Customer Reviews

Cuisinart DCG-12BC Grind Central Coffee Grinder

5 star:		(46)
4 star:		(27)
3 star:		(16)
2 star:		(40)
1 star:		(169)

 

 

There's only 1 thing a coffee grinder should do -- grind coffee well. Like most of the other reviewers, I found that no amount of grinding will produce a grind that can even be considered acceptable. With small batches of beans, the product comes out in chunks of all sizes -- some beans are barely cut in half. Larger batches yeild somewhat better results, but still incredibly uneven. This is an expensive grinder that's not worth a penny.

After much research and investigation into blade coffee grinders on this site and epinions, I had decided to purchase the KitchenAid because of the ability to wash and clean the cup and blades. I wanted a blade grinder for flax and spices as I use a burr grinder for coffee. The KitchenAid had a major complaint in that it was messy, which seems like a design flaw.

This Cuisinart grinder has it all: Capacity, cleaning cability, powerful motor, handsome design, "fairly" quiet (after all, it is a noisy process), cord storage under the base, absolutely no-mess-grinding and a lid for the stainless blade cup for storage of extra grindings.

On the con side, it is more expensive costing $30; but I think it will be a long lasting appliance and should easily outlast the other less expensive blade coffee grinders costing $20. Also, the instruction brochure states that this grinder is for purposes of grinding coffee only and using it for nuts and spices will dull the blades. Well, duh! I am sure the cheaper models would have the same problem and the Krups that I am replacing has a plastic lid that has become all pitted and cannot be cleaned properly.

Purchased two of these grinders last month, one for myself, the other as a gift, but unfortunately the blade assembly began to fail on mine in less than 2 weeks, after processing less than a pound of coffee. Cuisinart customer service said if I return it postage paid, and include an additional $5 to cover return postage to me (The book says $4) they will fix their mistake. I suggested that at the very least they should pay shiping one way, after all, it was their failure, not mine. They said "We make thousands of these every week, they can't all work". As interesting as I found their quality control philosophy to be I still I think they have a lot of nerve expecting the total cost of their product failure to rest on my shoulders. Appearently they disagreed, as they hung up on me without saying goodbye.

Fortunately we purchased through Amazon.com. No problem. Amazon immediately authorized the return, and by policy will even pay the shipping because it's defective. While I appreciate their approach to customer serice I'll pay the postage myself. It's well worth a few bucks to have someone stand behind defective merchandise - particularly when the manufacturer won't.

Quality is free, it's the cost of doing things right the first time. Some producers appearently aren't even interested in getting it right the second time.

This grinder looks great, has some great features, but unfortunately lacks in the most important area. The grind!

It has a removable grinding bowl, which is very convenient, especially since it's dishwasher safe. I love that feature. Makes cleaning easy. This grinder also looks great. I love the stainless steel, even if it's a bit larger that other grinders. It's also fairly quiet...at least relative to my last two grinders.

Now, the grind. This grinder takes longer than others I've owned and is not that consistent. Sure, it holds a lot of beans at once...one of it's selling points to me. But, as it grinds a full load, it doesn't grind evenly. The fine grounds get packed down below the blades and the top grounds are too coarse. Even with a small load though, it has trouble creating very finely ground coffee....and it takes a while.

Sad to say, my final words are, "not recommended". If I can find the receipt, I'll be returning this one.

Beautifully made grinder, nice styling, sturdy construction, hefty blades, but despite the fact that the brochure says it grinds "fine" for expresso in 45 seconds, it doesn't ever grind fine enough. After grinding on & off for a total of 90 seconds or more, it still didn't produce the powdery-fine needed for good expresso, AND the motor smelled hot! The Krups Fast-Touch 203-42 and Braun KSM2 grind finer for expresso and at half the price.

I'm no coffee grinding expert so I can't compare this device to anything else I've owned. This was a wedding gift that my wife and I were happy to receive. I've had problems with it, but I can make a decent pot of coffee so I give it average marks.

We had it five months before it began making a great deal of noise while grinding. It's at least twice as loud as it was when we purchased it.

Also, we have the same problem as so many others in that the grind is not consistent at all. I now make it a habit to grind the coffee longer than recommended to break up the larger pieces, but then have to discard the powdery stuff that ends up packed under the blades. My question is this: Why do the blades have to sit a quarter inch off the bottom? The fine stuff is going to sink and of course if the blades aren't at the very bottom it's just going to collect down there. Seems like someone put too much thought into making the thing look like it could beat the crap out of the other grinders and strayed from the real goal...grinding coffee and doing it well.

I'm not returning it, but I'll buy something from another company when this dies or my landlord tells me to get rid of it (it is louder than our vacuum cleaner after all).

I have had inexpensive Braun coffee grinders in the past, but decided to splurge on this Cuisinart grinder because I wanted a grinder that could hold more beans. And, hey, Cuisinart has a great reputation and the grinder looked good.

I should have returned the grinder months ago, when I first purchased it and found that it took MUCH longer to grind beans than any grinder I'd used in the past. As the months wore on, it seemed to take longer and longer each time; finally, last night, after grinding for several minutes with little success (there were still big coffee bean chunks in there), the grinder started smoking and died.

SO DON'T BUY IT!

How do I love it? Let me count the ways....

First of all, I really love that there's no static cling of grounds since the grinder cup is stainless steel. You should buy it for this alone because that means coffee grounds don't get sprayed around the kitchen while you're trying to get the coffee into your coffeepot! What a novel concept.

Also, I love that you can store whatever cord you don't need inside the base of the grinder. Mine is parked right in front of an outlet and I have quite enough extra cord tangling around on my countertop, thank you very much. Another truly excellent feature.

It's pretty quiet which is great because our young son was always kind of freaked out by our old grinder.

It's big enough that we can just grind every few days and the coffee stays pretty fresh.

And it looks sorta cool, too.

Everyone should buy this grinder! We even like it way more than a fancy burr grinder we bought; that thing made a huge mess, never did grind the coffee right, took up a ton of counter space and broke after we'd had it a month. After we bought this Cuisinart, we took the burr grinder straight to the thrift store & haven't looked back.

I purchased the cuisinart stainless steel coffee maker and loved it, so decided to buy this matching grinder to replace my 10 year old Mr. Coffee grinder. I hate the cuisinart grinder. The only thing it does well is look good and match my coffee maker. This grinder does not grind well at all. I have to use 2-3 times as many beans to make the same strengh of coffee my Mr. Coffee grinder made. If this product actually did what it was supposed to (grind coffee) it would be worth the $30 I spent on it. Needless to say, I think I'm going back to my battered but trusty old Mr. Coffee grinder ):

The ever helpful Amazon website reminds me that I purchased this item in March 2004. Has it been that long already?! I have raised the rating from 2 to 3 stars given that it has served me reasonably well for 3 years now.
This is a beautiful grinder and the stainless steel body gives the impression of ruggedness. But alas, the first thing to go, within a few months was parts of the switch. As a result I have been using it with the switch taped to the lid. It still looks rugged in a bruised up football player kind of way.
Now I find pieces of plastic in my grind with the inside of the cup dying a slow death. What is the life of this grinder in coffee grinder years I wonder....