Some time back my Gaggia Baby-D coffee machine died in a leaky can’t-maintain-pressure-and-piss-water-everywhere way. It was a sad loss mourned in our house given that Gaggia-the-company had also died and been taken over by Philips who weren’t honouring warranties, especially not on the ‘refurb’ unit I owned. I resorted to making espresso on the hob using my Italian espresso pot but I really missed the steamer and the convenience of it all.

Meantime, over on a UK techies maillist there was a discussion of bean-to-cup machines. Nicky and I had a few savings from birthdays and anniversaries and I talked her into letting me buy a DeLonghi-branded Magnifica ESAM4200. That was back in July; I figured I’d let the dust settle before I blogged any sort of review of it, but the short version is that I like it 🙂

It’s a nice unit, and tends to do everything for you including cleaning itself (an absolute boon as far as I’m concened – dismantling and cleaning the Gaggia was one of the onerous pains, especially since bits of it weren’t dishwasher-safe). Beans go in the hopper in the top, and it chucks out little coffee-poos into a box inside once finished.

It’s also fast – powerup to dispense is less than 30 seconds, and the steamer is ready within 15s from pressing ‘the button’. Thanks to this, if the daughter forgets to switch it on in a morning (the usual state of affairs) I can still grab a very quick coffee before work. In that regard, it’s quicker than the kettle if a little noisier with its ‘clunk’ and ‘whirr’ and ‘grrrtangfrrrrvvvv’.

As for coffee control itself, it’s pretty flexible – there’s the usual quantity and strength dials on the front, as well as a hidden knob to alter the grinder so the beans can be coarse or fine (I’ve left it on the default setting). It’s consistent and reliable, leaving a rather delicious-looking crema on the top every time. The coffee I’ve been using is the 1kg sacks of beans from CostCo (Starbucks brand) – although if you really want you can use pre-ground coffee just by moving the strength dial all the way back.

There’s a couple of things which are a bit tedious: the grinds disposal bin isn’t big enough so after six or seven shots it still needs emptying; similarly the water tank is a bit small (and it uses water on startup/shutdown to clean itself so doesn’t last very long). Keeping a jug or an old mug under the spout is mandatory as it dispenses a small amount of water whenever it cleans itself and the driptray could get full (and is more hassle to clean than a mug!). It’s a bit noisy, but the build quality is much better than the Gaggia though and seems to cope with the amount of coffee I require it to throw out on a daily basis.

It’s also important to set the water hardness correctly on installation – I waited (well, to be fair I didn’t read the instructions properly) and it nagged me for a descaler cycle after a month when it didn’t need it. Once that was triggered there was no way of telling it to stop nagging without doing a full descale which takes about an hour and requires the DeLonghi-specified descaler solution (or it invalidates your warranty).

If you want one of these units I’d recommend shopping around: for example, John Lewis list them at £399, but I managed to get it sub-£300 by going online to Amazon (though at time of writing they don’t seem to have any available direct). Still, recommended and seems to have been a good buy!

Wandering up into Clapham Junction this morning to find breakfast I discovered Jack’s Cafe, where for £3.50 I got a full English breakfast and unlimited mugs of tea. Well worth a visit if you’re at a loose end first thing in the morning.

Me and N are in Stratford-upon-Avon this weekend, mainly to touch Mr Tennant’s bottom (well, according to Nicky). Last night we arrived mid-evening and needed feeding so wandered into the town to see what was available.

Our first two choices were booked up (or at least would want us to wait 2-3 hours for a table), but our meanderings led us to a restaurant called Carluccio’s on Waterside. Well, I say “restaurant”, it’s more of a shop with a bloody big Italian cafe in the back of it.

We had a full dinner – I opted for chilli prawns to start, calves’ liver, and rounding off with a pear and ricotta ice-cream. Nicky went for bread, rib-eye steak, ice-cream. We washed it down with a bottle of the ‘house’ red, a reasonable Sicilian red ‘Sicani’.

Not bad. Although the prawns were pricey for what they were (£7.95 for a side-plate of five plus rocket salad) they were quite tasty. The liver was cooked to perfection and for once Nicky asked for ‘rare steak’ and actually got rare steak. In fact on the main course the only valid wah was the rosemary potatoes being undercooked, a complaint mitigated by the absolute perfection with which the spinach was wilted.

Pear and ricotta ice-cream. Who’d have thought it? Going to try making that one myself I think…

A nice touch was asking whether we’d like a mild or strong blend for our coffee (we usually prefer stronger blends and I find the usual ‘Italian Restaurant’ fare to be a little too mild for my tastes).

Total bill for aperetif-starter-main-dessert-coffee for two, plus a bottle of wine: £75.50. A little pricey for what is essentially a cafe with plastic tables, but in the context of ‘dinner in Stratford-upon-Avon’ it seems to be average. Back to the hotel for a Remy and a Baileys, collapsing in the corner in a contented heap.

The Italian shop at the front looked interesting. I think we may wander that way a little later.

Last night I stopped at Orac’s flat and we went out for dinner in Finchley. Our usual haunt was out since I’d already had fish+chips this week so he took me to ‘Izgara’, a Turkish restaurant on Hendon Lane.

I’d had a big lunch so I wasn’t in the mood for a starter and such, and jumped to the main course. Lots of interesting things on the menu alongside stuff which sounded like the sort of kebabs you get in takeaways; nothing could be further from it though. No elephant’s foot here, the meals were large and very well cooked. I went for a ‘lamb liver kebab’ – odd I know! I’ve had curried liver tikka before but this was more like a grilled liver with Turkish herbs. Very nice, and a huuuuuge plateful I couldn’t finish. Matt went for his ‘usual’, the #1 kebab which is basically sliced lamb steak.

I shall look forward to returning there for a larger meal soon 🙂

For Nicky’s birthday last night we’d got a plan to join some friends for dinner at Rustico, an Italian restaurant which has been attentive and good food in previous visits. To be fair we hadn’t booked, they were very busy when we turned up, and the waiter said he’d get us a table for 8:30pm – not a problem, there’s a very good pub across the road. Returning at 8:30pm there were no tables ready for us, three tables full of people hadn’t been seated in front of us, and we were herded upstairs to a bar with no space and a very confused waitress – total chaos and Gordon would have gone mental in the kitchen. Plan B then.

Out of the window and across the road we saw “Magdalene’s”, a fairly new restaurant specialising in ‘Mediterranean cuisine’ (it’s pretty much next to the Talbot & Falcon, where Cantors used to be). A short walk over there for a recce and we got a table within a minute. Salvation!

Magdalene’s menu is primarily Greek and Turkish, with a couple of interesting house specials alongside more traditional dishes – and no predictable kebabs! I started with ‘keftedes’, herbed meatballs in a tomato sauce which tasted freshly-made; it’s always nice to be able to identify ingredients but it not detract from the dish as a whole. They probably batched the meatballs but they were very well cooked, remaining firm without being tough or overcooked.

My main course was ‘Sarsem fish’, small pieces of halibut, salmon, king prawns and calamari cooked with red onions and asparagus, and flambeed in ouzo. The flambee was evident in the slight crispness of the calamari on the outside but not to the point of them being singed to rubber, and complemented the sauce (it’s easy to get sauces wrong on calamari, it being a subtle flavour). Served with rice to soak up the sauce, the portion amount was just right with not too much or too little, leaving with a simple feeling of well-being rather than over-stuffed.

(It being Nicky’s birthday we couldn’t get away without a pudding, although I didn’t partake. Nicky’s vanilla cheesecake was home-made, and Alice’s chocolate cake was very light and fluffy apparently.)

The service itself was excellent – our attentive and friendly waiter Taf was never far away, and the price was right. We were served quickly even though restaurant was about three-quarters full. Very much recommended, we’ll go there again.

(They have a website which, had I seen it first, would probably have put me off… so quite glad I didn’t see that first!)