Sage Barista Express Impress Review

We’ve been using the precursor to the Impress, the Sage Barista Express, at the studio for over 4 years and have calculated it’s made over 10,000 coffees to date. It’s working as well now as the day it arrived; a testament to the design in both form and function. But now Sage have tweaked the formula with this new addition to their line-up, called the Sage Barista Express Impress. But does it out perform the former version and is its flagship feature of an intelligent dosing and puck system advantageous? Buy on Amazon

Design

Unsurprisingly Sage (or Breville as they are known elsewhere in the world) have moulded the new Impress in the familiar framework of the original Barista Express, which we continue to rate highly as an all-in-one coffee making package. The Impress is a majestic appliance with a serious image that no owner would want to hide away whether it is sitting on a countertop or within an office environment. Available in black truffle, sea salt, black stainless steel and our model’s brushed stainless steel. All colours incorporate a polished stainless steel backsplash now, with ever so slightly more curvature around the base, and are raised slightly higher from the ground with a new chunkier foot design. The differences are hard to spot, whereas the commonality with its sibling is a great deal easier to highlight; the familiar espresso extraction pressure dial in the centre, the circular, satisfyingly tactile, buttons along the front, the large cup warmer above (gets hotter much quicker now), the steam/hot water selector on the right hand side and bean hopper with a capacity for 250g of coffee beans protruding on top. The latter of which is removable, so if you decide you want a change of beans, you can detach the hopper from the top and the remaining beans can be easily re-dispensed into a bag via an integrated twist lock; this means changing over blends is a doddle.

When we glance over to the left of the Impress we can see where the significant change has been made with this new Barista Express, via a brand new lever control. This operates the tamping arm mechanism, which works together with the new dial that, reminiscent of a strength tester game from a fairground, will illustrate when the portafilter is optimally full when lit green. It’s an elegant integration and visually simple to understand. One gripe is that there is still no water level indicator on the front of the machine or even an alert to say when it’s running low. Whilst the 2L tank is transparent, it’s not something we remember to keep an eye on when preparing many drinks for something like a dinner party type gathering, or on a day when we have a greater hankering for coffee than usual. Running out of water mid espresso, or whilst using the steam wand, is very annoying as it spoils either function and it does seem like the only possible flaw in the entire design that is otherwise so precise. We’re generally pleased to say that coming over from the Express to the Express Impress required minimal adjustment, with the exception of the swapped places of the power button and double shot extraction button; it took a few weeks to reaffirm the new location of these in our heads and now we’re generally hitting the double shot button in its new residence and not constantly accidentally turning the machine off!

Cleaning & Maintenance

A bottle of stainless steel cleaner is a must when taking ownership of the Sage Barista Express Impress. Its shiny backsplash is unfortunately less forgiving in hiding splutters of espresso and milk than the brushed variant was on our older model. The remainder of the design is brushed and is thankfully very easy to wipe down and keep glistening.

Roughly every 6 weeks the cleaning light will illuminate, a straightforward process that requires a Sage cleaning tablet to be inserted into a rubber basket within the portafilter and it then completes around a 10 minute cleaning flush cycle. On each occasion we unscrew the group head water filter via the supplied hex-key and wash any trapped coffee grounds out, as well as using a wet cloth to wipe over the exposed water head. Something we’ve noticed is that every so often the tamper should be inspected for excess coffee grinds which can stick to it and create false readings. Easy enough to do as the mechanism has a removable faceplate for quick access.

One of the big improvements over the original Barista Express is its drip tray, which now has a more obvious red alert float to signify when it’s getting full and it is time for it to be emptied. The tray itself is much easier to clean with its simpler and smoother textured plastic moulded parts. The coffee grounds separator remains in place and does a reasonable job at keeping around 70% of the grounds out of the waste water, but those that make their way into the drip tray create the reason for an occasional comprehensive clean. Behind the drip tray is a cleverly hidden basket for filters and accessory storage.

The new puck system

The Impress™ Puck System is intelligent and pleasingly rock solid in reliability, learning on the job when you introduce a new roast which usually doesn’t have quite enough ground coffee when compared to the last and will automatically top itself up. This will be remembered in the system and each subsequent grind and tamp will be exact. Upon pulling the ever-so-satisfying lever arm, it applies exactly 10kg of pressure, but it also finishes with a 7 degree ‘barista twist’. This leaves a smooth puck of ground coffee with clean edges that is ready to make espresso. In dire straits, where you’re left with old and stale beans, or pre-ground coffee, Sage have supplied pressurised dual wall (double or single shot) baskets to exhort arduous pressure that will compliment even pre-ground coffee. However, the single wall baskets are going to live in our portafilter mostly, along with freshly ground whole bean coffee.

For those with no prior experience, like some here at the studio, the Express Impress has interestingly presented less of a learning curve than the former Express would have done. This is all down to the fact that all the focus of manual skill needed to create fantastic barista grade coffee drinks with this maker is to master the steam wand and to understand the best coffee bean grind setting. The espresso side is now automated thanks to the Impress™ Puck System and the only thing you are needed for in the process is to transport the ground and tamped coffee within the portafilter from the left intelligent doser and attach it onto the right group head ready for extraction. Nevertheless, there is one piece of the process which even Sage are so far unable to automate and it’s that perfect grind setting. The inbuilt burr head grinder with its 25 settings (original Express had 16) is brilliant, achieving a coarser or finer grind than that on our Barista Express. But you’ll still need to experience the grind being slightly too coarse or fine and this will be apparent by the feedback from the pressure gauge reading and appearance of the pulled espresso shot. Tweaking the grind will enable you to achieve a perfect pressure reading and a wonderfully rich liquid caramel-like espresso. The added degree of tolerance due to the increased grind levels is considerable, allowing for an even more bespoke extraction from our batches of beans.

Making Espresso

The amount of ground coffee the Impress doses ranges between 1-3g more than we would have entered previously when manually dosing and tamping. However, an original concern that it might be overloading the filter basket within the portafilter was quickly dismissed upon trying the espresso and discovering it is more developed. What we mean by this isn’t to say the Impress is unlocking new aromas and characteristics from familiar blends when compared with the original Barista Express machine when it first came into the studio, but instead it intensifies the qualities we are already familiar with from Sage by utilising a nifty pre-infusion of the ground coffee to allow the grounds to expand before pulling the shot with the recognisable 9 bar extraction process delivered via a 15 bar Italian pump. This produces a rich treacle-like espresso flow, sumptuous crema and cascading layering. The fundamentals on the Impress are the same as the Barista Express; a Thermocoil heating system with digital control for a consistent 93ºC water temperature, flow rate and contact time. This is a really important part of the process which also means coffee is never burnt, even when using the hot water spout for an Americano. Yes, the consistency is undeniable and we have to admit that removing the human element has meant successive espresso shots are identical and the tamping process is quicker.

In truth, by removing the dosing and tamping part of the coffee making process for someone who is primarily an Americano or espresso drinker, this machine is only faintly more complicated to use than a pod based coffee machine, but instead it will deliver literal barista quality espresso, and is comparable in speed with even something like the bean to cup Siemens EQ.3 s500. Notably, the fact this very discipline we have repeated thousands of times has been replaced by the machine is needless to say magical, but it does pose the question of whether this is brewing up trouble for the manual way? The simple answer is no, because conversely, if you crave more involvement in your coffee making, then you can just twist the front grind dosage dial from automatic to manually select the quantity. To take this further you could also retrieve the portafilter from the grinder to tamp yourself and it becomes a Barista Express again (with a better grinder). The machine offers total control still, but despite us previously manually going through this process thousands of times, we have not once felt the need to take back control following a few hundred drinks being crafted using the new Impress. That says everything really.

Texturing Milk

Steaming milk is a skill and one that takes many attempts to comprehensively appreciate the nuance of the discipline: that of creating micro-foam, heat control and specialising in a specific milk type for the subject drink intended. The 130ºC steam wand is indistinguishable on the Impress from that on our Barista Express and will dutifully provide consistent steam for the creation of truly bespoke barista grade textured milk to suit a preference. Whilst the wand is powerful it’s slower than that you’d find on coffee shop hardware, allowing users to pace themselves, and it has obvious benefits for beginners who are learning the ropes. With the advent of the ballooning range of barista grade milk alternatives, we can say confidently they are much better than the animal product we previously used to use and from which they were inspired by. Examples of these are Minor Figures Oat Barista, Mighty Milkology Barista, Alpro Oat Barista, Oatly Barista and the non-barista milk alternative that is the M&S Sweetened Soya (offers the best value). All are similar to work with whilst flavours are subtly different, but interestingly, when compared to cow’s milk, they are a great deal easier to manipulate in stretching and creating micro foam via a vortex for beginners, and these types of milks make it much easier to clean the steam wand afterwards, too. Our only irritation with the steam wand is that, when making a series of milk based drinks, it is a tad annoying not being able to extract espresso and texture milk simultaneously.

Whilst the first few attempts will likely result in thin and possibly burnt milk, it becomes something you can feel in terms of the steam arm position, the way the milk is behaving and the temperature of the jug. A week from using this steam wand we were able to unify our textured milk with the beautifully rich espresso to create a clearly defined flat white, cappuccino or latte. Oddly heat control is an area where Sage have left us to use our own judgement, because they’ve not included their temperature control heat jug with this model, but instead a plain jug is to be met with in the box; which is a bit of a head scratcher when the cheaper model below it in the line-up comes with the heat jug?

Verdict

The Sage Barista Express Impress is a redefining moment for ‘at home’ coffee making. By automating the grind and tamp process via the Impress™ Puck System, it will certainly find a new audience that want to be involved in their coffee making process, but don’t mind outsourcing the building blocks that create a truly velvety full bodied barista grade espresso, which is enjoyable on its own or becomes the perfect base for milk based coffee drinks. This is where the Impress requires skill, and thankfully Sage have an excellent steam wand which is capable of manipulating cow's milk and vegan barista types to forge your favourite milk based drinks. At £729 it’s difficult to pick fault: the build quality is industry leading, its internal hardware has been proven to make over 10,000 coffees and ours has kept going for years without a hiccup - also it’s a tactile joy to use. Buy on Amazon