In my mind, GE is a manufacturer of large, boxy appliances. They are purveyors of reliable and relatively affordable stoves, and are the makers of the solid silver Monogram series refrigerator that I used to cart around town with my brother-in-law. That's a way of thinking.
I usually don't consider them competitors to Mr. Coffee, but their new coffee maker does. Part of the company's artful and tech-savvy Café line, it is also one of the few coffee makers approved by the Specialty Coffee Association (SCA), a Good Restaurant Management publication for coffee enthusiasts ensures a delicious cup of coffee for consumers. It's a pretty attractive coffee maker, but for the price, it doesn't make a very enjoyable cup of coffee.
Worn white
At first glance, the GE Café Specialty Drip Coffee Maker is easy to like. Take it out of the box and you'll be able to make a pot without looking at the instructions. GE Café has an app and you can connect it to your Wi-Fi network, but all the main features are accessible locally, so you can leave it in the App Store if not interested.
There are four phase intensity options: Light, Medium, Dark and Yellow, the latter of which is set to the SCA parameter. The water temperature for non-Yellow settings can be adjusted between 185 and 205 degrees F, allowing you to dial in your coffee brewing process. (In the GE, the Yellow setting is the same as the Medium setting but the temperature is locked at 200 degrees.)
It's a handsome thing, available in stainless steel, matte black, and what I would call a color “Tatooine Kitchen” white. My review unit was one of the matte white models, and while that finish looks great, it's an exceptional choice considering coffee's ability to stain.
Additionally, with its rectangular base and long-axis controls, it forces you to place it on the countertop in a way that takes up a lot of space, a trap that I personally love, the OXO 8 Coffee Maker. glass (9/10, WIRED recommended) avoid. And while OXO has dishwasher-safe parts, GE does not.
Photo: Amazon
tinker with flavors
Good coffee is the result of a series of factors such as bean quality and roast quality, grind size, brewing time, water temperature and water quality, etc. Start from a good foundation and you can Adjust your way to perfection, one variable at a time.
In my test kitchen, comparing it to none other than itself, that base seems solid—SCA approval is in! The coffee was good, but I wanted to go deeper with my friends from Olympia coffee in their Seattle lab. I met co-owner Sam Schroeder and retail coach Reyna Callejo, who brought her Breville Precision Brewer Thermal coffee maker (7/10, WIRED Review) at home, it's a big help. It's a great machine and a direct competition for the GE Café, perfect for head-to-head testing.
Sam and Reyna immediately did what coffee nerds do around a new device, hovered over it, enthusiastically pressed all the buttons, opened and closed anything that could be opened and closed, amazed. in front of the small replaceable water filter, appreciate the nice, wide shower head – the part where the hot water rises above the ground – and wonder whether it actually distributes the water evenly. Looking back, it was here that the small metaphorical cracks in the matte plastic began to show.
