Krups FNC2 NOVO

...machines, and in particular the Krups Novo 2100 Plus 962. Pretty and unusual name, don’t you think….shame we’re not intending to have any more children.

Half-way decent ones are unfortunately around the £100 mark and the Novo is no exception, though I bought this new, unused and boxed on eBay for £64 +£2.95 p&p.

This price makes my coffee taste ever better. Similar machines seem to come up regularly, so bargains can ...
...off some heat which rises. Krups have decided to make a virtue of necessity and call a vaguely warm spot a ‘warming tray’. If you turn on the machine and wait for your cup to be warm, you’d best buy War & Peace for something to do. Fill your cup with boiling water for a few seconds instead, and all is well.

The instructions tell you to remove the water tank when not in use or the valve/seal will deteriorate. Come on. Who’s actually ... more

I know what I like.

Currently on UK TV (Sunday BBC1) there is a very good looking screen adaptation of George Eliot's “Daniel Deronda”, in which Gwendolen says to Henleigh :-

“…I dislike what I don’t like more than I like what I like.”

I have sympathies with that attitude. I think. For instance, I probably dislike really bad coffee more than I like good coffee.
But perhaps not more than truly great coffee.

Instant.

Time was I would not have instant coffee in the house. Since finding Nescafe’s Alta Rica, I’ve actually drunk a great deal of it.
“Full bodied and bold”, is how it describes itself, and actually it’s not bad…for an instant coffee.
In fact somewhere around here there is a good (vh) opinion on the stuff by ‘stevethesleeve’.

Alta Rica simply demonstrates a quantum leap in coffee from the very worst, like perhaps Mellow Birds from shuddersville.
But still there are more quantum leaps to be made before achieving a coffee that ranks in the Top Ten all time best drinks in the world, along with the best wines, best Cognacs, best water, best Whiskies, best fruit juices etc.

Upwards and onwards.

The next leap up is making coffee out of coffee – novel notion I know.
But very good coffee can be made with one plunge of the humble Cafetiere. Likewise hot-water-drip coffee filter machines are a huge advance over any instant.
Care over the choice of coffee, its freshness, grinding your own beans etc, will easily make decent or good coffee with minimal outlay on paraphernalia.

But from filtering and plunging there is still a long way to go to get to espresso.
Espresso - the pinnacle of drinks that can be made from the coffee bean, and I include all it’s variants like Cappuccino, Ristretto, Latte etc.

Not espresso.

But what defines espresso? Well, let me start by saying what it isn’t.

The lie.
There are quite reasonably priced machines, sometimes conjoined with a Filter Coffee Machine. They have a large heavy-duty screw top, through which you fill its tank with water. The water is heated, pressure builds and it passes at high temperature and low pressure through coffee grounds into a receptacle (often a little glass pot with a handle).
It will be sold as an espresso maker. It’s a lie. I’ve got such a one, a Breville Anthony Worrall Thomson job – I was very underwhelmed with it.

The truth.
The truth is that what these machines really make is just strong coffee. Very often quite poor coffee – bitter and high in caffeine. What they do not, and cannot make is, espresso. It may well be a quantum leap up from lowlier coffee drinks, but compared to true, well made espresso it still has a very long way to go.
This will also be true of those various espresso gadgets that you put on the hob in the hope that they will gush coffee in that split second before they explode. Lets be fair, it can be very good coffee, but espresso it ain’t.

Pumping it up.

So finally we get to high-pressure pumped espresso machines, and in particular the Krups Novo 2100 Plus 962. Pretty and unusual name, don’t you think….shame we’re not intending to have any more children.

Half-way decent ones are unfortunately around the £100 mark and the Novo is no exception, though I bought this new, unused and boxed on eBay for £64 +£2.95 p&p.

This price makes my coffee taste ever better. Similar machines seem to come up regularly, so bargains can be had provided you exercise proper caution.

Around £100 is otherwise what you will expect to pay to be able to begin making real espresso. Machines in this price bracket are all pretty similar in how they work.

The Novo & Espresso at last.

The top of the Novo is taken up by a “warming plate” and a lift up flap under which is the large, clear plastic, lift-out 1.1 litre water tank. A valve at the bottom holds the water in until it is re-located in the machine – more about that later.

This tank is not heated at any time. The machine has a thermoblock heater. A hot metal block through which water passes on demand, heating it to around 93 degrees – under the boiling point at any rate. This is important in making any real coffee. This alone makes steam machines inferior.

The pump is rated at 15 bar pressure. This is more than adequate for the job. In fact anything over 9 bar is good for making espresso. The water (at the right temperature) is forced through a tamped down ‘puck’ of ground coffee in one of the two interchangeable holders or filters – one is single shot size, one double shot.
And it's all over and done in a matter of just a few seconds – 15 to 25 depending on the machine, tamping pressure and filter size.
It's fast and has to be. That’s the whole idea.
In just a few seconds it extracts everything you want from the coffee and leaves behind the stuff you don’t – like those bitter elements I mentioned earlier. Surprisingly it also leaves behind some of the caffeine. When coffee is this strong, that is quite good news, and you will still be getting quite enough of a ‘jolt’ anyway! But yes espresso is not as caffeine rich as you might suppose.

The black gold flows for a few seconds and you will be able to see the colour drop off quickly, to a creamy rich brown and then a weedy weak colour. Time to turn off the flow is when the rich brown finishes.
Leave it on and you weaken the shot, add the bitterness, and leach out excessive caffeine into your now spoilt espresso shot. You may or may not be surprised at just how small a single espresso shot is. This is normal. There is nothing wrong. This is how it is meant to be. A Cappuccino cup will be barely one third full. A single shot is often defined as 1oz.

The Crema

The most noticeable thing about the result is that it is in two layers. The black gold at the bottom, and a thin layer on the surface, a micro froth, creamy red/brown. This thin layer must always be present in espresso. It is part of it's very definition, and will always be absent when coffee is made by cheaper/different methods outlined above. This layer is a large part of the magic, containing volatile oils, taste notes and aromas that are otherwise lost.

This is the “Crema”. This is what makes espresso distinct. It should entirely cover the coffee below, cling to the sides of the cup and last to the very last draining sip.

Stepping up from the Breville type maker to this type of machine is a revelation. You cannot but notice the quantum leap. This is finally what good coffee is about. What these machines offer is the possibility of drinking real, good, genuine espresso.

Obsession

I say possibility because actually it is you who makes it. There is an art, a skill in making it. These machines make it possible to start taking coffee making to obsessional levels.
Roasting your own green coffee beans, purchasing a proper bevel grinding machine (not one of those metal bladed grinders – too uneven a texture for espresso), getting into internet arguments about how much force you should use to tamp down the grounds (15 to 50 lbs per sq inch, seems to be the range people argue within – AND I’ve heard that they will even practice on bathroom scales so they can judge what they are doing).

This level of machine opens the door to excellence. They are not the best machines by a long way, but they put you in the ballpark, and there is no other way of getting there than by spending a bit of money. This is what you are paying for.

Cappuccino and froth.

Add frothy milk and a sprinkle of chocolate or cinnamon and you’re in heaven – transported to that last holiday you took in Italy, or wanted to take, might take.

Frothing the milk is another dark art, but it’s easy enough to get going with these machines. They will do a good job, and with practice you can get better and better at the quality of foam you produce.

The Nova does not look like the machine pictured above. It has an on/off switch, and another switch, bang in the middle, looking for all the world like the minute hand from a clock at 12 o’clock. Once turned on, the thermoblock heats to the right temperature for espresso and a light goes out when it’s ready. Turn the ‘hand’ to the right for the few seconds it takes to produce the coffee.

For Frothy milk you must turn the ‘hand’ one click to the left, where the thermoblock will heat to a higher temperature to produce steam. The light goes off and you turn another click to the left, with a container of milk under the steam wand.

When you are done you will have froth and liquid milk beneath. A cappuccino should be one third coffee, one third hot liquid mild, and one third froth spooned on top. (Though I’m sure there are arguments about that too.)

Moans.

I actually like this machine. I’m learning all the time how to get the best out of it, and it out of me. I’m having a relationship with it. Coming to mutual understandings. Gradually opening up to each other.

But it doesn’t make it easy for you. There is a 96 page Instruction Book, only 9 of which will be in your mother tongue. Wherever this machine is sold there will always be 87 pages of wasted paper unless you are taking 10 additional languages at College and need the practice.

The 9 applicable pages tell you precious little about making coffee. Not even when to stop the flow of water when making an espresso! This may be common family knowledge in Italy, but sadly it isn’t in the UK, nor is the essential information that you need, going to be in the collection of cookery books in the kitchen.

It also tells you to do things without telling you why. It tells you to empty the drip tray after every few cups. Well I was careful not to let drips go down into it and didn’t bother. In no time water was spilling all over the counter top. Whenever the machine needs to releaser steam pressure, it does so into the drip tray and produces a surprising amount of water.

The water, below boiling point, passes through the coffee into your cup. If you have not pre-warmed your cup it will be cold before you get it to your mouth. There is a ‘warming tray’ on top of the machine. This is pretty useless. The thermoblock inevitably gives off some heat which rises. Krups have decided to make a virtue of necessity and call a vaguely warm spot a ‘warming tray’. If you turn on the machine and wait for your cup to be warm, you’d best buy War & Peace for something to do. Fill your cup with boiling water for a few seconds instead, and all is well.

The instructions tell you to remove the water tank when not in use or the valve/seal will deteriorate. Come on. Who’s actually going to do that religiously? It’s an unfair expectation by Krups and just might indicate an Achilles heel in the machine.

The rest.

But these are very petty little gripes, provided you are happy finding out about things from elsewhere, and learning as you go. I personally love it, it engages me in an adventure.

And on the most miserable of days I can have a moment of pure pleasure, luxury, and pride in my own growing ability to make and to appreciate something esspecially fine.

Obsessions are contagious.

I mentioned above, the idea of roasting your own coffee. You may have rolled your eyes! And why not. There is a limit.
But do you know? I’m going to have a go, because I understand its is easy, and very successfully achieved using nothing but a cheap hot-air pop-corn maker! And it can produce yet another quantum jump because roasted beans don’t stay fresh long but green beans stay fresh for yonks.

Can you imagine the wonderful smell, roasting your own beans, grinding them as soon as they cool, and then drinking your espresso as the roasting smell still hangs in the air?

Pragmatism and ‘instant’ espresso coffee-pods
.
A council of perfection is all very well. I can also be pragmatic with the best of them.
You can actually get an espresso without any of this fuss at all.
You can buy coffee-pods.
They are a bit like tea bags, with a tight little puck of coffee inside.
Stick one in, pass water through the machine, milk and sugar to taste – quick, good pragmatic coffee as fast as instant. Sling the pod in the bin and you are done.

However, they will only fit certain machines – often with an ESE logo on them for Easy Serving Espresso. Some machines need an adaptor in order to use them. Some just won’t take them at all.

This Novo model allegedly does not (though some do). I have no logo. I emailed Krups customer service and they wrote back promptly to confirm that this machine is not designed to use them.

In Tesco I saw a tin of Illy Coffee Pods winking at me suggestively.
I bought them.
They have a perforation around part of the puck and I pulled away the surplus paper, put it in my single shot filter and got a perfectly good result. It is even more reliable if I also trim the remaining corners off the pod.
They are a tad expensive, but very convenient, if not as good as the ground coffee I like.

Done. You still here?

 

...less