Breville One-Touch Tea Maker BTM800XL

Ooooooh! Aaaaaaah! Looks terrific!

I wonder how it compares to the Adagio tea maker…??.

Lori, I’d say it would be much more like the Zarafina. In my own opinion and personal definition- the Breville, even w/ the changes I want, is much “better”.

I have the Adagio tea maker and it is OK but sort of clunky and cheapy…And only 2 temp settings….

Ok, so then (having NOT) used any of them, I’d rank Breville top, Zarafina middle, and TriniTEA bottom.

Now what you all have been waiting for…
Zarafina versus Breville One-Touch Tea Maker BTM800XL
http://amazonv.blogspot.com/2010/05/update-breville-one-touch-tea-maker.html

HAHA! I love that you say the auto timer is “life changing”!=P As a woman who is NOT a morning person and deals w/ severe winters I can definitely say there will be times where this will become life changing for me as well. I will attribute this feature alone to an increase in my tea consumption… yes… I know… It’s extremely lame when even I am too tired/cold to make tea. I also like the “keep warm” feature. That way you don’t have to sit by the tea maker and immediately decant whiny, bratty tea. (I love whiny, bratty teas though) lol. My question is: Say I wanna make Mayan Chocolate Chai at 200 degrees and steep for 6min… will it keep the water at a constant 200 degrees for the entire 6 min steeping time or does it naturally cool like other steeping methods?

i think keep warm maintains 160….i haven’t actually read the manual yet (i refuse) so i am not positive but it certainly didn’t keep it 200 degrees

I don’t mean the keep warm feature for once it’s done steeping. I realize that temp is probably lower. I was just wondering if the temp you specify is the temp it stays while it steeps or if it cools.

hmm good question! i don’t know, and since it brews while i sleep i may not figure that one out for a while yet

I have a Keurig Milk Steamer/Frother that is amazing for this. It is great and over time it will pay for itself.

LauraR- that is the exact product I was going to get- but I’ve been told Breville is coming out w/ something unlike no other product in time for the holiday season and I want to see that 1st. Waiting rather than risk being disappointed w/ a product almost as soon as I get it by wishing I’d gotten something better is worth it.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOO
don’t do it
i do wish it worked that way though

LOL that’s what I thought, but just incase by some miracle I was wrong I thought I’d ask. That’d make chai flippin easy.

tell me about it! i love chai but end up paying Starbucks for it daily because i hate heating soy / lactose-free milk on the stove

Have you tried the lactose free Smart Balance milk? I love the regular fat free version, but I was wondering if the lactose free is as good as it’s regular counter part as the dairy is.

nope, and my supermarket doesn’t have smart balance (in fact most of what it has is certainly not in English)

It’s sold at our higher price market- I wish walmart would sell it!

As I was looking for the place that I was going to purchase my Breville, I came across a milk steamer that looks a lot like an electric kettle. (Never, ever heat milk in an electric tea kettle though, I learned the hard way) If steaming/heating milk is something you do often, it might be a sensible purchase. I don’t heat milk enough to make it worth my while…

LiberTEAS, could you pretty please post the link? I’m sick and tired of having either luke warm milk or it plastered to the inside of my microwave. THANK YOU!

LiberTEAS: RE: your “Where to buy” search… If you don’t mind waiting for it to ship, you might want to consider using the code and link I posted at the top of this page.

http://tinyurl.com/23jdyaw

Thanks for posting that link!

I’ve decided to buy with Sur La Table online – they don’t have as good a price as the link you have above, but you do get free Dammann Freres Tea with it! I decided I like the tea offer better than saving the 5%.

And… I’m actually also still considering the other tea maker machine that you have posted in my breville vs. zarafina thread. I’m really terrible when it comes to making decisions! LOL

Oh yeah the tea is a better value. Is it picked for you or can you specify? Sur La Table also has a similar milk frother, but it’s almost twice as expensive.

Sur La Table isn’t known for it’s discount prices… unfortunately… because I LOVE the store (and the site!) But, they do offer really excellent quality products. The tea is chosen for you, but it’s two tins of tea. And from the teas that I’ve tasted thus far from Dammann Freres, I’ve been very impressed so I don’t think I’ll be disappointed by their selections.

I looked into the milk frother/warmer and found that unfortunately it only has a capacity of 5.4oz… I need an 8oz one. P.S. sears.com sells it for $5 less.:)

If any chai or latTEA lovers are interested, I found a milk warmer/frother that holds 8oz. It warms. It froths. And I don’t have to deal w/ the stove or messes in the microwave!:)
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B002S51RWA/ref=asc_df_B002S51RWA1121088?smid=AYBHI2AQPIRDU&tag=dealtmp4057-20&linkCode=asn&creative=380341&creativeASIN=B002S51RWA

Yea!

Congrats! I’m totally jealous! If you have the capability to make a video and post it here, I’m sure we’d all love to see it in action!

The link to the manual can be found on page 2 of this thread, I’d check there.

Have you Christened it yet? With what tea? What tea are you going to have waiting for you in the morning?

You are soo lucky!

Cofftea, I had My favorite which is Formosa Silk Oolong from Te House of Tea and it was wonderful. In the morning I am going to wake up to Silk Road Teas Imperial Red (it’s one of my new teas so I’m still experimenting with it).

@ Lori, Thank you yes I am. My hubby is actually lucky he had my teen wake me up with a James Avery charm for my charm bracelet and the For All The Tea in China book and I got kinda mad I mean I loved both those gifts but I had my heart set on the Breville and luckily he had it tucked away and when he saw me kinda pouty he gave it to me! Yay!!

I can’t wait to read both your tasting notes!

It sounds like you had a wonderful Mother’s Day…My kids REFUSED to let me get the teamaker as they do not want me to get any more tea “stuff”. But I really can’t stand that clunky Adagio trinitea (or whatever it is called)…

Soooooo lucky!… Definitely keep us posted!

Congrats. Do you know where they got it? It’s still not available on the web site and I have a feeling unless I spoonfeed the info to my boyfriend I will have to get it for myself. :-0

WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

@Morgana, In short they picked it up at Williams and Sonoma. The whole story is that not ALL Williams and Sonoma’s stock it immediately. The salesperson told my husband that only 12 stores in the U.S. get immediate releases and so he had to go to the downtown location to pick it up (they had 12 units). Hope this helps!

Update: When I came back from dropping my son off at school my tea was ready!! I’m sipping on it now.

with other tea makers, it works fine when you chop or rip the taggie off the bag (paper & staple) and then toss the baggie (or baggies depending how much water) in

I actually emailed Breville. They said that the quality of the tea might not be as good as it would be with loose tea. So I’m willing to slice open my tea bags for a properly brewed pot. I only would be drinking 1-2 pots a day so this definitely seems worth it.

I ordered mine 2 days ago from Bloomingdale’s. Anyone have experience ordering from them?

“They said that the quality of the tea might not be as good as it would be with loose tea.”… well depending on the bag used, that may have everything to do w/ the tea itself and nothing to do w/ the One Touch.

Hey guys,

Saw this discussion about tea dust so I ran it by one of the Tea Maker’s designers as well. Here’s what he had to say:

“Unfortunately the filter basket has been designed for loose leaf tea, and it will not effectively isolate the tea dust from the tea itself due to the size of the individual holes. However, you can use tea bags. Just cut the string from the bag and place it into the tea basket. 4 bags for 1200mL is about right.”

He was also curious if a special tea dust filter would be a desirable accessory for this product. Thoughts? Is tea dust really popular?

Thanks for your help! Let me know if you have any more questions. Or, as always, our Get Satisfaction channel remains a great way to get in touch: getsatisfaction.com/breville

Brad

It’s just my personal opinion that the Breville One Touch is kinda like trying to kill a lake fly w/ a 2×4 so I can’t see where the dust filter would be desirable, or if it is I can’t see where it would be popular enough to implement. But then take into consideration I rarely drink a tea bag, and almost never drink dust. I’d be interested in knowing what dust drinkers think.

On another not FoodThinkers, has any further thought/action gone into adjusting the time/temp settings. I still can’t sign into my getsatisfaction account to ask there.

i personally just snip the tag on teabags and use them that way, same as with the zarafina, occasionally with a loose leaf some ‘bits’ escape – but personally i don’t care and would find a filter an extra step – the second filter when pouring near the spout does a good enough job

No experience either but OUCH that’s even more expensive. That’s $65 more than I’ve seen it sold most places. If my only 2 options were this price or wait, I’d personally wait.