12 Cup Thermal Coffee Maker

Product Review: Kitchen Gourmet 4-Cup Coffee Maker

The Kitchen Gourmet 4-Cup Coffee Maker is sold through retail at just about all Walgreens locations, and can also be ordered through their website. At $9.99, it is certainly one of the more inexpensive options for a small coffee maker, but it also turns out to perform pretty well with only a few minor drawbacks.

The unit stands only about a foot high and is entirely plastic, making it quite lightweight and easily portable. The four-cup glass carafe is on the small side, but easily makes a full mug of coffee in one brew cycle. Surprisingly the unit has a "pause and pour" feature, a rarity for low-end coffeemakers - brewing can be halted while you pour a mug of coffee and replace the water for another on the fly.

The one major drawback of the unit is that due to the compact size and shape, pouring water into the reservoir without spilling can be a bit tricky if your hand dexterity is not so good (I found it handy to just get a small funnel from the local dollar store and place that into the reservoir - problem solved). The unit comes with a reusable mesh filter, which is adequate if a bit of a pain to clean - standard #2 cone-shaped coffee filters, which are usually about 2 bucks for 100, can also be used however. The carafe is fairly solid given the price and I've yet to have a problem with it in months of continuous use. The unit also features a warming plate underneath the carafe which keeps the coffee heated while the unit is on. Both the carafe and the reservoir have water level indicators to let you know how many cups are currently in - both have been very resistant to washing.

During the first four runs of brewing or so (in which I cycled water through to clean the unit per the instructions), there was a bit of a "burnt plastic" smell while brewing, but after the fourth cycle this disappeared and has not returned.

If portability and small size are important to you, or if you just want to stay within a budget, the Kitchen Gourmet 4-Cup Coffee Maker is a pretty good choice as opposed to better-quality but heavier and more expensive stainless steel units. After almost six months of continuous operation it has no issues thus far and is pretty easy to keep clean. Also, several times a year Walgreens will drop this unit to $4.99 on sale, so keep an eye on their circulars. For five bucks, it really can't be beat.