How does nespresso work

Learn more. Nespresso has carved out a niche in the espresso world by creating a line of machines that make delicious, rich coffee without the high prices and complexity of traditional espresso machines. No matter what you call it, Nespresso coffee is high-quality, and many people use their machines due to their simplicity. Even the most hardcore Nespresso fans might not realize that Nespresso machines are fundamentally different from other coffee machines.

Most coffee machines use the same operating principles with only slight differences between brands, but Nespresso turns the game on its head and uses a unique process to brew the smooth, flavorful coffee fans of the brand love. So how does Nespresso work? All coffee machines require two fundamental ingredients: coffee and water.

Extraction is the process of extracting flavor from ground coffee. When hot water comes into contact with ground coffee, the chemical compounds and oils that give coffee its flavor dissolve and ride along with the water until they wind up in your cup, where you can enjoy them. There are many ways extraction can take place. There is immersion brewing, where coffee grounds soak in water as in a French press. There is percolation brewing, where water passes through ground coffee like in pour-overs.

Finally, there is espresso, which uses extremely high pressure to force hot water through tightly packed coffee grounds. These are the most commonly-used methods, but there are lesser-known options as well. At the bottom of the tank is a part for the pump that sucks the water in and pumps it through the machine. The heated water is then pumped through an ultra-thin tube to increase its pressure for coffee drinks. Moreover, this hot water has a high pressure that pumps through the coffee in the pod, releasing an aromatic flavour.

Filter paper at the bottom of the pod prevents the ground coffee from falling through into your cup. Lastly, the smooth coffee then drips into your cup. For it to work, you must insert a coffee capsule and secure it closed. The Nespresso machine will then puncture the capsule three times on the top. This heated water is then pumped into the capsule using a high-pressure action until it bursts. At which point, the capsule releases a rich espresso into the coffee machine. Moreover, inside of the capsules are filters that prevent coffee grounds from going into your cup.

The beauty of using Nespresso machines is that the machines work for you, making it easy to create filter coffee for people to drink. For new coffee machines, ensure that you rinse them out with water on the inside.

You should also wipe the exterior with a warm, damp cloth before your first use. First, rinse the water reservoir and fill it back up with clean water. Then, slide the reservoir into its place on to the coffee machine — they are most commonly located on the back.

Next, plug in the Nespresso coffee machine and switch it on via the appropriate button. This is the land of the Starbucks venti. People are used to getting a 16oz or even a 20oz coffee. In a bid to crack the US, Nespresso introduced a whole new range of machines — the Vertuo system, capable of delivering much larger portions. In , it finally signed up Clooney to a North American deal; until then he had only been the face of the firm in the rest of the world.

But eventually, would-be competitors spotted an opportunity to exploit the niche that Nespresso had created. In , Gaillard launched the Ethical Coffee Company, which sold biodegradable capsules for Nespresso machines.

In , the American firm Sara Lee started to sell capsules that worked in Nespresso machines. Nespresso furiously litigated against its rivals, arguing that its patent systems were being infringed. Things came to a head in , when a key batch of Nespresso patents from were set to expire. That year, Nespresso lost its patent battles in Germany and England, and settled other outstanding cases around Europe. Overnight, the company had to accept it could no longer stop third-party capsules being sold for its machines.

The court cases also made awkward PR for a company keen to promote its ethical sourcing. The report led to a worldwide boycott and reform of its sales practices. Even today, Nespresso employees I spoke to said the memory of the scandal hampers its messaging around coffee. Nespresso launched an internal investigation after the programme aired. Jean-Marc Duvoisin became CEO in , and was charged with taking Nespresso to a new era, leaving the patent disputes behind.

From a closed, Apple-type system — Nespresso products for Nespresso machines — the company had to move to a more open, Android-type model. E very generation has its own anxieties around coffee. In the 16th century, the governor of Mecca feared it would encourage his citizens to overthrow him. Some decades later, in London, women petitioned against coffee houses, claiming it made their husbands impotent. These days we are less worried about what coffee does to us, especially with widely available decaffeinated options, and more worried about what coffee does to the world.

In the past decade, consumers have grown increasingly concerned about the sheer amount of waste caused by coffee pods. Halo, a firm which makes compostable pods, estimates that of the 39, pods made every minute, 29, will end up in landfill. It did not stop the Nespresso boutique in the city centre from doing a brisk trade.

On top of the landfill problem, there are the environmental costs of producing aluminium in the first place. Mining a tonne of aluminium can produce about tonnes of waste, including tonnes of toxic alkaline red mud.

Sustainability in coffee is complex. Lots of the carbon cost is in transport, so by some measures, the most efficient use of beans is instant coffee, where only a small amount of coffee is used per cup. But as that coffee tends to come from large farms growing cheaper beans, it can be a worse deal for farmers, and encourage types of farming that have a bigger impact on the environment.

One solution could be reusable pods, where fresh coffee can be loaded into a Nespresso-friendly capsule, but at a significant cost to convenience. Defenders of pods say that as well as using a smaller volume of coffee, they use less energy, as the machine only heats the small amount of water needed for each serving.

But until Nespresso pods can be included in household recycling, the figures on reuse are unlikely to improve. A s Nespresso has grown, it has come up against an awkward truth: the more popular a brand is, the harder it is to maintain a luxury image.

Like other high-street businesses, Nespresso has been buffeted by months of coronavirus closure. In its lates incarnation, when most of its pods were sold by mailorder or on the internet, Nespresso would have been less affected by coronavirus. While the fancy, new coffee machines offer a variety of confusing buttons and the old machines make way too much coffee, the Nespresso keeps your morning nice and simple and offers you the one thing you need to get your morning going: a perfectly measured, freshly brewed espresso style drink or cup of coffee.

Read on to find out how Nespresso pods work, how Nespresso works, and how Nespresso machines work. Coffee capsules have recently received some flack; pro-capsule people love the convenience and taste of this perfectly packaged and tidy product, while anti-capsule people will tell you that capsules are one of the leading causes of landfills overflowing and exorbitant waste accumulating.

Both of these people are right. Yes, some of the brands are non-recyclable, while others using recycling their pods as part of their brand activation, so choose wisely. But what exactly goes into making your favourite coffee capsule? Your perfectly portioned cup of coffee or shot of espresso starts with the coffee capsule, also known as a coffee pod. The Nespresso name brand coffee capsules come from one of three factories in Switzerland. It is within these factories that the coffee beans are roasted, ground, and packed into the pods.

Housed in each pod is grams of ground coffee, just enough to make one perfectly portioned cup of espresso or coffee. Nespresso pods are made from a lightweight aluminum canister, which is then capped with an aluminum lid in a process called hermetic sealing.

Hermetic sealing is done by first filling the pods with nitrogen an inert gas and then the lid is quickly fused to the body, to prevent any oxygen entering the capsule and spoiling the coffee. The capsules are finished by being painted in a food grade lacquer.

This serves two purposes, firstly to color the pods in a way that the consumer can pick the flavor, and secondly to protect the aluminum from corroding and potentially disintegrating.

As you would imaadine, the manufacturing of coffee capsules is done on an industrial-scale; conveyor belts, heavy machinery — you get the idea. It is important to note that there are two different lines of Nespresso machines and they take different types of pods. The OriginalLine series of Nespresso machines take a cylinder shaped pod with a dome top.

These pods look like the creamer pods you would find at a local diner. The VertuoLine series of Nespresso machines takes a pod shaped like dome or half circle. Whichever machine you choose; it is important to order the pods that go with that machine as they are not cross compatible.

While the basic functions of the Nespresso machines are the same, there are slight differences with the two lines of machines. The pressure is typically 19 bar and the temperature is around degrees Celsius. This process is identical to how baristas make coffee in cafes, just on a fancier machine.