… for me “upward mobility” would be...
Keurig in da house
Posted by Kelly Adams on August 16th, 2008 
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My new coffee machine has arrived:
What I got was a Keurig model B60 “Special Edition”- I’m not sure what’s special about it, although it does have pretty blue LEDs that light up illuminating the display and the water reservoir. This is important for keeping Irene happy- she likes blue LEDs. I was pleasantly surprised to discover that they included sampler package of coffee, so I was able to try out the K-Cup right away. After priming the unit (a one time thing), it made its first cup of actual coffee: Tully’s coffee Kona blend.
Some descriptive words regarding the machine: solid; quiet; fast; easy; attractive. One of the downsides is that the “default” K-Cups are really sized for a medium size (7.25 ounce) cup, and I drink something closer to 10 or 12 ounces in my travel mug. You can set the Keurig to brew a 9.25 ounce cup using the default K-Cup and that works reasonably well in my travel mug, but it also makes a slightly weaker cup of coffee. And the Kona blend itself is mild, so my first cup was a bit on the “watery” side of things. That said, the coffee brewed was at a nice temperature, tasted good without any bitterness, and was produced quite rapidly: definitely less than sixty seconds. I’m pretty confident I can get exactly the cup of coffee I want by selecting a “bold” or stronger roast- I’ll have to see how this holds up in practice.
K-Cup in front (black thing to the left is the “holder” removed from the Maw above)
My K-Cup with its filter removed in behind
Thanks to comments in my previous post from my friend Chris, I’m not feeling too terribly bad about splurging on this single cup technology… but it doesn’t hurt to work out the numbers. Price on the Keurig B60 at London Drugs was $159.99. The “My K-Cup” gadget (for using your own coffee instead of the pre-packaged K-Cups) cost $14.99. K-Cups cost about $15 for 24 or about 60 cents a cup: call it 70 cents with shipping. I expect to drink one or two cups of coffee each morning as I get ready for work, so that’s about $1.40 a day for supplies. Assuming the machine lasts two years, that adds another 20 cents a day for the equipment- my coffee habit will be satisfied for under $2 a day, allowing a bit for milk and sugar. I guess that isn’t too horrible 
August 16th, 2008 at 3:18 pm
The way I look it it, you get what you want when you want, and thus will probably enjoy it more. I makes more financial sense to spend $1.00 on a beverage you enjoy than $0.25 on something that you are only drinking because its there.
August 17th, 2008 at 7:09 am
True statement, Chris. It’s like if I buy a bottle of Pepsi for two dollars, and it goes flat. Did I spend two dollars on the liquid, and therefore should feel compelled to drink it? Or did I spend two dollars on the less tangible enjoyment I derive from drinking it when it is bubbly and good, and therefore should dump it out? I tend to think the latter, and so making sure that I get what I pay for (the enjoyment of the consumable in its intended state), paying a bit more probably makes sense.
The coffee machine passed the cat test this morning, by the way. Iris was sitting right beside it when I brewed a cup, and all she did was sniff at the machine- the noises it made didn’t startle her or cause her to run away.
August 18th, 2008 at 3:34 pm
I think Extra Bold coffee - the best for Keurig. Check this website, they Giveaway K-Cups every week
August 19th, 2008 at 8:39 pm
Greetings, Coffeeman! I have been trying a number of different coffees and at least thus far I think I agree with you. If I’m brewing the “large” (9.25 ounce) coffee, which I pretty much always am, a bold or extra bold coffee seems to work best.
But I have several varieties to try out yet
I just got my first shipment from Green Mountain- the timing was perfect as the 18 K-Cup samples that came with the machine are almost gone. I still have a shipment coming from Timmy’s… as I say, lots to try out!
September 10th, 2008 at 9:50 am
Oie back at last…
I have a little one cup perk from Ikea. Frightening thing is, it works rather well and cleaning the oils out to try new coffees is a sinch. I’ve been sold on fresh grinding my beans, and buying these beans from… um.. crap. Well they are good.
September 10th, 2008 at 4:48 pm
Welcome back, Oblivions!
I used to have a coffee press long ago, it made pretty good coffee. But I guess I like the technology bit, and I’m not patient enough to “roll my own”. For someone else, the whole ritual of grinding the beans, setting up the filter, boiling the water, watching it pour through and so on is a big part of the enjoyment. I know when I perked a cup in a single cup machine a few times the flavour just wasn’t that great- maybe I just had bad luck.
I know some folks who claim that the very best coffee is the pot they make over a camp fire by putting some ground beans in an old beat up pot- no filter, no fancy grinder, nothing. To each their own, I guess
Off topic, fire me an email if you are so inclined to let me know what happened to your blog- it seems to be gone
September 11th, 2008 at 3:35 am
“Off topic, fire me an email if you are so inclined to let me know what happened to your blog- it seems to be gone ”
Ditto that. Good to see you still live
(posting from the road)
October 23rd, 2008 at 4:27 am
Hi Kelly!
We just purchased the Keurig Special Edition Model B60 last weekend. I love it. We also bought several boxes of different types of coffee and, at the advice of the sales attendant, froze most of the coffee for later use. You’re right on the nose about the middle 7.5 oz “pour” of coffee. It does not fill a standard coffee mug and the larger “pour” barely does.
One question: When we turn it on, there is a loud vibration noise. It seems to be caused by the looseness of the drip plate and drip tray. It is mildly annoying. Does your’se do that?
October 23rd, 2008 at 7:14 am
Greetings and welcome to my blog!
One thing I found regarding the largest (9.5 oz) size: with a 12 ounce travel mug, which is more or less the standard size, 9.5 ounces works out well for folks who add in milk. The mug looks kind of empty until the milk is added, though!
Interesting comment about the drip plate vibration. I didn’t notice that until just a couple of days ago, and I thought it was because of the way I use the machine. Most of the time I’m using a travel mug, and so I take the drip plate assembly out and sit it beside the machine. The other day I noticed an extra racket, and it was the drip plate assembly vibrating like crazy… which was easily proven by resting my finger on the assembly, which stopped the noise. I wouldn’t expect this vibration to be a problem if I was using the drip plate normally (I.E.: had it in place with a filling coffee cup sitting on top of it), but I guess it could still vibrate even then.
The noises don’t actually bug me so long as I know they are “normal”. To put it in perspective, a $4,000 expresso machine makes horrible noises, but that is unavoidable based on its function. My Keurig’s sounds are much less offensive to my ears than an expresso machine, and so I can sort of accept them as charming idiosyncrasies
And the machine is still “quiet” in comparison to the Tassimo system, or so I’ve been told.