. My son has a pod machine and I've never had a coffee I like from it. I prefer instant which son thinks is dreadful. I've had to bring my own decaf instant with me when staying there - strong coffee gives me a headache and makes me feel sick nowadays. I ask for decaf lattes when in cafes and the costa one is good but Waitrose now make it much too strong for me. I think I'll have to switch to tea, which I do find rather boring.

I think those machines and the pods are a ridiculous amount of money. Added to which the problems to the environment by disposal of the pods. I have a double walled cafetiere that I bought from John Lewis and I'm very happy with it. It keeps the coffee nice and hot if you want a second cup.

I'm with the expresso pot on the stove groups, and hot milk in the very strong coffee, or even black. I usually have one of each at tea time . I like some grounds in my black coffee and love Turkish/Greek coffee too. I'm not keen on the coffee from Tassimo or other pods. I was offered one but turned it down. I take those plastic single mug filters to daughter when i baabysit as she often has no coffee in the house at all, just healthy vegan teas. The filter things are not wonderful but better than nothing.

its amazing how many of these machines end up on ebay, once people work out the cost per cup they get rid of the machines. i think its just another fad, like cake pop machines

I had one and didn't like the flavour of coffee at all and the pods are so expensive to buy. You can't beat fresh coffee made simply in a cafetiere for my taste and I gave the machine away to a joiner doing some work for us.

I don't drink tea - can't stand the smell of it - so have tried coffee every which way. Pods can be good but are both expensive and wasteful, expresso pot on the stove needs watching and cafetieres - ugh! cloudy and tastes "thick". Good quality instant is OK if we are in a hurry but for preference we like filter coffee, clear and clean tasting. We even take a filter coffee maker on holiday with us.

Aside from being difficult to recycle, many coffee pods are made by Nestle. I'm sure most of you recall the Baby Milk Action boycott of Nestle? It hasn't ended, and I can testify from my own experience in Madagascar where Nestle heavily promotes powdered milk (in a country that lacks sufficient access to clean water) that they have not mended their evil ways. And have a look at what they're doing with water in California!

Unfortunately, boycotting Nestle means doing without many many other items, for instance products from Lancome and Garnier, lots of pet foods and sweets; you can get a long list from Baby Milk Action or consult Ethical Consumer Magazine. If you really care about the environment and infant health, it's surely worth it.

Someone gave me a Tassimo. It's OK, but hard to get a strong and decent sized mug out of it without using two pods. Gets expensive as I don't like Costa brand and the others are more.

Recently I have been buying Waitrose 10 packs of those coffee filters. The French blend is as advertised, strong and bold. I can slap those on top of a mug, pour not-quite-boiling water (coffee spoils on the boil) in and it gives great coffee. If I want a stronger mug, I add a tsp of Carte Noir Espresso powder into the coffee filter thingy first. Heaven. I also preheat my mug in the microwave. Carte Noir Espresso on it's own isn't that great, but mixed is lovely.

And it works out much cheaper... than the price of a cup of Tassimo made with two pods.

So, I do enjoy the stuff that comes out of the big expensive barista machines, but have resigned myself to the fact that I need to get to the cafe to have it.

Nespresso is much better I have heard and tasted myself, but the cost is a bit much for me being the only real coffee-holic in the house!

I love my Nespresso machine but as I like really hot coffee I always run it through without a pod in first to warm the mug- takes an extra 10 seconds. I use the extra strong ones. Nespresso have a collection service for used pods so they can ensure they are re-cycled properly.

Ooo- time for a nice frothy cup of coffee I think!

I have a Dolce Gusto machine which makes a fantastic range of drinks and love it. DH insists on making real expresso in hob-top pot, and we buy a regular supply of freshly-roasted beans from a brilliant online environmentally supportive company. Actually not a great coffee lover, but don't like teabags either, apart from the "Teapig" bags, so buy real tea from Whittards. Each to his/her own!

Adair, I remember back in the 1970s-80s that Nestle was highly criticised for even offering their infant milk formula product in third world countries because women should be breast feeding, as well as the clean water issue and the burden of expense of having to buy formula. (Barring of course situations where breast feeding was not possible). Historical article below... very long, but it brought back memories of workplace discussions among colleagues who were not breastfeeding. Two of them could not get the pump to work for them to store/freeze milk for feeding whilst they were at work.

www.nytimes.com/1981/12/06/magazine/the-controversy-over-infant-formula.html?pagewanted=all

i love my tassimo and, thank goodness, asda are now selling the pods. if you buy from tassimo themselves there's a minimum order and they won't accept anything other than that. i think thge minimum is £30 and, living on my own, that amount of pods would probably go off before i finish them!
however i've also bought the pods of tea although i don't drink tea and nobody in the family does either. but i did buy some fruit tea and green tea both of which i'll drink now and again.
i don't like the costa coffee pods so buy the tassimo ones - so much better.
my daughter however won't drink anything but instant coffee - and extremely weak at that! can't have brought her up right!!

It's a Dolce Gusto machine, which I chose because the price was good and as both of us drink black coffee, we didn't need the 101 options that Nespresso offers, flavour wise. We pick the coffee to suit the time of day or our moods - I might have a really strong coffee to wake me up in the morning, whereas F likes a slightly weaker blend in the afternoon (with a shot of brandy if it has been a very hard day!). It takes about 1/2 a minute to make a cup, I can add cold water to mine right from the machine and the decaff version is good too. What's not to love? I'm off to make a cup now...

I use plastic reusable pods from Amazon. You can use any ground coffee you want to fill them, easy to do and less expensive. Each pod can be used between 30--50 times before needing to be replaced.

I love my cafetiere coffee. 10.30am my body starts prompting me to get the kettle on. ??I have large and small sized cafetieres and each has a neoprene cosy to keep it warm while the coffee is steeping.

Can't believe all these defenders of 'throw-away' pods, of course they don't get thrown anywhere than into landfill where they last for 1000s of years. They can't be separated out, it's things made of mixed materials like these that create our problems with rubbish. Presumably over time there will be a dawning of awareness so (a) people stop buying such things and (b) they don't get made any more.

You can buy expresso machines that don't use pods, you fill the container yourself with your own choice of beans at 1/100th the price. Clever marketing has made the pods OK for now but it won't last.

Do you know that used coffee grounds are snail/slug deterrent? I collect bagsfull from my local coffee shop to mulch round special plants, then dig them in as compost. Can't do that with these pod abominations.

What's wrong with a cafetière? Everything if you work in a small office and have less than a square foot to make coffee, a minute toilet wash-basin to wash up in, and nowhere to throw the grounds. A DeLonghi machine and paper cups solves it all, and very nicely too.

Spot on Pamish. I fill our filter coffee maker first thing, 10 minutes later we have a ten cup jug ready for breakfast, the grounds go on the compost heap. It doesn't take up any more room than a pod system.

Never having used one of these machines, but would like to, I have oftened wondered if the user has the choice of temperature for the milk.I do prefer asbestos mouth hot drinks.

I have a soft 'spoontula' that's brilliant for getting the grounds out of my cafetieres. If you make sure all the liquid has drained, the grounds are really easy to remove. I put them in the bin.

After years of trying various methods we have reverted back to making filtered coffee straight into an insulated jug, which keeps it hot throughout breakfast. We then make fresh throughout the day, when required. The best taste In our opinion.

The grounds can be used to fertilise roses, seems to work.