Melitta CI Touch Fully Automatic Coffee Machine Review – A Coffee Lover’s Quiet and Customizable Dream

The Melitta CI Touch Fully Automatic Coffee Machine combines high-end functionality with a sleek design, making it an excellent choice for coffee enthusiasts who value convenience, customisation, and quiet operation. With its wide range of features, from silent grinding to intuitive one-touch controls, this machine promises an elevated coffee experience that rivals your local café.

First Impressions: Design and Build Quality

The Melitta CI Touch® impresses with its elegant silver exterior and compact design, which adds a touch of modern sophistication to any kitchen. At 345 x 255 x 475 mm, it’s relatively space-efficient for a fully automatic machine. The build quality feels premium, with a sturdy stainless steel drip tray and LED cup lighting that adds a touch of elegance to your coffee preparation rituals. Weighing in at 9.3 kg, it’s substantial without being overly cumbersome, making it easy to find a permanent spot on your countertop.

User Experience: Simplicity Meets Customization

One of the standout features of this machine is its intuitive one-touch operation. The high-resolution TFT colour display guides users through the coffee-making process with ease, ensuring that even those unfamiliar with automatic machines can brew a perfect cup of coffee. This simplicity doesn’t come at the expense of customisation. With the ability to save personalised coffee profiles for up to four people, the CI Touch® ensures that everyone gets their coffee just the way they like it. You can adjust brewing strength, grinding fineness, temperature, and coffee quantity with ease, allowing for a highly tailored experience.

Coffee Variety: More Than Just Espresso

The CI Touch® offers an impressive selection of coffee drinks. With four classics – espresso, café crème, cappuccino, and latte macchiato – available at the touch of a button, and six additional variations like ristretto and americano accessible via the menu, the machine caters to diverse coffee preferences. What sets this machine apart is the “Italian Preparation Process,” which ensures that ingredients are added in the correct order for an authentic taste. For example, when making a latte macchiato, the espresso is added after the milk and milk froth, just as it would be in a traditional Italian café.

Grinding and Brewing: Silence is Golden

For those who enjoy a peaceful morning routine, the ultra-quiet steel conical burr grinder is a godsend. It’s designed to grind your beans with minimal noise, making it perfect for early risers who don’t want to wake the entire household. The machine’s “Manual Bean Select” feature allows you to switch between two different types of beans, housed in the dual-chamber bean container. This is ideal for households with varying coffee preferences or for those who like to switch between different blends throughout the day.

The machine also boasts a pre-brewing function, which dampens the freshly ground coffee before brewing, enhancing the flavour extraction for a richer, more aromatic cup of coffee.

Milk Frothing: Café-Quality Creations

Milk-based drinks are where the Melitta CI Touch® truly shines. Its one-touch milk system delivers perfectly steamed milk and froth with minimal effort. The included milk container can be stored in the fridge and is dishwasher-safe, making it easy to maintain. The “Easy Steam Cleaning” function ensures that the milk system remains hygienically clean with a quick blast of steam after each use, preventing any build-up of residue that could affect the taste of your drinks.

Maintenance and Cleaning: Keeping it Simple

Maintaining an automatic coffee machine can be a daunting task, but the Melitta CI Touch® makes it as straightforward as possible. The machine notifies you when it’s time to clean or descale, guiding you through the process step by step on the display. The removable brewing unit allows for easy internal cleaning, ensuring that your machine stays in top condition for years to come. The use of a Pro Aqua water filter means you’ll only need to descale the machine once a year under normal usage conditions, which is a major time-saver.

Energy Efficiency: Eco-Friendly Features

For those conscious of their environmental footprint, the CI Touch® includes several energy-saving features. The programmable Auto OFF function allows you to set the machine to turn off after a certain period of inactivity, while the 0-Watt switch lets you manually shut it down to ensure no energy is wasted. The machine also carries Melitta’s “Mission Eco&Care” sustainability label, highlighting its commitment to eco-friendly design.

Final Verdict: Is the Melitta CI Touch® Worth It?

At £699.98, the Melitta CI Touch Fully Automatic Coffee Machine isn’t cheap, but it delivers excellent value for money given its extensive features and premium build quality. It’s an ideal choice for households that appreciate a variety of coffee drinks and want a machine that’s both easy to use and highly customisable. The quiet grinder, personalised coffee profiles, and easy maintenance make it a standout in the competitive world of automatic coffee machines.

However, the price point might be steep for casual coffee drinkers who only need basic functionality. But for those who take their coffee seriously and want the convenience of café-quality drinks at home, the Melitta CI Touch® is well worth the investment.

Score: 9/10