Sage - The Oracle Touch, Brushed Stainless Steel

Product Information

This, along with its dual boilers and heated group head, enables it to craft a balanced espresso no matter how small the difference in degrees can cause an otherwise delicious cup of coffee to take on an undesirable ashy flavour. That is why I am here to provide you with an honest review and comparison between the Sage Barista Touch and the Oracle Touch.

So this machine, the entry level in the Creatista range, has the ability to blow just about any other Nespresso machine out of the water, where milk texture is concerned. If you're looking for an impressive pod machine for an Airbnb for example, as I know some people choose these machines for, you can't get much better than this – unless you splurge a bit more on the Plus or the Pro, which so more or less the same just with one touch pre-sets for milkies, and more settings. You may have noticed the portafilter has a spout/dispenser either side, like you see in the coffee shops. This does mean, that even when you want a single shot, you need to make sure your cup is under both spouts, we don’t to waste anything. Machines like the Barista Express and Barista Pro don't have any assistance, they're no easier to get great espresso and great milk texture from than any other traditional espresso machine, integrated grinder or not. Unlike its baby brother the Sage Barista Express, the oracle will not only grind the exact amount of beans required, it will also tamp them correctly for you. Leaving you with a perfectly compact amount of freshly ground coffee. The Creatista Veruo is more or less the same machine where performance is concernYou can control the brew temperature over a much bigger range than usual, 10 degrees in 1C increments, from 86-96, and you also have control over preinfusion power, and a much bigger range of preinfusion time than with any other similarly priced dual boiler espresso machine I've come across. If you're planning on really developing your skills and your palate, you might want to go for a setup that gives you the ability to upgrade the grinder, for example starting off with the Dynamic Duo would give you similar shot potential, but further down the line you can upgrade the grinder to the Niche Zero, Baratz Sette 270 and so on.

One amazing feature within this machine is the adjustable PID controller. That’s a fancy term for producing perfectly balanced espresso shots. No matter which machine you choose, our coffee subscription can provide freshly roasted speciality coffee beans to ensure you get the best-tasting espresso possible. Sage has constructed a coffee experience that cannot be replicated by any other devices, managing each step of the coffee-making process. The good news, in a way, is there's not much choice, and one is almost double the price of the other ;-), so if a machine like this is for you, it's going to be quite easy to figure out which is the best for you. Sage Barista Touch ImpressYou can easily fit anything from an espresso cup to standard size mug under the dispenser. According to my measuring the clearance between dispenser and drip tray is 105mm, which is just enough for a decent size mug. So in a nutshell, the Barista Express is a great value for money option if you're not aiming for home barista use and freshly roasted beans, but if you are heading in that direction I'd recommend having a look at the Barista Pro instead. The Oracle Touch, like the Barista Touch, features a three seconds heat up time, perfect for those who need their coffee in a hurry. Its integrated steel conical burr grinder allows you to enjoy freshly ground beans without mess or fuss. Menu: Pre-sets for all the usual plus babyccino, hot chocolate, tea with 2 temp options & 8 customisable drinks

If you don’t like the idea of struggling to turn a heavy coffee machine around every time you need to remove the water tank, then don’t worry, Sage isn’t keen on the idea either. Underneath the drip tray, a plastic dial allows you to deploy wheels under the machine. Turn the dial, and the wheels make it possible to easily spin the Oracle around without lifting it or dragging it across the countertop. Sage Oracle Touch review: Coffee quality I do much prefer the touch screen on the Barista Touch Impress, by the way, but the reason for that is the innovation that this brings with it, including the grind size guidance and the enhanced barista guidance, and the really clever milk system with the queuing option. But as you could expect from Sage all is not what it seems, the steam wand is capable of automatically frothing your milk. Or for when you fancy trying out as a Barista it can be a manual milk frother. Its outer and inner surfaces are made of brushed stainless steel, with a water tank capacity of 250g.At first glance you could be forgiven for assuming the milk frothing is a manual process, it certainly has what appears to be a steam wand. What are they? These are traditional espresso machines with a level of assistance that makes them ultra-convenient and user-friendly. The Barista Express has a lower RRP, though, and because it's been around for so long, there is more competition for it, and the price you can get it for at times makes it a very, very interesting proposition, especially vs other usually lower priced options. The Bambino Plus is the more premium version of the two Bambino machines, and it's one of Sage's most popular coffee machines, certainly one of their most popular stand-alone espresso machines.

This machine does offer a 54mm portafilter against the 58mm commercial grade portafilter the Oracle Touch offers. The machine even asks you what kind of coffee beans you're using, supermarket beans with a sell by date, or freshly roasted beans with a roasted on date, and guides you to using the dual walled baskets and a courser starting grind size if you're using store bought beans. It's a good grinder as far as integrated grinder espresso machines go, but it's not a grinder that I would class as being the ultimate pairing for the Dual Boiler. So unless you get one of the fully assisted Sage machines, you may in some cases actually end up with worse-tasting coffee from using a non-assisted manual espresso machine as if it were a bean to cup machine. The Sage Vs Breville Confusion

James Bellis | Founder, CEO & Coffee Writer.

So if you don't want to mess about, you're happy to let the machine dictate how wet or dry (how much air is pulled into the milk, more for drier, less for wetter) and what temperature the milk is steamed to for each drink, you can just tell the machine what kind of milk you're using, and let it do the rest. OK, that should really be “filter coffee machine” as Sage only produce the one filter coffee machine, the Precision brewer, and I can understand why this is the case, because simply put, the Precision Brewer is among the very best filter coffee machines on the market, I don't think they really need to release another one, and if I they did I don't know how they could make it any better.