Hamilton Beach The Scoop Single Serve Coffee Maker & Fast Grounds Brewer for 8-14 oz. Cups, Brews in Minutes, Stainless Steel (49981A)

I originally bought one maybe 10 years ago, after our first $200 Keurig died. It cost $40 at a small kitchen store. It made excellent coffee and was far cheaper to operate and far more eco-friendly than Keurig/Pod based coffee makers, that exist only to generate plastic waste and dissolve plastic into your coffee, whether or not you can taste it. I had a job where I sometimes lived alone during the week, so I got a second one for the rented house I lived in as making a full pot of coffee seemed excessive. We got a second home somewhere in there, so I got a third one. One of my sons stole one, so I got a fourth one to replace it. I've given a couple away as gifts. I LOVE this coffee maker. To make coffee you take the STAINLESS STEEL pan (dry) and scoop up some ground coffee. With experience, you can easily eyeball the right amount for your tastes. You put the pan into the machine on top of the secondary screen, add water, put your cup underneath, and hit one of two buttons that nominally alter very slightly the brew temperature/pattern. You can vary the amount of coffee relative to the amount of water to the regular/bold button results to get at least some degree of optimization to your own tastes, but honestly, if you use good , fresh coffee to make coffee, the coffee that comes out is going to be good, hot coffee for almost any reasonable permutation in its range. To make a second cup, you take the pan, rap it sharply on the side of your garbage can to remove the grounds, rinse it, and rinse the little filter that sits under it to keep the coffee grounds-free. Put back the small filter, and either dry the pan and scoop etc or use a second pan (I generally keep two to rotate them) or refill the wet pan with a secondary scoop. Literally a minute, with no non-biodegradeable waste. You can even compost the grounds if you are eco-fanatic enough and generate NO waste. If you are a coffee essential oil fanatic, you can use a small piece of coffee filter paper in/under the pan to absorb the "bad oils" and further improve the cup it makes, but I rarely bother as I don't use paper filters at all even in full pot machines -- too much waste, too little gain. Good coffee beans make good coffee, stale ones make bad coffee, simple as that, no point in trying to make good coffee out of bad coffee grounds/beans. A simple trick makes this coffee maker even better. It has (for reasons that escape me) a big hole in back above the tank intended to keep you from overfilling it with water. This hole limits the size of the coffee cup you can make at one time pretty substantially. If you leave the hole open, you can use an Ozark stainless steel cup that holds 16 oz of coffee and has a snap-shut lid (available at Wal-Mart, usually near camping) to make a perfect thermos cup of coffee if you add water to the very edge of the spill line. If you COVER this hole -- which I routinely do now -- you can add enough water to fill their LARGER stainless thermos cup with a snap-shut lid and basically end up with around 22-24 oz of coffee in a single brew, ready to safely carry to your car -- say, 1/3 of a 12 cup pot. Obviously, you fill the pan a bit more if you do this, but there is plenty of room to make coffee that is still plenty strong enough if you do, especially with "bold". So you can in ONE PASS make enough coffee in a single stay-hot stainless cup to get even a fanatic/addict through the morning and well-launched on a day, or you can (of course) just make two 16 oz stainless cups. Either way, these "travel" mugs/cups are double walled and insulated and can keep coffee warm to hot for hours when snapped shut. This coffee maker does need to be cleaned/descaled periodically, and you should use soft water or clean more frequently, just like any other, but my ORIGINAL purchase is still running after years of service cleaning it with vinegar as usual a couple of times a year. You do need to rinse off the brew head (where the water comes out to hit the grounds) a lot more frequently, especially if you (over)fill the pan, but you can actually hold it upside down in the sink and run water over it to do so and at the same time hose out the water reservoir etc as need be. A second thing to note is that if you own this machine on a decadal time scale as I have, you have to either replace the pan or periodically clean off any coffee that sticks to the pan screen or the holes will close up and your brew will back up into the head or overflow onto the secondary filter. Soaking in cleaning vinegar or "the Works" toilet bowl cleaner (basically hydrochloric acid) and then washing/scrubbing rinsing will revive it for a few more years, but at some point it will probably need replacing (when the screen wears through, for example:-). Wearing a coffee maker OUT, of course, is something that never happens in the planned obsolescence world of today, but with this single cup maker, it is possible. The ones I own just might actually last the rest of my life, except for the pan, if I can keep the guts descaled. There just isn't much else to go wrong. Could it be improved? Maybe, a tiny bit. It's brew temperature is a hair colder than "perfectly optimum" -- fresh-brewed coffee comes out at maybe 150-160F, a good drinking temperature but a bit cooler than the 180 coffee fanatics insist on as the ideal brew temperature. Still makes a damn good cup, though. They could either leave out the hole or at least, put it up where it NEEDS to be, right before the point where water overflows down into the brew head and makes a mess, not down there at least 4-5 oz short of the true maximum brew capacity. But overall, as I said, I LOVE THIS COFFEE MAKER. It has already outlived generations of 12 cup makers on the side and I'm thinking of buying another spare just in case they ever stop making it.

I had been looking for a single cup coffee maker that DIDN'T use pods for a while, but none really impressed me very much. Then I came across "The Scoop" by Hamilton Beach and I pushed the button and made the purchase. The coffee maker arrived on time and in pristine condition. I had read the reviews beforehand so when I placed my order, I also purchased 1 box of #1 coffee filters (seen in the photo) along with a new 16 oz THERMOS Stainless King Vacuum-Insulated Travel Tumbler. After running 3 cycles of clean water through the system, I made my first mug of coffee following the directions exactly. I did NOT use a paper filter and to be honest, I didn't run into an issue of sludge being in the bottom of the mug, nor did I encounter any grounds floating in my coffee. Lastly, there was NO sputtering during the brewing and NO splattered coffee escaped outside the travel mug... not a drop. That said, I was using the travel mug pictured which almost goes completely to the bottom of the filter well so there was very little room for anything to escape. All in all, the first mug wasn't bad. It had a slight acidic taste to it but was within my boundaries of being called "decent." After I finished the first mug of coffee, I rinsed both filters and the filter well out thoroughly and prepared to make my second mug; this time with a paper filter. As seen in the photo, I placed a #1 paper filter between the brew basket and secondary filter. The grounds were placed inside the brew basket. Almost an entire bottle of Dasani water was poured in (which was surprising since the well is only supposed to hold a maximum of 14 oz and a bottle of Dasani is 16.9 oz) and the bold brew cycle was again started. A few minutes later the second mug was ready, and it DID actually taste better than the first. The slight acidic taste I experienced with the first mug was not present in the second mug. This improved the taste from being decent to being fantastic! So, in summary, I do not believe that paper filters are necessary when using "The Scoop" coffee maker but IMO the paper filters do cut down on the oil and acidic taste turning a decent cup of coffee into an even better cup. I would easily recommend this coffee machine to friends and family who are looking for something other than a "pod machine." The price is extremely reasonable, it's well made, looks nice, cleans up easily, doesn't take up a bunch of space and most importantly, it makes very good coffee. Oh... almost forgot... when brewing a cup or mug do NOT remove the cup when the coffee stops pouring into the cup. I discovered rather quickly that the coffee will stop pouring several times while filling my travel mug but would then start up again a second or two later. The mug/cup is ready to be removed once the green light goes out.

I purchased the Hamilton Beach Scoop Single Serve Coffee Maker, Fast Brewing, Stainless Steel (49981A) on December 3, 2021. I followed the instructions, cleaned the parts and the coffee maker. Now here is the part that Hamilton Beach leaves out of their instructions. (This may have also been the user's problem that posted the video that initially poured in 8 ounces of water but she only got 4 ounces in her cup after it was brewed.) When I first poured water into the coffee maker to clean it, I initially poured in 14 ounces of water, but it did not fill to the MAX line, which is 14 ounces. The coffee maker has a 4 ounce reservoir which allows it to be basically primed with 4 ounces of water to heat up quickly. (see picture with arrow) So, I had to add 4 additional ounces of water to get it to the MAX line. I ran the coffee maker on Regular on this first run to clean it. I again filled it with 14 ounces of water and this time it went to the MAX line. This time I chose Bold on this run to clean it. I again filled it with 14 ounces of water to the Max line, and ran it again on Bold for the third run to clean it. After this, I completely emptied the coffee maker of all water, and water poured out of the 4 ounce reservoir. I also noticed that water came out of the showerhead. Keep in mind, that if you travel with this coffee maker or don't use it for several days, this water is in this reservoir and if you don't remove it, it could begin to get moldy or get mildew in it which you don't want to happen. If you do travel with it and forget to empty it, and you lay it on it's side, you will have a water spill. Overall, I like the coffee maker. Some have said they have had a plastic taste in their coffee, I have not experienced that. Some have said it did not heat up very well, I did not have that problem. I tested the water temperature with a liquid thermometer when the coffee came out into my coffee cup and it was 182 degrees. Nice hot coffee, which is what I like! Initially I used it without any paper filters and I use a fine ground coffee. I had residue from the coffee grinds in my coffee cup. I use one tablespoon of coffee per 8 ounces of water. I have tried both settings, Regular and Bold, and have experienced no issues with the coffee maker. The Bold selection does run slower and the coffee is a little bolder but not much. If you make more than one cup of coffee with it, and use the same grounds for the second cup, the second cup will be weaker in taste, however, the color of the coffee was the same. The showerhead and the filters do get hot, so be careful when you touch those when you make that second or third cup. The best cups of coffee for me is to dump out the coffee each time from the filters and start fresh. I did purchase the 1 cup paper coffee filters and that has removed the coffee residue. Put the paper coffee filter under the scoop that holds the coffee, not in the scoop. It would be nice if Hamilton Beach provided coffee filters for this coffee maker. If you use a coarse ground coffee instead of a fine ground you may not have that issue as much but I believe that no matter what grind you use, you will have coffee bean fine dust from the grinding process that will initially end up in your cup of coffee without a paper coffee filter. I gave this coffee maker four stars because Hamilton Beach doesn't mention anything about the 4 ounce water reservoir on the initial fill of water nor do they mention that you should empty it each time of the water when you are done using it. Also, they should include paper coffee filters for those you wish to use them. I hope this review has been helpful, and please never let the water set in this and become stagnant. For if you do, you will definitely have some very nasty tasting coffee and it can't be very healthy for you either!

I bought this for my office to replace a Kuerig B40 . What I like about it is it is very simple to work and looks good in the steel Coworkers think it's expensive. Funny because it cheaper than the cheapest Kuerig. The scoop brewing system allows me to make my own coffee from beans I grind at home. No need for expensive K cups that are bad for the environment. I was using the Kuerig with ecobrew refillable cups but cleaning them was not as easy as the Scoop's metal basket and it also holds more coffee than a the ecobrew kcups. I find that because of this my I can make a richer cup of coffee than with the Kuerig . The other thing I disliked about the Kuerig was the thing was beginning to make smaller and inconsistent serving sizes even though I always picked the largest size it could make, often leaving me with a less than half full cup . Now with the Scoop brewer I get out pretty much the amount of coffee equal to the amount of water I poured in. My first brew with it was using 8 o'clock 100% Colombian peaks, ground for automatic drip. I put in about 12 Oz of water and had the grounds filled to just below the max line. I picked the bold brew option. The machine brews and pauses very brief until all the water is through the grounds, it takes 2 or 3 minutes. I didn't time it exactly. It is slower than the Kuerig but this is a drip brew system not a vacuum pump brewer so the additional time is expected. My cup of coffee was hot, strong, the expected volume of brew, and had more flavor than the Kuerig could make so it was worth the wait for sure and the less clean up hassle. Since I have not had it very long I plan to update in a Month or so. My first impressions of it are good and I would recommend this for any one that wants a single cup brewer and doesn't want to deal with kcups. Update 8/17/18 I am still liking this coffee maker. I started to use finer ground coffee I got on sale( Lavaza intenso dark roast) the screens dont catch all the finer grounds and you do get some in the bottom of your cup. I got some aeropress paper disk filters that other reviewers recomended that did help. Still overall pleased with this but will say it seems to work best with coffee ground for automatic drip brewing or medium ground. Course grounds makes weaker coffee, fine makes the brew take longer, its stronger and you will get sediments in your cup even with the aeropress filter some will get past with fine grounds but I still find it good and drinkable. 9/11/18 Still liking this thing. I switched back to grinding a weeks coffee to use at work from beans from BJ's wholesale. Still brews a nice cup. I prefer the bold cycle. Still please that my isolated travel cup is a good fit under the brewer and capacity wise too. My 20 oz beast tumbler by green steel even fits under but you can't brew a full 20oz but you can max out you Brewers capacity.

I bought this for my office and was reading all the reviews possible to find out about using disposable mini filters for ease of cleanup (no sink in my office). I’ve had this for several months now and wanted to come back and share my experience. I was able to find single serve, non-bleached filters here on Amazon, but my coffee kept brewing like tea—far too weak and tasteless. What I have found is that if you get Moka Pot grind coffee (finer than regular grounds, not as fine as espresso grind) it works perfectly to brew with a disposable paper filter. I don’t use the scoop at all (worried it would cause overflow) just the metal filter + paper filter and it brews a lovely cup. I have my own little scoop that I’ve tested the right amount of grounds for my cup to brew. So easy to toss the used grounds/filter and leave the top open for it to dry. I haven’t needed to deep clean it yet and it works great! If I had a grinder at home to dial in the perfect size grind I would, but for now I just order the moka pot grind. There was a period of time it tasted a little ‘plastic’ like, but all my testing to get the right cup worked it right out. Just brew some water and test runs and you’ll be good to go. Recommend!

BOTTOM LINE - Reading reviews for this product, it seems that people either love it or hate it with no in-between. Many reviewers have posted their tips and tricks for getting a good, strong cup of coffee out of this coffee maker, and I found my own alternative remedy that finally got the job done consistently. In the end, though, there was an extremely strong plastic/chemical taste that found its way into the coffee that made it unbearable and led me to return the product. Since so many people reported being very happy with this coffee maker, I can only guess that it's hit-or-miss whether a particular model will have that same plastic taste issue. Unfortunately, mine was a bust. Here were my approaches to remedying the most common issues reported by other reviewers and how they turned out. PLASTIC TASTE - As I said, I never got rid of this issue. You can smell the same plastic/chemical odor in the water reservoir. I attempted various remedies I found on the internet. I ran multiple cycles through with just water. I ran a vinegar/water solution through twice, then rinsed. I ran a baking soda/water solution through, then rinsed. Finally, I wiped the reservoir out with rubbing alcohol and a paper towel. The chemical odor never diminished, and the taste in my coffee never diminished. All in all, I probably ran about 25-30 cycles through the coffee maker between cleaning and actually making coffee. I wanted to give it more time to see if it would resolve itself, but I hit my limit! WEAK COFFEE? - Many users reported getting weak coffee. This was my initial experience as well. I tried various approaches that others recommended with mixed results. Using finer grounds and packing the grounds slightly gave me stronger coffee, but it also backed up the flow and created a mess. One user observed that the first couple of seconds' worth of liquid that makes it in the cup is mostly clear water. This led me to theorize that the first water to hit the coffee grounds wasn't getting absorbed into or running through the grounds and filter, but instead was running off the top of the grounds through the built-in overflow opening in the Scoop. I theorized that perhaps if I "primed" the grounds with a little water, maybe this would allow the first hot water to filter through the grounds right away. So before closing the lid on the Scoop, I placed my mug underneath and poured just a tablespoon of cold water over the grounds to moisten them. Once that cold water soaked through and dripped into my cup (virtually clear), I dumped that water and started the coffee maker. This worked like a charm for me as the first drips of liquid into my cup were now quite dark! FINE GROUNDS IN COFFEE - Some reviewers complained of sediment in their coffee. I had a surprising amount of fine grounds in mine as well. This actually doesn't bother me that much. If I have a strong, good-tasting cup of coffee I don't mind just avoiding the last couple of sips, but if this is a deal-breaker for you then it seems that the paper-filter approach used by another reviewer is probably the best option.

I have used an older model of this exact coffee maker for the better of four years and have loved every cup. After a recent power surge in the home I was forced to replace it. The new model above looks identical from the exterior but the permanent filters have a slight design change in the overflow prevention. I personally prefer the older design, but if you didn't know the difference this version would not be an issue at all. Another point to mention is the three internal parts of the filter system (permanent grounds filter, secondary small particle filter and drip cup) did not fit as well as the original model that I had. They were a bit harder to put into place and seemed to catch just a tiny bit upon placement, like maybe they were a hair to big. But they do go into place and function perfectly. Again, I am comparing the older to the newer. My older version parts fit perfectly into the newer and do not 'catch' at all. One more part that was a bit unfitting was the stainless steel drip plate in the front. It slides forward about 1/4 of an inch (maybe less) when in place. That was a bit irritating to me as the older sits perfectly in it's frame and does not shift.Also, the older version allowed the drip plate to be inverted to lift smaller mugs closer to the drip spout and the newer does not seem to have this function though I never used that feature myself. Again, I swapped out the older part for the newer. Now, two BIG bonuses I noticed is that the new bold feature actually pauses the drip to saturate the grounds and drips in a pulsing fashion to create a full flavored brew. Excellent flavor with French Roast. The other bonus is that this newer version makes a steaming hot brew. Now, that may very well be due to the older having accumulated buildup on the heating element but my home water is not heavy laden with mineral content. We have no scaling or residue . Time may also be another factor as the older unit was 4 years old vs. brand new. Even with the very few cons of fitting issues that I had, which I feel were just spec problems, I would not hesitate to buy this coffee maker again. It's proven reliability, ease of use as well as the quality of brew and ability to choose my own grounds and grind, as well as dishwasher safe double permanent filters makes this unit recommendable. Also, it's footprint with hidden cord is extremely minimal compared to my Ninja Coffee Bar IQ and Keurig 2.0. This unit is as narrow as a small 4 cup brewer yet a 20 oz stainless mug fits well underneath with additional room. The sleek all stainless appearance is also quite eye catching and easy to clean with a moist paper towel. I am very, very pleased with this purchase and wouldn't hesitate to buy again should the occasion call for it.

I have bought many single cup coffee makers over the last 18 months. They all start out great, After a couple months the auto shut off turns it off at 1/4 full then 1/2 full then 3/4 full then finally full. Each time you have to add more water. Well where is the water going? I can not tell you if this one will have the same problems (yet). It seems to be well put together and very sturdy. I will rate the things that are important to me. You can just determine the weight of how important it is to you & go from there. SPEED: It is very fast, I will give it that. Less then 2 minutes to brew a 14 oz cup. Well wait a second.... Are you talking the time it takes before the light goes out or when you can safely remove the cup without dripping? lol That speed is when the light goes out. If you remove the cup you will have some cleaning to do. Total time before you can remove the cup is about 2 minutes. Still a very decent speed all considered. DUAL FITERS: Just plain brilliant!!! Many boast on how you don't have to buy filters. They brag with how you are saving money and the planet. For them it is a gimmick. You can either have grounds in your cup or use a filter which messes up the brewing process. This one is NO gimmick! you will have no grounds in the cup. Cleaning them is a breeze. BOLD/REGULAR: A total gimmick! The same light comes on no matter which option you pick. If you hit one by accident. Not to worry as they taste pretty much the same if you are not thinking about it. If you let people sample both but do not tell them which is which. Most will tell they can not taste a difference. The ones that do pick usually pick wrong (to include myself). If anything the regular has more a bold taste. So it may seem backwards. Either way they should make it so the button selected lights up. FILTER/SCOOP: Another total gimmick. There is something called contrast! They really need to understand the concept before this can be a 5 star product. If the scoop is tar black you do NOT have the lines and words also tar black! They should be white. If it is white then the lines & words should be black. It is MUCH easier to just use a scoop and pour it in. There is a reason paper is white but ink is not. WATER FILL LINES; This is almost a deal breaker! You will have the same problem here. There is NO contrast in color. Be ready to keep a bright flashlight next to it or a measuring cup. No matter how fast it is or how easy it is to use/clean. Everything good is canceled out by the bad. If I have to get a flashlight or measure out the ounces & then measure out the scoop. All the speed is lost. It is for these reasons I can only give it 3 stars. As is it is a middle of the road coffee maker. With a few simple changes it could be AMAZING and a must have!!!

This is the best coffee maker I’ve ever had. I’ve had Tassimo, Keurig, small one cup cheap ones, and multi cup normal ones. It makes delicious coffee that doesn’t have an unpleasant aftertaste. It is so easy to use and clean, and best of all, you can use normal coffee grounds instead of wasteful K cups or pods. It’s so simple to clean after each use, just dump the grounds and rinse under water. To top it off, it looks beautiful and high end. Highly recommend and will definitely buy again if ever needed (hopefully it lasts for years though!).

La cafetera funciona bien, la acabo de comprar así que todo ahora sin problema. Tiene buenos materiales y la temperatura a la que calienta es suficiente para un buen café aunque no tan caliente como otros equipos. Me hubiera gustado que el contenedor del agua fuera desmontable para fácil limpieza, tiene dos filtros así que no deja pasar los finos del café, después de un tiempo daré la crítica nuevamente por lo pronto el producto me parece muy bueno

machine is not working . & not aware about the service centre

I received a damaged product didnt working ! Still not getting any help from Amazon

La cafetera es de excelente calidad de un tamaño compacto ideal para termos de hasta 480 ML, las personas que se han quejado por el derrame de café es debido a que no usan el molido adecuado, y otras personas se han quejado de un sabor extraño del café, eso es debido a que no limpiar la cafetera al usar por primera vez como indica su manual, para mi gusto es excelente y el sabor de café queda impecable, no podrás conseguir una mejor cafetera en este rango de precios