Gentleman of Leisure: Tassimo Beverage System

Gentleman of Leisure is writer, erstwhile lecturer and notionally overeducated Martin Marks's PAPERMAG column on the things he likes and why.

Let me make one thing clear: I need coffee. I need it good, I need it strong, I need it often, and I need it nearby. Surprisingly, this leaves very few alternatives. Starbucks? Two years of college Italian, a semester of Calculus, and I still can’t parse the various cup names and their corresponding sizes. The nearest source of caffeine that passes the Gent. o' Leis. test? A restaurant called Havana, located at the intersection of S. Dixie Highway and Forest Hill Boulevard -- so, so SoHo, it’s in South Florida.

Then there's the nearest nearby: Buying my own cappuccino maker. But did I really want one of those Über-EspressoUndKappuccinoMaschines, made from reinforced titanium alloy, built to withstand drops from apartment windows, Category 5 hurricanes, the Apocalypse, with chrome notches and valves and pipes and levers that never seemed to do anything except spray piping hot milk across freshly cleaned countertops and make weird whistling sounds every time the barometric pressure dropped below 29.2 mercury inches? (That’s what she said.) Alas, I had neither the wherewithal nor the scullery maid to operate such a device.

Then, on a trip to Italy, I saw them. They were everywhere -- in homes, bars, gas stations. The land that gave us Michelangelo, Dante, and MTV Italia had done it again! They had produced something that we non-Italians would find glorious and baffling, in that we could never quite replicate it at home -- those little cappuccino makers with disposable pods. But why couldn’t we? Bosch Home Appliances resolved this very question in 2005 when they introduced their Tassimo Beverage System to the American market.

Remember the opening sequence of 2001: A Space Odyssey, before Charlton Heston discovers the Statue of Liberty but after Dian Fossey saves those mist-plagued gorillas (I had a high fever the last time I saw the film[s]), when that giant stone rectangle plops down in the African desert, forever changing the course of humanity?

Thus spake Tassimo. What that hengeian monolith was to our ancestors, the Tassimo Beverage System is to me. I am not joking. It has revolutionized my life. After going through enough T-Disk pods to build my own Leaning Tower of T-Disks, I now hold the Tassimo Beverage System in the same scientific esteem as I do pacemakers and moon landings -- if you believe in that sort of thing. I never have to leave my apartment again!

The machine is easy to use (it has one button), easy to clean (I wash the removable parts in the dishwasher), and easy to buy (either online, or at Bed Bath & Beyond). And the selection of disposable T-Disk flavors available to feed this hungry, hungry Tassimo-tron Java-bot (as I've lovingly named the one in my kitchen) -- present a veritable Technicolor Dream Coat of Caffeine, all to make the itching go away!

More info:
www.tassimo.com

Available at:
Either at the Tassimo website, or,
Bed Bath & Beyond
620 Sixth Ave,
New York, NY 10011

Price:
For the machine: $169.99
For the refills: $6.49-$10.99