I own a Barista Pro. Some tips:

1. The larger single-wall basket is made by IMS and is good! It holds 16-19 g of coffee, which is a great dose range for this machine. Don’t be in a hurry to spend $$$ for a different basket.

2. The portafilter is also good! It’s not naked, so you don’t get to experience that trend, but it has a distinct advantage that aftermarket portafilters lack: Because of the spouts on the bottom, it sits level on a counter top. That means that when you go to tamp, it’s very easy to tamp firmly and evenly without any extra equipment like a tamping station. A BIG tip for the stock portafilter: before you insert a basket, remove the black plastic piece in the bottom by prying it out. Keep it for later, if you want, but it doesn’t aid the extraction process, it’s plastic that is directly contacting very hot liquid (a no no if you are concerned about microplastics), and if you end up buying a larger basket (you don’t really need to do this – see #1), you’ll need to remove this anyway to fit a deeper basket.

3. The included, no-frills tamper is ALSO GOOD! It has a handy silver ring on the bottom edge that shows you whether you’ve tamped enough (i.e., if you still see the silver ring, you need to tamp more, or use less coffee). Also, for those new to espresso: it is basically impossible to tamp too hard. You can only tamp too softly. So don’t bother buying a fancy spring-loaded tamper or some other nonsense. The included tamper works great.

4. I do recommending spending $13 on a bellows for the coffee grinder. I bought the Aieve one from Amazon and it works great. The bellows helps you solve a legitimate problem with this machine, which is coffee grounds getting stuck in the grinder.

5. THIS TIP GOES WITH #4: Once you have a bellows, switch to doing single-dose cupping. This means that you only put in enough coffee in the grinder that you need for your shot. So, for each cup, you’ll measure out 18g (or however much) of beans and dump it into the hopper. This is important for a few reasons: First, you can now set your grinder to run for however much time it takes to grind the coffee + 2-3 seconds. In that last 2-3 seconds, while the grinder is empty but running, you can pump the bellows to blow out the stuck coffee grounds. This will ensure that your dose is consistent from cup to cup. The second thing single-dose cupping does is lets you keep your coffee fresher. If you fill the hopper up with beans, your coffee is now exposed to air (the grinder is open from the bottom), which does affect the taste of coffee. Third, single-dose cupping lets you switch easily from one bean to another. Why spend $600 to drink coffee if you’re not going to change things up whenever you want? Last, single-dose cupping lets you eliminate grind time as a variable when dialing in a new coffee. Since you’re keeping grind time constant, you’re now free to dial in your espresso by just manipulating grams of beans and fineness of grind.

6. One last thing I do which helps consistency between multiple consecutive shots brewed is to run a shot, without the portafilter, between each cup. This helps keep the shower screen clean.