To make the experience of enjoying a great cup of coffee easier, and saving you the trouble of scooping coffee powder from a tin and putting it into your espresso coffee maker, some bright spark designed prepackaged, pre-portioned pods and capsules along with special machines to brew these packaged coffee servings. They’re known in the trade as  an ESE for easy serve espresso, or a single-serve coffee system.

It’s similar to the concept of a tea bag, where a pre-portioned, processed serving of tea is placed in a paper filter good for one serving of tea.

COFFEE PODS

Coffee pods are a serving of roasted and ground coffee powder (about 7 grams) placed in between two circular pieces of filter paper. Most espresso machines that accept powder can also be used with these pods. Instead of scooping powder into the filter sieve, a smaller filter sieve is used where you place a coffee pod instead.

COFFEE CAPSULES

Coffee capsules are small containers made of aluminum or plastic containing a single serving of coffee powder (7 grams). They are nitrogen flushed to preserve freshness. A special capsule espresso coffee maker is needed to use these capsules. This machine consists of a chamber where the capsule is placed and punched with holes on both sides: one single hole on one side to allow the hot water to enter the capsule and several tiny holes on the other side to act as a filter. The rest of the mechanism is the same as a regular pump espresso coffee maker.

Both are much more expensive than buying regular coffee powder because of the convenience and the packaging they offer. In terms of flavor, they are no different than buying regular coffee powder, and if you are only an occasional coffee drinker than this might be a better option since the nitrogen flushed packaging preserves the freshness for longer.

As the name suggests, single-serve coffee machines will prepare one espresso at a time, unlike regular pump espresso machines that generally can prepare two shots of espresso at a time.

It’s your call. Me? I wonder about the effect on the environment of so much needless packaging that saves little by way of time and effort.