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Bonaverde brews up complete solution for coffee aficionados

Bonaverde brews up complete solution for coffee aficionados
The Bonaverde machine roasts, grinds and brews coffee
The Bonaverde machine roasts, grinds and brews coffee
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Bonaverde was founded by Hans Stier in Berlin
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Bonaverde was founded by Hans Stier in Berlin
The machine roasts, grinds and brews coffee
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The machine roasts, grinds and brews coffee
Coffee beans will come in jute bags
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Coffee beans will come in jute bags
Bonaverde works with farmers around the globe, like Henry Hueck from Nicaragua
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Bonaverde works with farmers around the globe, like Henry Hueck from Nicaragua
The launch is slated for October 2014
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The launch is slated for October 2014
The coffee lover can bypass 17 stages typically involved in the processing and distribution process
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The coffee lover can bypass 17 stages typically involved in the processing and distribution process
The Bonaverde machine roasts, grinds and brews coffee
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The Bonaverde machine roasts, grinds and brews coffee
View gallery - 7 images

Coffee is one of the most popular beverages in the world, the fuel that ignites the brain in the morning and keeps us going throughout the day. Some people take their coffee more seriously, and enjoy a more artisanal approach to coffee-making, and not just stirring up a quick instant coffee. It’s for those people that Berlin-based startup Bonaverde has launched a new coffee-making machine that gives coffee lovers total control of the process.

Bonaverde’s coffee machine not only grinds and brews coffee, it also roasts green coffee beans. The Bonaverde team says that with one push of a button, the coffee lover can bypass 17 stages typically involved in the processing and distribution process. The promise is of a "tree-to-cup" experience in less than 12 minutes, a feat the team is hoping is going to get one of their farming partners, Henry Hueck, from Nicaragua, a Guinness World Record.

But more than just a fast, high-tech way of making coffee, Bonaverde coffee makers personalize the relationship between coffee drinkers and coffee producers, from whom they can buy their beans directly. Bonaverde is connected to a network of farmers around the globe, adding a scent of social networking to the process. Sustainability is also on the cards as beans will be shipped in jute bags, avoiding less environmentally-friendly materials such as paper, plastic and aluminum.

The launch is slated for October 2014
The launch is slated for October 2014

"Consumers want greater transparency in the coffee market across the entire value chain," Bonaverde founder Hans Stier said in a press release. "Our concept is a complete shift away from the established market. We give our customers complete control over the roasting process and ensure that more money goes to where the most value is generated – the coffee farmers."

Bonaverde has launched a Kickstarter funding campaign to bring its product to market. Supporters can chip in with as little as US$5, while an Early Bird package of $250 will include the coffee machine, 6 lb (2.7 kg) of green coffee beans and a Bonaverde jute tote bag. For the hardcore coffee lovers with more money to spare, Travel Packages of up to $10,000 will take them as guests of the Bonaverde team to visit farming partners in various countries, including Brazil, Nicaragua, Ethiopia and Peru, among others.

Shipping of the Early Bird Bonaverde coffee machines is slated for next October while those who purchase the Beta Tester Package will get their hands on the device in August 2014, as the company already has more than a hundred working prototypes, both for consumer and commercial use.

In the video below, Bonaverde's Felix Artmann shows how the prototype works.

Sources: Bonaverde, Kickstarter

Roast-Grind-Brew 101

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6 comments
6 comments
Vince Pack
Ok - I want this machine without the drip brewer!! I'd love to experiment with different beans and roasting combinations, but I'll never go back to a dripper after pressing for the past decade. Super awesome concept, and for the $250 campaign cost, it's a bargain.
zippyflounder
A number of small points, first this is hardly the first roast, grind, brew system Samsung showed one in 2003 at the home appliance show, a similar unit was sold for a number of year unimax 555 SI 5 cup ....price $287.00. The real problems on all of these units is 6 fold, 1. roast is very "haphazard" in that you never get the same thing twice. 2. green bean sourcing, good, bad, hard to tell. and then how do you roast it? 3. Noise, all of them are pretty noisy, a air popper and grinder. 4. speed, they say 3 min for a roast, that would be a very light roast 6 to 8 min is more realistic, so with brew time your looking at 9 to 12 min per cup. 5. brewer dependent, if you like drip, great, what about all the other brew types, press, espresso, vacuum? 6. safety you had better check smoke filter often, as when its "done" and you forget you have a kitchen full of acrid smoke and or a merry fire.
thk
@ zippyflounder,
The main problem as for as I am concerned, is smoke. I don't think any smoke filter can remove the burnt smokey smell that's going to permeate your kitchen. I did roasting coffee beans before and I did it outdoors and I would not recommend it for apartments, even with balconies without risking your neighbors pasting a note on your door one day.
I am not sure how much you can save either. Afaik, the only bean that mellows with age is the Sumatran Mandheling. The others would go bad; you can't buy by the bushel. Freshness from freshly roasted roasted is a hype so long as you store in an air-type container even for grounds. 200 grams of beans you can finish before you notice any difference.
As for taste and aroma from the roasting, you can wing it with trial and error.
mick2d2
Nice idea, especially the part about cutting out the middle men and giving the money to the farmer, but I could never go back to drip. The only way for me to enjoy coffee is expresso or carajillo ;)
morriss003
Tree to cup is nonsense. Anyone who grows their own coffee can tel you that the tree to bean process is the most time consuming and the most labor intensive. Once you have the dried bean, the rest is easy.
MattBrock
I wrote about this the day it was released. I am very intrigued and skeptical at the same time. Like @zippyflounder mentioned, this is not the "world's first".
http://roastlab.net/blog/worlds-first-roast-grind-brew-machine-that-isnt