Cuisinart DBM-8 Coffee Grinder Review: Grrrinding is Grrrreat!

With the Cuisinart Supreme Grind Automatic Burr Mill I feel like a Barista!

Many moons ago I worked at a quaint little coffeehouse as a barista. I still remember using the commercial burr mill each morning to grind the different types of beans for the many boutique blends of coffee we served each day. This Cuisinart grinder comes pretty close to the grind quality that you used to only be able to get via commercial grinders.

Today I am a little less picky and lot more cheap...

So I like to buy whole bean coffee in bulk at Costco. I generally store the beans in a large canister that has an airtight seal to keep the beans fresh as long as possible. The Cuisinart burr mill grinder has a storage area at the top that will hold around a half pound of beans, however don't hope for the worlds freshest cup of coffee if you leave beans sitting in the canister at the top of the grinder for long. The canister doesn't have an airtight seal, so the beans will lose freshness quickly sitting in the storage area. If you are a daily coffee drinker (as we are) then it's not really a big deal. We make 8-cup pots of coffee each day with our Cuisinart DCC-2000 Coffee-on-Demand 12-cup Programmable Coffee Maker and go through the coffee in the canister in about a week or so. If you aren't a family of coffee-freaks like we are, you might want to store coffee in an airtight canister and just measure the amount of coffee needed per pot.

We've owned the Cuisinart burr mill coffee grinder for about 6 months now and I must say that the sweetest thing about the grinder is that you can make some serious adjustments to the grind quality and quantity. If you are anal about how your coffee turns out, you can micro-manage the grind settings or you can do as we lazy-folk have done; Leave it at just about medium grind and the 8 cup setting and forget about it. What I love is that I can stumble into the kitchen half-awake and press one button on the grinder and know that the coffee beans will be ground to perfection every time.

After coffee beans pass through the burrs, the ground coffee is deposited into a small sealed canister at the bottom that you can remove and dump into your favorite coffee maker. This is likely so that you can grind a bunch of beans at one time and just scoop out the grinds as needed; this would alleviate the above mentioned issue whereas the beans get stale quickly. This smaller grind canister is sealed far better than the top canister. However, we like our coffee fresh-ground and prefer to grind a little bit each day. The flexibility of the grinder is yet another benefit that makes it a great buy.

Cuisinart DBM-8 Supreme Grind Automatic Burr Mill Quick Review:

Purchased: Well we didn’t because it was a gift (yes we have some awesome family members!), but we saw it at Linens and Things for $50 bucks

Cuisinart DBM-8 Supreme Grind Automatic Burr Mill Benefits:

• Very consistent grind quality
• Easy to use and configure for different grind types and amounts
• Ability to grind a large amount of coffee at one time or small amounts each day
• Stylish stainless steel design looks cool sitting on the kitchen counter
• The quality of the grinder is excellent at this price point

Cuisinart DBM-8 Supreme Grind Automatic Burr Mill Drawbacks:

• The storage area at the top is not airtight and will not keep coffee fresh for very long

The Mrs. gives the Cuisinart DBM-8 Supreme Grind Automatic Burr Mill 4.5/5
I would have given this a 5 if the canister at the top kept the coffee fresh for a bit longer. Maybe if they just added a small rubber seal to the canister lid it would help. Other than this issue, the grind quality is certainly comparable to that which I could get at a coffee house. The Cuisinart burr mill grinder is used daily in our house and has never let us down.