Our review of the Touch T526S single-serve brewer – for richer, better coffee.

When they created this brewer I think the designers at Touch had drawn up list of all the ways in which they could improve on current K-Cup brewers.

It’s like they zeroed in on the weak spots.

First, the water reservoir is big. It holds 90 ounces of water, which means you can make a lot of cups of coffee before you need to refill it.

Next, it brews hotter. I did a side-by-side comparison of the temperate of the water coming out of the Touch brewer compared with my Keurig B60 (Also known as the K60).

My thermometer isn’t good enough to be sure about the absolute temperatures, but the water coming out of the Touch was about 4 degrees hotter.

This makes a different because temperature is an issue with most single-serve brewers, and water at those lower temperatures fails to draw out the full flavor of the coffee.

In other words, the Touch’s higher water temperature is a good thing and results in a bolder, richer brew.

Next, you have a lot of choices when it comes to brew size. In fact, the T526S offers 8 brew sizes, from 6 ounces right up to a full carafe.

This is great for when you want a smaller cup of coffee at 6 ounces, want to fill a big travel mug, or even want a carafe for the breakfast table.

This brewer is also fast. Turn it on and it’s ready to brew in under 30 seconds. Much faster than my Keurig B60 brewer.

But the brew time itself takes a little longer – about 60 seconds. And that’s deliberate. Most single-serve brewers push the water through the K-Cup, pod or capsule as fast as possible, as if speed were always a virtue. The Touch brewer takes a little more time, allowing time to extract the full flavor of the coffee.

The Touch Cups are a little different too. They contain a little more coffee than regular K-Cup.

And by the way, the Touch will accept any kind of K-Cup, regardless of where you buy it.

OK...on to the bigger question...

If the Touch offers 8 different brew sizes, from 6oz to a full carafe, how can they do that with a K-Cup? Wouldn’t the smaller cup sizes be incredibly strong, and the largest sizes incredibly weak?

Good question.

They address this by offering more than one size of K-Cup.

For 8-10 ounce cups they suggest using a regular K-Cup. For 12-14 ounces they suggest using their XBold Cup, for 16-20 ounces use their XLarge cup and for the carafe use the Refill Jumbo reusable filter.

This gives you a range and flexibility you won’t find with any other K-Cup brewer. 

I probably don’t need as many as 8 choices, but it’s good to be able to choose.

What I really appreciate is that the folks at Touch have addressed three issues that really impact the quality of the coffee.

• A higher brewing temperature
• A slightly longer brewing/immersion time, and
• The ability to match the volume of water to the correct weight of ground coffee 

This brewer is more expensive than many other K-Cup brewers, but if you appreciate quality coffee – as well as speed and convenience - I think you’ll find it’s worth it.

If you can’t find one locally, you can get the Touch T526S Brewer at Amazon.com.

NOTE: This product was sent to us free in return for a review. (That said, we always reserve the right NOT to review a free product if we don't like it, or feel you wouldn't like it.)

About the author: Nick Usborne, aka Coffee Detective, is a writer and long-time coffee enthusiast. Read more…