Review: Wilfa Performance Coffee Maker and Uniform Grinder

Do you like coffee? The folks at Wilfa sure do, but even more than that the seem to enjoy eye-catching design. Almost Rube Goldbergian in its construction, the Wilfa Performance Coffee Maker looks like what futurists in the 1970s probably imagined a coffee maker would look like in the 2020s. And hey, maybe they were right!

The unit is surprisingly simple: Water in the carafe on the right. Grounds (weighed to the appropriate number of grams, naturally) and filter in the basket on the left. There’s only a single power button, no timer, to get it going. To set the amount of coffee you want, you twist an analog dial on the bottom of the filter basket.

Coffee comes out expeditiously, but as expected I found the results varied dramatically based on the coffee I used. Lardera, the North American partner for Wilfa, provided samples of 4 of its 11 single-origin coffees to use with the Wilfa system. Far and away my favorite was the Bourbon Washed offering from Peru; it’s not made with whiskey, but it had a slight mocha character, modest nuttiness, and a more nuanced flavor profile despite an overall bolder profile. I also enjoyed the Catuai Honey expression, grown in Costa Rica, which was quite fruity and a bit sweet, a much different experience than the Bourbon Washed. All coffees run about $2 for a 2-oz bag of whole bean coffee (good for about 4 or 5 cups).

Of course, you’ll need to grind those beans before you drink them, and Wilfa has you covered there, too, with a Uniform Grinder that costs more ($299) than the coffee maker ($249). This massive device, 15 inches tall and 7 pounds in weight, has 41 grinding level options, all dialed in by twisting the top of the device. Just dump in your beans and press the lonely start button. Grounds are deposited into a canister below. It’s quite effective, but the amount of counter space it takes up, like the Coffee Maker, is beyond excessive.

At $548 for the combination of coffee maker and grinder, this is a set of gear designed with absolute coffee nerds squarely in mind. While my tests over the course of a week with the system didn’t result in visibly more delicious coffee than I can get from a standard drip machine, its status as a conversation piece arguably filled in some of that gap.

Wilfa Performance Coffee Maker: B / $249 [BUY IT NOW FROM AMAZON]
Wilfa Uniform Grinder: B / $299

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