Your grinder and scale will find a permanent home on the counter with the new KitchenAid Burr Grinder and Digital Scale Jar.
BY ASHLEY RODRIGUEZ
BARISTA MAGAZINE
There are few kitchen appliances that could be described as beautiful. Usually, kitchen appliances live most of their lives tucked away in a cabinet, only to be released momentarily, finding a space on the countertop only until they fulfill their intended purpose. Every now and then, an attractive piece is made—the sleekness of a Kalita carafe, for example, or a beautiful container for flour or sugar make the cut and find a permanent home on the counter. But the bulkiness of your typical grinder or the brutal functionality of a scale are generally scurried off to the closest empty cabinet.
KitchenAid has been making beautiful products for years, and have recently released two coffee-specific tools that are both aesthetically pleasing and functional for professionals and novices alike. The KitchenAid Burr Grinder harkens the sleek simplicity of the iconic KitchenAid Mixer, with a gloss finish that comes in black, silver, and red. Inspired by geometric shapes, the machine is simple designed and built for efficiency and repeated use. Instead of plastic pieces, the KitchenAid Burr Grinder uses a glass hopper and chamber to catch your ground coffee. There are no harsh lines or unappealing pieces—the grinder fits in with any appliance you have in your kitchen.
Along with being design-focused, the KitchenAid Burr Grinder is also easy to use and effective. There are 15 different grind settings, which can deliver the perfect particle distribution for your favorite brew method, be it a fine espresso grind or a coarse French Press setting. The knob on the front of the grinder, which Staff Industrial Designer Brandon Mark describes as a “bank safe-like dial,” is meant to be sturdy and easy to use. The dial is numbered one through eight and can make half number adjustments, is easy and intuitive to use. The only other buttons on the machine are the on-off switch.
The KitchenAid Burr Grinder can accompany any of the new brewers that KitchenAid has released as part of its push to design effective brewing devices that are simple to use. “We wanted to have a great grinder that would cater to any of our new brewers.” Brandon says, and along with any of the brewers, the burr grinder can also be paired with the Digital Scale Jar, another recent release from KitchenAid.
The essence of both of these devices is simplicity, and conveying that message, along with quality and durability, through design choices. “It’s super simple,” Brandon mentions, describing the burr grinder, “and a lot of its personality comes from that simplicity. When you look at the burr grinder, it’s really pure, classic geometry, and we wanted to ensure that the consumer understands the quality of this product through material choices.”
The Burr Grinder isn’t just built to give consumers a quality cup, but to continue to give them consistently ground coffee for a long time. Intentionality has become a buzzword in the specialty coffee world, and this extends to the choices we make in how we craft the future of consumer-facing tools and gadgets. KitchenAid has jumpstarted this conversation and hopes to continue to create both beautiful and useful tools for home users to access the world of craft coffee.
