Review: AeroPress XL

Several years ago, I stopped by the AeroPress booth at a trade show and asked if there was anything new in the pipeline. The reply, which I may now be overinterpreting, was a bemused but understanding “wait a few years.”

The original AeroPress is like a giant snub-nosed syringe that makes delicious coffee. It is compact, travels well, and is fairly easy to clean. To brew a batch, put grounds in the chamber, pour hot water over the top, stir, and then use the plunger to press the coffee out through a flat, circular filter into your mug. It was invented by the same guy who came up with the Aerobie, and since it was first introduced, the company has only put out one additional product of note: the AeroPress Go, a near-perfect model for making coffee on the road. The original and the Go have a cult-like following among baristas and other coffee lovers.

Fans have always wanted more though. Now that the company has changed hands, they’re getting all kinds of more. Out now, or coming out soon, are a couple of accessories; a clear model made of Tritan plastic; a fancier glass, aluminum, and stainless steel version; and the just-out XL. I just got my hands on the supersized AeroPress XL a little over a month ago and have used it almost every day since. It’s twice the volume of the original, with size increases for all the main parts—the plunger, chamber, cap, filter, and stirrer. It also comes with a carafe to press the coffee into. Altogether, the whole thing feels a lot larger than the original.

Photograph: Aeropress

There wasn’t much to learn. It works just like its predecessor, so I simply added larger amounts of coffee and water to each brew. The coffee tasted like it should, but the whole thing felt almost disproportionately big. Then I took it over to the lab at Olympia Coffee Roasting Company in Seattle; I wanted to see what their retail trainer, Reyna Callejo—one of the country’s top baristas and an avid AeroPress fan—thought of it.

We chatted about an 18-day trip she took to Japan some years ago, and how she used her AeroPress every day. Then she pulled the new version out of the box. She seemed surprised by how much larger it was than the original. She nestled the plunger into the end of the chamber like you would when brewing and held it up to her arm, where the whole assembly extended from her wrist to the middle of her bicep.

Reyna heated water and fired up the grinder for what she calls her “good for most people” method. Scaled up to match the larger volume of the XL, this used 30 grams of beans with 500 grams of water. (That’s a 1:16.67 ratio, for all you coffee nerds out there.) Then, in a sign of the unwieldiness to come, she climbed on a stool to work with the XL. She had good reason to get up there: When you stick the plunger on the chamber and put that on top of the carafe, it’s about 19 inches tall. I’m 6 feet tall, and on a 36-inch countertop that setup comes halfway up my sternum. At 5' 3", Reyna felt it was too high for her to safely operate without the stool.

She then realized that it wouldn’t fit the carafes Olympia uses for pour-over at the café, which mirrored the disappointment I felt when I found I could not brew directly into most of my mugs. That said, the XL comes with a carafe to brew into, which works fine and pours nicely.

She also noted how easy the whole thing would be to hand-wash. But when she first tried to fill it to its stated 600-ml capacity, she said it felt like “inviting chaos.”

Reyna used Olympia’s Morning Sun coffee and said approvingly that the brew “tastes like Morning Sun.” A great result for a first batch from a new brewer.

As excited as we were to try it, something felt off. Rena reiterated that using this larger quantity of boiling water added a certain degree of peril that making coffee with the half-sized original AeroPress did not present.

“It’s hot. It’s hard to hold,” she said with a hand on the chamber, which clearly felt warmer than she was used to on the original. “That’s like half a liter of boiling water in there. That can hurt.”

AeroPress disasters with the smaller versions are rare, but not unheard-of. I’ve had memorable spills in several countries and at home—the hot, wet grounds and hot liquid go everywhere—and I’d have to imagine that the burn risk goes way up with a hotter chamber wall and much more water. At home with the XL, I appreciated the nonslip stability I gained from working on a silicone baking mat on my countertop.

“This is not for beginners, it’s too dangerous. It’s for someone who has a method already and just wants more coffee,” Reyna said. “It’s a good brewing experience, it’s just massive. It’s good for larger batches, but you have to be much more careful.”

Photograph: Aeropress

And that brought up the last piece of the puzzle: figuring out who the XL is for. One press of the plunger makes a big thermal mug or two regular mugs of coffee. Or you can pour yourself a mugful and put the rest in a thermos to keep it warm, but that seems like a lot of semi-bulky stuff for the dishwasher. You’ve got the three pieces of the AeroPress, its carafe, the thermos and its lid, and your mug and spoon. That’s a lot of dishes for two cups of coffee!

I had walked into Olympia’s lab excited and full of questions, and I left with a sense of doubt, which was unexpected, considering what slam dunks the original and the Go are. The XL works well, but it’s not in the same league as its predecessors. It’s a funny position for the company, and maybe why the former owners resisted launching new products for years. People were clamoring for something bigger, but giving them what they wanted seems to prove that it wasn’t such a great idea. This could explain the list-price adjustment they have already made, dropping it from $80 to $70—which is still a lot, considering it’s all plastic.

“Maybe their target audience is people who think the traditional size doesn’t make enough,” Reyna said, “but I wonder if those people should find a different method for larger amounts of coffee.”