photo credit: Amazon
iCoffee by Remington
Disclosure: This post is sponsored by iCoffee. Any opinion expressed in this article is honest and my own.
I’ve loved my Keurig Mini because it’s quick and easy to make one small cup of coffee as needed, but I had no idea how much I was missing out on the real flavor of coffee until I got the new iCoffee by Remington machine. I typically don’t use the K-Cups that are prepackaged. Instead I use the K-Cup filters and add my own coffee. Since I’m a tightwad, I use whatever brand is the cheapest at Target or whichever store I’m at, so right now I’m using the Market Pantry brand of coffee. To be honest, it’s always tasted a bit bland to me, especially after adding the amount of creamer I add.
I decided to give the iCoffee by Remington coffee maker a try since I wasn’t too happy with my Keurig and I can’t believe the difference in taste. You know that bitter flavor that coffee sometimes has? That yucky aftertaste? The iCoffee completely removes that and leaves you with delicious, gourmet coffee no matter what brand of coffee you are using. It’s honestly amazing and I’m hooked.
So, how does the iCoffee work? Well, it’s a little different than your average coffee maker. The iCoffee machine steam brews your coffee to extract only the best flavors from your coffee grounds.
How much coffee do I put into the iCoffee machine?
This comes down to personal choice and a little bit of trial and error. For the first pot, try using the recommended amount of medium to coarse ground coffee per cup indicated on the package of your favorite coffee. Since we were using the Keurig reusable filters, we used those as our measure guide. We figured that we should use about one filter size scoop per cup of coffee and it seems to work well.
Cleaning and Descaling
As soon as you notice that the brewing time has increased significantly on your iCoffee machine, it might be time to give it a good clean. We have hard water so this process is required about every 40 brew cycles. If you can, try to use purified water as much as possible to prevent mineral build-up or slow the build-up process down.
Descaling Procedure (courtesy of iCoffee):
1. Fill the iCoffee Brewer water reservoir with household white vinegar to the 4-cup level mark.
2. Turn on the brewer to heat and circulate the vinegar into system.
3. Carefully watch the vinegar level in the reservoir until the vinegar level disappears.
4. AND IMMEDIATELY TURN OFF THE BREWER.
5. Let the vinegar sit in the brewer heater for 30 minutes to dissolve the internal mineral scale.
6. After 30 minutes, empty the carafe then fill the reservoir with plain water to the 12-cup mark, AND TURN THE BREWER BACK ON.
7. When the water level in the reservoir has empties,
8. TURN OFF THE BREWER
9. Discard the vinegar in the glass carafe.
10. Your iCoffee brewer is now sanitized, descaled and ready to brew.
Cleaning Brew Basket:
Remove the drip basket and brew basket together. Rinse the drip basket with water. Discard used coffee grounds and fully rinse brew basket. Place the brew basket, brew basket lid, and drip basket in the top rack of the dishwasher if desired.
Cleaning Carafe:
Fill carafe with a solution of equal parts of tap water and white household vinegar. Let stand for one hour. Discard the solution and wash and rinse carafe. Do not use harsh abrasives that may scratch the carafe; scratches may cause the carafe to break.
