De’Longhi Maestosa coffee machine – What can $5,000 do for your coffee?

How on earth do I explain to people what it’s like to live with a five-grand coffee machine for a month? De’Longhi’s premium coffee machine, Maestosa, has been dominating a corner of our kitchen. But at $4,999 people who’ve come over simply ask one question, why?

Great Automation isn’t cheap

First of all, this is a fully automated machine. One that either takes grounded, plus two types of whatever beans you like. It froths the milk in a very integrated way and offers so many styles of coffee or other beverages, the mind boggles.

The idea is barista quality coffee at the touch of a button. I’ve tested a lot of coffee machines this year, that make the same claim. The Maestosa undoubtably is the closest I’ve seen and tasted the end result to that being true. But until a machine can whip up a leaf design on my cappuccino, I’ll just concentrate on its features for now. 

The Maestosa is beautiful to look at with a stainless-steel ribbed body and black glass front. In fact, it’s such a masterpiece you really would need a kitchen that blends in with it. Because it could potentially stand out like a Rolls Royce parked at Bunnings. 

Can I just say I’ve done that by the way!

Don’t be overwhelmed

It’s easy to be overwhelmed by such a product, but really, it’s all very simplistic. As long as you understand how to fill the water tank, top up the dual coffee containers and understand the cleaning programs you should be ok.

Grinding the coffee properly is one of the first steps to a great coffee. De’Longhi use Adaptive Grinding Technology to release maximum aroma. It then heats and extracts the coffee via some serious scientific processing going on.

A separate milk container called the LatteCrema System delivers just the right proportions of steam, air and milk for the type of milk you require. Be it a cappuccino, latte or even just hot milk.

Another container called the MixCarafe works its magic by creating perfect hot chocolate or even iced coffee. Once you start to experiment with beverages outside of just coffee, more and more pieces are required. Equipment like a Choco-stirrer or Aero-stirrer that mixes ice cubes with milk and coffee are just the start.

Great Personalisation

The machine can make up to 30 style of drinks. Although we used it to simply make milk-based coffee or in my case expresso most of the time.

But within each drink you can personalise just exactly how you like it. Not all cups are the same size for example. Once you set up a ‘My’ setting where you make your drink manually, it’s saved on a dedicated profile. 

For example, my wife drinks a cappuccino from a large mug, that requires about 25 seconds of milk foam and 40ml of coffee to suit her tastes. But she also doesn’t like the milk to be too frothy but likes it hot. All of these demands can be altered via the brilliant touch screen, in the end she just settled for a flat white anyway.

The Maestosa can make two coffees at once and has remote app connectivity. The latter feature is more of a party trick, I mean who is making a coffee while still in bed.

Ultimately this is a very high-end Italian designed machine that delivers an excellent bean to cup experience. You can’t replace a human, expert barista. But you can lau down massive coin for an experience that comes close.

 Price: RRP $4,999

Stockists: Selected Harvey Norman stores