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We've had a Miss Silvia for over 7 years and it just keeps on working. We use it 3x a day, every day. Great make, built like tank,makes excellent espresso. I couldn't be more satisfied with this well made machine.
Get a few cleaning brushes, 12oz and 20oz pitcher for when making 1 or 2 drinks and cleaning solution for your machine. Has anything in this world tasted better when done automatically.This machine produces very good quality espresso. If you can afford a step up than go with a the Mazzer Mini. The one it comes with the machine is a joke.4. The tip it comes with works perfect for steaming milk that looks like perfect snow.5. Look at youtube and always do your shot of espresso first than steam your milk, not the other way around.1. This machine has only one boiler so you have to wait from the point of making a shot of espresso to heating up the boiler again for the steam process.Also DO NOT follow the instruction dvd that they give you on how to steam milk.
Get a quality grinder. The Rocky is OK to Good. So you want quality espresso without having to dish out $1.50 for a single shot at your favorite coffee shop, then this is the machine for you.It takes some time to get use to if you've never used a manual machine before and believe it or not Manual is BETTER. Ebay has them as well as WholeLatteLove.3. Get a quality tamper (the thing you use to press down on the espresso in the portafilter) Spend about $50-75. Do not buy any special 3 hole tips for the steamer on this machine. Get a timer to time your shots. 7.
You can't go wrong with this machine, but here are some things you'll need to know that haven't been said. Deep clean at least once per month6. I just bought my Rocky about 4 months ago and see the down falls of this grinder but it works.2. It doesn't have a PID controller which will accurately set the temp the perfect degree which will give you a consistent quality shot everytime. Remove the white film on the top of the espresso machine. Should be about 22-25 seconds long.I would give it 5 stars if it had a PID controller and a better knob to turn on the steam wand, but nothing comes close without paying $1500
This expresso machine make very good coffee. It is quite small so you don't need lots a space in your kitchen. This only thing is that it takes very long for it to get hot so you need to leave it on all the time and also consult how to on youtube.
And you must expect to but at least a $200 proper bur grinder or else Silvia will do whatever Silvia bloody well feels like doing and you'll be wondering why you spent all of your money on her. She doesn't come with a brush for her brewhead.
Massive kudos to HiTech Espresso for this service.The short of the PID is that it controls the internal temperature of the machine very precisely such that if you know how much of a change there is between the thermometer and the brewhead, then you can set the PID to roughly 201F plus that difference (mine came at 220, I dropped it a couple degrees) and have it give perfect-temperature water on all of your shots instead of hoping you're catching the boiler at the right spot in its heating/cooling cycle. Very nice for whoever's making the morning shots of espresso in the house (and that would be me where I live).The key thing you need to be prepared for after researching the Ms.
Rating primarily the mod work, I just got mine and the mod work that HiTech Espresso does on installing the PID (exactly between the steamer arm and the brewhead, sticking out front by maybe 1/4" but otherwise looking fr all the world like it just belongs there) is fantastic. Her portafilter is fabulous, but it really really needs a knockbox.
Silvia (she's very popular amoung amateur coffee geeks like myself) is that, with or without PID, Silvia needs to be accessorized. The tamper she comes with is garbage -- it simply doesn't fit.
She doesn't come with a dedicated 1-shot portafilter (despite having a 1-shot basket) which may or may not be a problem for you. Do yourself a favor and budget accordingly.
We bought this unit about 1 month ago, and have been experimenting ever since.Between the Rancilio grinder and the espresso unit, it has not been easy to find the right comnbination. Which coffee beans to use, how fine do you need to grind the coffee beans, how much coffee to use, how much to tamp the coffee, how long to let the steam go through the coffee, etc. Many more variables than you would think of, any any one of them can turn the result into an undrinkable bitter or watery mixture.At this point, we can produce drinkable espresso, but only produced 2 cups of great coffee that would rival a Tully's or Starbucks.There is definitely an art to this, and it takes time to get good at it, at least we hope.Providing a neutral recommendation as there is nothing to say bad against the machine per se, except that it takes a lot of practice to do it right. I do not know if other machines are "more forgiving" or not, since this is our first.
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