French Press To Go Go? Review Of The Xpress
Most of the good coffee shops that I come across offer French Pressed coffee to go, however there’s one company that wants you to take the French Press with you when you leave the coffee shop. Smart Cup, created the Xpress, which is basically a to go cup combined with a French Press.
The Xpress works very similar to a French Press. You add 2 tablespoons of ground coffee, mix in hot water and let it steep for three minutes. Then you press down on the plastic rod, which pushes down on the filter.
Then it gets a little different, instead of pouring the coffee into a new cup, it stays in your Xpress.
Pros:
The Xpress allows you to make French Pressed coffee anywhere. It doesn’t need anything besides a source of hot water.
Cons:
The largest design flaw that I see is that the coffee grounds stay in the cup, which if you’ve ever left coffee in a French Press can lead to over extraction and some really bad coffee. The Xpress does have two filters to separate the grounds from the water, but from what I could tell (and taste), the coffee was getting pretty dense towards the end of the cup. I did shoot them an email asking if the filters really do separate the grounds from the coffee, but I haven’t heard back yet.
I also emailed them about the possibility of a ceramic version, because the Xpress is designed just for a single use. When I first looked into the Xpress, I thought it was re-usable mug, like a traveler. However, it’s made of paper and plastic that has to be discarded after you finish your coffee. (Good news is that the plastic lid and recyclable and the cup itself is biodegradable.
My Thoughts:
Overall, I’m torn if I like the Xpress. I do want a French Press that would allow me to make coffee just about anywhere and the taste of the coffee wasn’t that horrible. However, it wasn’t as good as a regular French Press either after the first ten or so minutes. Plus, there’s the single use issue.
What do you think about the Xpress?
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Category: Coffee Equipment Reviews
About the Author (Author Profile)
Mike Crimmins is the highly caffeinated blogger behind Daily Shot Of Coffee. Besides drinking way too much coffee, he's obsessed with the Yankees and getting dirty on his mountain bike.Subscribe
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They have travel mini French presses by bodum, don’t they?
They do and I think that would work better for someone on the go or looking for quality coffee at the office.
It’s a nifty little gimmick, but I don’t see much applicability for it.
I think I have to agree with you on this one.
I saw this a few months back. I can always go for some good french press. Definitely seemed like a neat idea, but the result produced wass not up to my coffee snobbery.
In the current stage of my coffee journey…if the cup is not excellent, it was a waste of bean!
I think with a couple of tweaks, it could raise it to a lot higher level that would make me want to use it a lot more.
I love my bodum cup like this. I do think it’s neat that a coffee shop would offer this! I don’t find my bodum over-extracts, but maybe I drink my coffee too quickly.
I really think I need to try the bodum cup!
I’ll pass.
I had one of the thermatic travel cup slash coffee press. Thought it was a great idea for those mornings when I had to dash but really really wanted that press coffee. Perfect don’t you think? Wrong wrong wrong. By the time I actually had a chance to enjoy a good sip, the grounds had been sitting on the bottom for 5 or 10 minutes. Not a very tastey cup when I really really wanted one.
Some coffee drinkers might not know the difference. That’s fine for them I guess. I won’t spend the money on it.
The travel cup slash press made it to the recycle bin. Hasn’t been missed.
If there was just some sort of feature that prevented over extraction, I think that would solve a lot of the problems with these devices.
Where’s my soap box…
I have to bring up the whole environmental impact issue here sorry folks… Aren’t we trying to REDUCE waste? Not increase it? With a tonne of new companies bringing out ‘disposable looking’ thermal cups – the idea being we reduce the amount of paper cups being thrown out each day… I can’t help but wonder what the people at Xpress are thinking.
They are basically taking a very big problem (i.e. disposable paper cups) and making the problem bigger, by adding in the plastic french press filter set-up.
There are plenty of French Press style travel mugs out there in the market, so why make a throw away version? When are companies gonna start contributing towards solutions to our problems, instead of adding new ones?
Mike… you can have the podium back now thanks!
Those are some good questions! Podium is yours whenever you want it.
I know that I would support companies that contribute towards reducing waste. I already try to support companies that are direct trade, use environmentally sound growing practices, but there’s a lot more that can be done.
I have something similar — it’s a French press tumbler that I can travel with. Personally, I’m not that big a fan—I thought the coffee was overextracted, oversaturated, and the filter didn’t work very well (when I plunged it, grounds came up through the mesh). As much as I love the idea of a French press to go, I almost think that you might as well get a plastic 8 cup press and put a mug or whatever inside of it while traveling. Then, when you want to make your coffee, pull it out of your backpack and voila.
I have a 12 cup press that I brought to work with me and it sits on my desk. And you know what? It’s just as portable as the XPress! It can travel with me, literally, anywhere. So, while I think the XPress is a good idea, I just feel that it’s oversimplifying a process that was already pretty simple to begin with.
I completely agree with you. There are some great easy travel brew products out there. I think the XPress is more geared towards those that want the bene’s of a press without the extra baggage. They can just toss it all in the trash and be done with it.
Personally, this product seems to fit rushed or lazy people. Neither of those qualities works for a good cup of joe! I drink coffee for the taste, not the caffeine…so I’d rather just go without than with this sub-par brewer.
For office use (compact with easy cleanup) I prefer my AeroPress
The Joe isn’t as meaty, but still darn good!
Yes, I’ll have to go with you on the ceramic idea. That and a way to separate the grounds would be ideal. Also, being a coffee lover…Ever tried the Kopi Luwak coffee?
Cat poo coffee! YES! Hehe…I want to try it, but its expensive and NONE of my coffee buddies are willing to go in on with me
I think I’m just going to have to bite the bullet and dish out the $$$ myself one day.
As for separating the grounds, currently you’ll just have to generate extra trash: treat it like a disposable french press and pour your brew into another cup…or suffer the unsavory consequences!