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Two things make an espresso machine taste worse over time. Coffee oil builds up in the group head and goes rancid. Limescale builds up inside, where you can’t see it, and blocks valves and heating elements. They need different cleaners, and mixing them up is how people break machines.
First, Check for a Three-Way Valve
Backflushing pushes water backwards through the group head to flush out oil. It only works on machines with a three-way solenoid valve, which releases pressure after the shot. Pull a shot and listen. If there’s a short hiss and water dumps into the drip tray when you stop, you have one.
- Can backflush: E61 machines, the Rancilio Silvia, the Gaggia Classic Pro and Classic E24, the Breville Barista Express and Barista Pro, the Bambino Plus, and the De’Longhi Dedica Maestro Plus.
- Can’t: the plain Breville Bambino, most Dedicas, bean-to-cup machines and lever machines. Wipe the group and clean the shower screen instead.
The Backflush Routine
You need a blind basket (no holes) or a rubber backflush disc, and a group head detergent such as Urnex Cafiza powder or Cafiza tablets. Puly Caff is the Italian equivalent.
- Put about a quarter teaspoon of Cafiza, or one tablet, in the blind basket.
- Lock it in. Run the pump for 10 seconds, stop for 10. Repeat five times.
- Rinse the basket and do the same five times with water only.
- Pull one shot and pour it away.
At home, a water-only backflush every week and a detergent one every month is plenty for one or two shots a day. Make more and do it more often. Never backflush with descaler or vinegar. They’re for scale, not oil, and they can damage seals.
Breville’s Barista Express has its own cycle. Put the grey rubber cleaning disc in the single basket with a cleaning tablet, and when the Clean Me light comes on, hold the 1 Cup, 2 Cup and Power buttons together for a few seconds. The cycle takes about five minutes. Run one water shot after. For the differences between Breville’s grinder machines, see our Barista Express Impress vs Barista Pro comparison.
The Steam Wand
Wipe it and purge it after every jug of milk, every time. Milk dries on fast. Once a week, soak the tip in a milk cleaner such as Urnex Rinza, and run steam through it.
Descaling
Descaling dissolves limescale. It doesn’t touch coffee oil, so it doesn’t replace backflushing. On single-boiler and Thermoblock machines, descale every two to three months in hard-water areas, using the machine’s own descale program if it has one. Urnex Dezcal is the standard powder.
Dual boilers are different. Descaling them is usually a technician’s job, because scale flakes can lodge in valves. With these machines, stop scale forming in the first place. A BWT Bestsave pad in the tank helps, or you can mix your own brewing water with mineral packets like Third Wave Water. Ordinary jug filters don’t remove the minerals that cause scale. Our boiler types guide explains why machines like the Silvia Pro X need this care.
Brushes and Spare Parts
A group head brush with an angled head, such as the Pallo Coffeetool, cleans around the gasket in seconds. A grinder brush like the Pallo Grindminder keeps old grounds out of the burrs. A puck screen cuts down how often you need either.
Replace the group gasket and shower screen about once a year on a machine you use daily. They’re cheap. A hard, cracked gasket leaks and makes the portafilter hard to lock in.
Ten minutes a week keeps a machine going for years.