Should you invest on branded pods for your Dolce Gusto coffee machine, or are compatible pods capable of producing coffee that is not only more affordable but also superior in flavour?
Dolce Gusto-Compatible Coffee Pods
In the not too distant past, owners of Dolce Gusto coffee machines were only able to use the company’s official line of branded coffee pods, which can be very pricy. However, this restriction was lifted not too long ago. However, in recent years, an increasing number of third-party coffee pods that are compatible with Dolce Gusto have become available. This has enabled users of Dolce Gusto coffee machines to have more options about the coffee that they consume. Switching from Dolce Gusto pods to supermarket own-brand choices, which are often less expensive, could result in significant cost savings for those who consume large amounts of coffee on a regular basis. If you drink two cups of coffee each day, purchasing a pod from a supermarket rather than the official Dolce Gusto version may save you more than £70 over the course of a year. We put the Nescafé Dolce Gusto pods and compatible pods from other brands, including those sold by Aldi, Asda, Costa, Lidl, and Starbucks, through a round of blind tasting and rating to see which one was the best. In the following, we will discuss the various possibilities that are available to people who drink lattes and Americanos.
Dolce Gusto vs compatible Latte pods
compatible Latte pods
Fans of milky coffees can get compatible versions of latte and cappuccino Dolce Gusto pods in addition to Americanos from the Dolce Gusto lineup of compatible pods. These come with a second pod that has milk powder in it, which is what is used to form the frothy topping over the milk. We requested that our panel also evaluate these, so that we could find out how the more affordable compatible pods stack up against one another. Our tasters gave the Dolce Gusto, the Starbucks Latte Macchiato, and the Costa Signature Blend Latte their highest marks. However, they found that the more affordable latte pods from Lidl and Aldi had an unpleasant artificial sweetness and did not perform as well as coffee that was prepared with fresh milk.
This is how we evaluated the Dolce Gusto pods.
Dolce Gusto pods
We put a variety of Dolce Gusto compatible pods through a blind taste test, and the results were very interesting to say the least. The following individuals made up our group of independent coffee experts:
Giles Hilton is the head of the panel and a coffee expert with more than 40 years of tasting experience.
Colin Smith is a coffee roaster who specialises in artisan coffee and was formerly the president of the Speciality Coffee Association of Europe.
Charles Love is a trained and experienced expert in tea and coffee products.
Monmouth Coffee Company has been in the business of roasting and selling coffee since 1978, and Mike Nunn is the head of training there. We brewed each cup of coffee in a Dolce Gusto machine purchased from Best Buy, and then had our taste testers evaluate it both with and without milk. They evaluated every aspect of the coffee, including the fragrance, look, flavour, mouthfeel, sweetness, and aftertaste. After compiling the results of these ratings, an overall percentage score was determined.
How to Choose the Best Machine for Coffee Pods
Are you unsure about the kind of coffee maker that would work best for you? There are many different types of pod coffee machines, the most of which are only compatible with a single brand of coffee pod, such as Nespresso or Dolce Gusto, which restricts your selection to the variety of pods that are sold by that particular manufacturer. Dolce Gusto alternatives are growing increasingly widespread, despite the fact that Nespresso offers the widest selection of compatible pods. Check out our shopping guide for the best coffee pod machine for recommendations on which system will work best for you. Some coffee makers are compatible with both kinds of pods, so you don’t even have to decide which one you want to use. Check out our review of the Lakeland 2-in-1 Coffee Pod Machine for a model that is capable of using both kinds of coffee pods.
