Be Excellent To Each Other

When we got married we ended up with a bunch of house of fraiser vouchers as a weird cash. back deal thing. Long story short I've about £250 quid I can spend in store (but probably not on line).

Sounds great right? Problem is the shop is terrible. It's like an anti shop. So bearing in mind I can't sell my share of the voucher how should I spend my £250? We've already bought enough sheets, pillows and tedious crap. If only they sold vitas.


So my task for anyone bored enough, is to find. the most interesting way to spend £250 in house of fraiser.

http://www.houseoffraser.co.ukhttp://www.houseoffraser.co.uk

It sells whiskey. Buy lots of whiskey.

Does it?!

Depends which one you go to. It's a series of department stores. You can buy damn near anything between them.

The one near me sells art.

Kitchenware is an obvious selection. I've bought some pretty decent quality pans and so forth. Or glassware, too.

Kitchen stuff, clothes, shoes?

does it expire? if not maybe gifts for other people, like parents birthdays or weddings etc

I'm surprised you're struggling, the one in Glasgow at least sells everything under the sun and I could easily spend that money on clothes alone.

The one in london doesn't really sell anything.

Expires in less than 6 months.

I would rather avoid consumables like whisky, and go for a big ticket item I wouldn't justify otherwise. So far the leader is a dab radio.

For kitchenware, I'm pondering possibly a coffee maker. But I don't know anything about them to make an informed choice (I currently use a mokapot - but find the cleaning tiresome).

We had an used House of Fraser gift card from a couple of christmasses ago.

Used it online to buy some nice clothes.

For use at home, then a Nespresso is probably your best bet. Good quality, both in terms of the machine and the coffee, minimal fuss, virtually zero cleanup.

Hmm, thanks Trooper, I'll look into that - sounds right for me (a lazy person).

Current list of possibles is:
Suit
Watch
or
Nespresso.

Get a bathroom cabinet. A kick ass one, like, all mirrored and stuff. I did. It's awesome. I keep my toothbrush in it.

Coffee machines?
I'd always go true bean-to-cup machines over stuff like 'Nespressos' (which to my mind are glorified instant coffee makers, using (expensive) processed liquid concentrates made in a factory, that have been stored/sitting in plastic bubble wraps for however many months etc.).

Jura make the best machines IMO; sadly you have to pay for them though. A basic espresso-only machine is around £500, but if you love *real* coffee you'll never regret buying it.

Have you tried the coffee from a Nespresso? Even if you think you haven't, if you have had coffee in a restaurant I expect you have

The Nespresso is the best of the one hit wonders. Sure, you can spend £500 and get a better bean-to-cup machine, but the cheaper bean-to-cup machines will be worse than the Nespresso. The don't have the pressure needed.
I'm pretty sure Dr Lave doesn't have a £500 voucher though

Nespresso capsules contain regular ground coffee AFAIK.

Ummm... yes? They contain ground coffee, that's kinda the point of them

Are you talking about the myth that they contain instant coffee?

I think the Dolce Gusto are similar, I opened one out of curiosity, it looks to be grounds. Mine was a gift, but I do like the coffee and the convenience.

Capsules not being freshly ground probably bothers some people. I'm pretty sure I couldn't tell the difference in a Pepsi challenge scenario, though. I just have a coffee grinder and use either a stove-top pot or an Aeropress. I kind of like the faff of it all and it also means I don't end up drinking too much strong coffee. So bean to cup or capsule machines hold little interest for me.

He was going on about 'processed liquid concentrates' which doesn't sound like regular ground coffee to me.

Ah right, sorry I missed that from Cavey. Yeah, no idea what he is talking about there!

Some machines simply water down coffee concentrate, a bit like coffee squash. I think they're mainly commercial / bulk ones, rather than home machines though.

We had a Nespresso machine in the office a couple of years back, and it made very nice coffee. However, we broke it by putting hundreds of cups a week through it - it was a home machine and couldn't really handle the volume of an office-load of caffeine addicts.

Yeah I've tried one round a friend's house - luke warm, cheap and nasty. Don't forget I am a ponce mate. And believe you me, no restaurant I go to would be seen dead with one

Even the cheapest Dura machine has 15bar pressure which is at least four times the minimum needed for a decent brew.

The point about those capsules is that a factory has had to produce "concentrate liquid coffee" (kind of like that "Camp" stuff from the 70s ), at which point it is processed stuff that's no longer coffee beans? I can see the convenience of it I suppose, but personally I'd much rather have a £60 coffee grinder and £10 cafetiere than one of those things (or a stove top coffee maker for about £20).

£250 is a good downpayment on one of those machines though? They are awesome, honestly.

So... you wouldn't be seen at The Fat Duck then?

A Nespresso machine produces 19bar pressure.

The only thing inside a Nespresso capsule is ground coffee beans.

Sorry mate, I think they're crap.

No need to be sorry You can think what you like, but I don't think you know what a nespresso machine is, if you think it uses liquid concentrate

Just seen some stuff online, apparently it's some kind of ground/instant coffee hybrid (so yeah, stand corrected on the liquid stuff - it's dry).

For me though, you can't beat coffee that's just been ground there and then (as it oxidises/degrades very quickly), but each to his own.

I'll start this by saying I dont like coffee but :



I would suggest the next time Mrs C drags you round John Lewis that you walk to the kitchen appliances section and i'm sure they will have people giving demos of them and you can try one to see what you think :-)

I'll give it another go out of interest mate, but the one that my mate has made quite the worst cappuccino I've ever tasted, lukewarm, weak and revolting. Maybe his missus just doesn't know how to use it properly, I don't know, but it put me off for life.

I've got a Jura J9 - outrageous extravagance and expense, but it don't half make a good cup of coffee.

Removed Jura link at company's request - Grim...

This is the one I had in mind for Lave - how cool is this?

http://www.selfridges.com/en/Home-Tech/ ... tAodJy4AXg

The following is a statement of my own opinion and belief:

I would not spend £250 of anyone's money, especially free money that was actually mine to spend on myself, on a poncy coffee machine.

Ah, I thought we were talking about coffee, carry on with your cappuccinos

<waits for Curio to arrive to outponce us all...>

Mate, I'm with you - albeit I will admit to very occasionally liking the odd after dinner cappuccino on a Sunday afternoon.

But otherwise, yeah, double Ristrettos all round.

I like my coffee like i like my men, black and strong...

I must admit I don't like Nespresso much either, regardless of what's in the capsules. And I can get it for free at work, too.

According to Troops then, Curio likes his men white and fluffy?

Poncey and coming in a small cup.

You'd better buy a bloomin' coffee machine after all this Lave.

FRASER FFS

I like my coffee like I like my men - Not in my mouth.

Yeah, I don't like coffee.

Up the bum???

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coffee_enema

Nespresso is equivalent to a middling espresso machine with middling-to-decent pre-ground coffee. As has been noted above, the capsules contain ground coffee and the water is forced through at a respectable 19 bar of pressure.

It's not going to compete with a bean-to-cup workflow with a thousand pound Gaggia and whatever gourmet beans you favour. But then its also significantly cheaper, less work, and makes less mess. Call it 80% of the goodness for 20% of the work.

Cavey, I strongly suspect you are mixing Nespresso up with one of the (quite unpleasant) capsule instant machines like Dolce Gusto or Tassimo. Nespresso is qualititavely different from those.

Also, if you had a bad cappucino, that will be at least in part down to the person who made it. Nespresso machines just make espresso. What you do to it after that is up to you. (Some, like ours, have an optional milk frother; that's OK but it doesn't steam the milk. Some people prefer the steaming effect.)

Also in pretty sure drinking cappuccinos excludes you from the higher tiers of the coffee snob club anyway.

Fewer mewer

Yes, if the machine was making capuccino directly, then it definitely wasn't Nespresso. I have seen machines like that in restaurants, and the coffee from those is awful.

Why? Why would you ever do that?

I'm pretty certain the backwash is on the menu at Curio's local coffee shop...

Ground up and in the freezer.

Shipped over from South America in a crate.

Man, that's got me thinking: have I even got the right machine here...? Pretty sure the damn thing spewed out a cappuccino directly (albeit I was roaringly drunk by this stage)...

Shit. Good job the Belm thread isn't still active. Oh dear.