I’m José Villalobos. I founded Espresso and Machines to do one thing: cut through the marketing noise and tell home baristas the truth about espresso equipment, based on real testing rather than press releases. This is the long version of who’s behind every review, comparison, and buying guide on this site — so you can decide whether to trust the recommendations.
The short version
- 40+ years of hands-on coffee experience
- 150+ espresso machines tested since 2018
- 18 coffee-producing countries visited across the Americas
- 8 years pulling shots daily
- Live-fire and asado cook with deep ties to South American grilling tradition
- Cooking and palate roots in Italian and Latin American food
Where it started
I was born and raised in Valparaíso, Chile — a port city where coffee, food, and family were never separate things. My obsession with coffee started in childhood, watching the rituals of long meals, espresso after lunch, and conversations that lasted longer than the cup did. By the time I was 16, I was traveling through South America to see where coffee actually came from. That trip never really ended.
Over the next four decades, I visited coffee farms across 18 countries in the Americas — Peru, Colombia, Brazil, Ecuador, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Panama, Mexico, Costa Rica, Honduras, Venezuela, Haiti, Guatemala, the Dominican Republic, Hawaii, California, Puerto Rico, and Cuba. Some I returned to many times. Some I only visited once. Each one left a different fingerprint on how I think about origin character, processing methods, and what makes a single-origin espresso shine versus disappear in milk.
Why machines
Tasting great coffee at origin makes you obsessed with reproducing it at home. That’s how the machine testing program started in 2018 — frustration with how hard it was to find honest, hands-on reviews of espresso equipment in any price tier. Most “reviews” online were either thinly-rewritten press releases or affiliate-driven listicles with no actual testing behind them. I started buying machines, testing them properly, and writing what I actually thought.
Eight years later, I’ve tested over 150 espresso machines — from $79 plastic pod brewers to $20,000 commercial-grade dual boilers. I’ve made every mistake worth making. I’ve ruined shots, broken parts, descaled the wrong way, paired bad grinders with great machines, and bought machines I regretted. The point of Espresso and Machines is to save you from making those mistakes by sharing what I learned along the way.
How I test machines
Every review on this site is based on a minimum 30 days of daily use with the actual machine on my counter. Not a 10-minute demo at a trade show. Not a single shot at a press event. Real, daily, lived-in testing. The protocol is consistent across machines so I can fairly compare them:
- Standardized shot parameters: 18–20 grams of coffee in, 36–40 grams output, 25–30 second extraction, dialed in across at least 3 different bean origins
- Multiple bean origins: typically a Colombian, an Ethiopian or African washed, and a Brazilian or natural-process bean — each tested over the full 30+ days
- Daily-driver evaluation: warmup time, workflow ergonomics, cleanup, water-tank refill frequency, descaling experience, steam wand performance, milk texturing for cappuccinos and lattes
- Build-quality observation: after 30 days you start to see what cheap plastic feels like, where heat-stress builds up, which knobs wobble, and which machines age gracefully
- Price-tier comparisons: every machine is compared head-to-head against at least 2 others in the same price range, so the “is it worth it” question gets a real answer
For the full methodology, see the testing methodology page.
What I won’t do
A few things I refuse, regardless of what it might cost the site:
- I don’t write from press releases. If I haven’t physically tested it, I don’t review it.
- I don’t take payment for positive reviews. Manufacturers cannot buy a recommendation here.
- I don’t recommend machines I wouldn’t buy with my own money. Some of the most affiliate-profitable machines I won’t touch with a 10-foot portafilter.
- I don’t use stock photography of machines. Every machine photo on the site is shot in my own kitchen, on my own counter, with the machine I’m reviewing.
Beyond espresso: the food side
Coffee doesn’t live in a vacuum. My palate was built around Italian and Latin American food traditions — long lunches, espresso to close them, asado cooked over wood fires, and the kind of meals that take all afternoon to prepare and ten minutes to disappear. I cook live-fire and BBQ in the South American asado tradition, which informs how I think about flavor, fat, smoke, and balance.
This site is focused on coffee and espresso machines, but the food background is part of why I think about the experience holistically — espresso isn’t just about extraction parameters. It’s about what comes before and after the cup. A great machine fits into a kitchen, into a meal, into a daily rhythm. The reviews try to reflect that.
What you can expect from this site
- First-party reviews of espresso machines, grinders, and accessories — based on hands-on testing, not marketing copy
- Head-to-head comparisons across price tiers and brands, with concrete recommendations
- Buying guides organized by budget, by use case, and by skill level
- Brewing tutorials drawn from actual problems I’ve encountered
- Origin guides covering the coffee-producing regions I’ve visited firsthand
- Honest opinions — including about machines that disappointed me
A note on independence
Espresso and Machines is funded primarily by affiliate commissions when readers purchase through links on the site. Some of the machines I rate highest pay the lowest commissions. Some machines I won’t recommend at all are the most profitable to link to. I’d rather lose the commission than send someone home with a $1,500 paperweight. For full details, see the affiliate disclosure.
Get in touch
Questions about a specific machine? Disagree with a review? Have an espresso problem you can’t solve? Reach me through the contact page. I read everything and respond to legitimate questions personally.
Thanks for reading. Pull a good shot.
— José Villalobos