Customer Reviews

Adagio Teas 3 UtiliTEA Variable-Temperature 30-Ounce Electric Kettle

5 star:		(85)
4 star:		(24)
3 star:		(8)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

This kettle fills a long-time need in the electric kettle marketplace -- one with a variable temperature control! For those who are real tea appreciators, you will appreciate finally having an electric kettle that allows you different temperature settings for your different kinds of tea.

Other great features are that it heats the water quickly, in under 5 minutes. It has an automatic shut-off when it reaches the set temperature. It will not boil dry (I haven't tested this feature, but the literature claims it to be true). It looks sleek and modern sitting on your countertop with its stainless steel and black stylings as compared to the white plastic electric kettles of yore. It also has the convenient design feature of the cord coiling into the base, so you only have to pull out as much as you need to reach your outlet.

I only gave it 4 stars instead of 5 for a couple of reasons. Most importantly, because it gets hot hot hot to the touch. Be careful, or you will burn yourself. Make sure to only touch the plastic parts, which isn't always so easy. Secondarily, because the temperature control knob and the on/off switch are made of flimsy plastic -- the rest of it is well made, but the second time I pushed the on/off switch it popped off! Luckily, it is easily re-attachable.

I am glad someone finally put one of these out on the market!

I am a tea drinker and I find this appliance to be very useful. I drink green, oolong and pu-erh tea pretty much every day. I keep this little guy on a book shelf in my room where it is at a perfect height for me lift it up and set it down.

The temperature control knob is designed as a general guideline, and I love that boiling water isn't its' sole function. I mean, I drink green and oolongs too, so to boil water and wait is misused energy. It shuts off after reaching the desired temperature. I tweak the knob personally, as it is just a guideline.

Yes, the knob and kettle switch are not made of steel. They are in fact plastic. So please, don't start wrestling with your tea kettle. I know it's fun to use and it looks like a spaceship, but no wrestling...

If you combine this with a Brita filter, you have two of the best investments for tea for the rest of you life. It is wise to use filtered water in this utilitea, otherwise you risk calcification and other mineral build up on the interior of the kettle. The buildup can diffuse into the water and changing the taste of whatever you brew.

Although the lid retains a plastic smell even after some months of use, it DOES NOT adulterate the water. If it did, I would have returned it instantly...

In conclusion, the ease of use, aesthetics, temperature control and reliability give this 5 stars. I'm someone who uses this everyday, I can say it significantly streamlined my life- tea is a large part of it!

I also recommend for the coffee drinkers using a French press.

The UtiliTEA is an excellent electric tea kettle-- it's comes in two parts, the base and the kettle. The base plugs in, the kettle rests on top of it. Fill it with (up to four cups) of water, fit the kettle on the base, set the dial to the desired temperature, flip the switch and moments later, you've got hot water when the switch pops back up. I've used mine endlessly since I've gotten it.

A few gripes though, the UtiliTEA's temperature gauge is color coded rather than providing any kind of numeric indication and the manual. It's easy to use, but if you needed precision (and I don't), you won't be able to get it. More irritating is no real audible indication that it's done-- the lever clicks, but there's no whistle, bell or anything else you'll notice in the other room. Good news is, it's really fast, even to bring water to a boil. A final thing I dislike-- there's no "off" switch on the base and they recommend pulling the power cord between uses. I'm not certain whether it's unsafe to leave it plugged in, but I keep pulling the plug after every use which is quite honestly annoying. Mind you, I'm a new homeowner, I'm a little paranoid about such things.

I realize my criticism is pretty harsh-- the UtiliTEA does its core competencies fantastically, and I've used this exclusively as my water heating solution, but while it's an excellent device, any potential buyer should be aware of its limitations.

Electric kettles are an appliance where Americans are behind the curve compared to the rest of the world. In Europe and Asia, they've been well established on the kitchen counter for ages. They are portable, efficient and just handy. In the last decade they've been more and more popular in the US as well, but its been hard to find kettles that have impressed.

Well color me impressed.

The Adagio kettle has a few features I like:
1. Temperature Control: I list this first, because its a rare feature. Green teas are quite popular, but most people who drink them don't know they are generally supposed to be steeped at a lower temperature than black teas and herbal teas. (~180 degrees vs 215 degrees). So while you can just boil up some water for your standard breakfast tea, you'd be 'overcooking' a green tea if you steep it with such hot water. Why spend all that money on good tea, and for some people even more on a nice tea set if you don't prepare the tea to bring out its best flavors. The Adagio has a very simple knob with two 'zones', one for green teas, and the other for black/herbal teas. As simple as it can get. My only quibble is a wish they had a numbers for the gauge as well so I can see the exact temperature rather than go by their judgement.

2. Stainless steel: I've had plastic electric kettles in the past. They tend to suffer from two problems. First, they smell of plastic and leech plastics into the boiling water (even after the smell goes away.) More and more studies are showing our bodies have lots of environmental chemicals in them. Why not take a simple precaution to avoid adding more? Secondly, the plastic kettles just don't seem durable. I had one at the office where one piece of plastic fell off and into the pot melting to the heating element. I was just glad it didn't end up starting a fire.

3. 360degree base. A good # of kettles have to be 'fit' onto the base with a specific facing. The Adagio can be put back on its base without that. Its a small issue, but both ergonomically and aesthetically I prefer the ease of it.

I do feel it can be a bit slower than prior kettles I've had to heat water, but then I see less 'flicker' of the lights when its turned on or turned off, so I suspect its slightly lower wattage. This is fine, it works speedily enough and faster than a stovetop kettle still.

Really its just a nice solid kettle, that doesn't have the worries of chemicals from plastic, that can allow you to properly prepare green teas and black teas, and looks quite nice. Now to see how long it lasts with regular usage.

From what I've seen so far though I heartily recommend it.

It's a good idea to have temperature control, but if you're not interested in having any temperature other than boiling water, you don't really need this.
30 ounces capacity looks like an overstatement. I can barely fill three 4 ounce mugs.
The kettle started leaking water about 3months after I received it from Amazon. There appears to be a crack in between the handle and the kettle's body (on the lower part) and there's always a puddle of water on the counter after the use and you have to always empty the kettle if you're not using it.
I contacted Adagio directly and they said they would send me a replacement after they receive the defective kettle. The problem is...we have to live without a tea kettle for probably about 2 weeks (I suppose this is how long it'll take for me to ship it out, for them to receive it, send me a new one and for me to receive it). I asked if they could send me a new kettle and then I'd send them mine back. I even offered my credit card, so they hold any amount of money (in case I fail to send my defective kettle to them). I'm waiting for reply and will update this review once I get it from them.
The company doesn't even list the phone # on their site, so it's really hard to deal with them. This is directly from their FAQ:
"Unfortunately, at this time we do not offer live phone ordering or support. However, we are lightning fast at answering emails!"
The only reason I bought this kettle was because of the great reviews it received on Amazon. I'll just have to do more research about the manufacturer and its return policy next time.

Edit (11/2/2009) I was able to contact Adagio Teas company (they actually do respond to emails pretty fast) and they replaced the kettle hustle-free. I had to buy a new one, and as soon as I received the kettle they gave me a UPS shipping label, I shipped it back to them and they immediately issued credit to my credit card. I know this has nothing to do with the product, but it was one of the few companies that it was pleasure to deal with. If I could bump up my rating just for this, I would.

I got this unit to compliment my aeropress coffee maker which is best used with water below boiling. The unit is sleek and works well. However mine came with a leaking gasket in the front plastic window that shows the pots fill volume. I got the paperwork that comes with the unit and saw that it had a 90 day warranty. So i politely contacted the manufacturer...3 times. Never heard back. So I turned to Amazon and they were helpful but I can't get a full refund. So I am out of pocket for a defective unit and the manufacturer is non responsive to warranty claims. Also I don't have time to run to the post office or re-package it. I never write product reviews really (time being the factor again) but I was sufficiently disappointed with the way this whole scenario went to let everyone know. All I wanted was a cup of coffee once a day.

The idea behind this kettle is great. However, it doesn't really work. The short story is that its thermostat is inaccurate. Set the control knob to a different setting and you'll get a different temperature--but what that temperature will be is anybody's guess. Using both a Mastercool infrared thermometer and a long probe instant-read thermometer, on any setting but the highest (full boil), I find the kettle is accurate to only something like 15-20 degrees. That is, on the same control knob setting, it will bring water to very different temperatures with successive uses. Without adjusting the knob, I'll get water at 195 one time and around 175 a second time. (Yes I allowed the kettle to cool between uses, not that that should matter.)

I bought this to use with a press pot coffee maker, which likes water just below a boil. It DOES NOT WORK for this purpose.

Other concerns:
The minimum water fill line is greater than 12 oz.s. With 8-12oz. being a standard coffee/tea mug size this means you have to boil more water than necessary each time. If you use bottled or filtered water you might not like this.

This kettle is on the small side. Even so, it appears to heat water more slowly than several other electric kettles I've owned.

The construction of this kettle is solid, though not as good as the Chef's Choice 677, which I also own.

My wife and I have burned three kettles in the last 6 months. For the the last one, I was half way to work before realizing that I'd left it on for tea and got home home just as the last drops of water had boiled away, so safety was a big concern. I also bought this to brew drip coffee because I have to brew both decaf and regular at the same time and use filter cones, so convenience was also a factor. I like my water to be 90 C and use a multi-tester with thermocouple to check the temperature of the kettle. It's a somewhat tedious process and if you boil it it takes a few minutes to cool down, not something I want to wait for in the morning. There are several good things about the UtiliTEA kettle. 1) it's attractive and not too large. 2) it's comfortable to handle, more ergonomic than a large tea kettle, 3) it heats water very quickly, and 4) you can vary the temperature. 5) Also it has the automatic shutoff as a safety feature. Here's the bad part - the thermostat is imprecise and you won't get the same temperature from the kettle two days in a row. I'm not sure what factors influence the shut off but I find that I still have to use my multi-tester to get my 90 C. However, and back to the good part, it's still easier than a stove top kettle. I can get close to the 90 C, usually by undershooting it and then hold down the switch for a few seconds to get the right temperature. I would buy it again despite the imprecise thermostat.

Within the first 3 months, the Utilitea started to fall apart. First, the auto-shutoff feature stopped working, then the spout filter fell off and, as far as I can tell, there's no way to reattach it. Next, it started to leak badly from the bottom so could only be used with the edge hanging over the sink. A more extensive search on the internet than the one I did before purchasing it, revealed that many people have had these same problems with the Utilitea. My advice is to stay away from it.

After reviewing many different electric kettles on Amazon I decided this one would be my best bet as I like to drink some hot tea in the evenings. I looked for the most reasonably priced kettle with and all metal interior and a concealed heating coil. This one fit the bill and after using it for a couple of weeks now I am extremely satisfied. No extra taste added to the water, the ergonomics are good with the heat dial and the lid button on the handle. I do not find any issue with the level readout as some others have reviewed, it seems easy to read in my opinion. All in all a solid kettle at a good price.