Soto Helix Coffee Maker £21.95

Ireally love the minimalism of this coffee brewer. It’s a pour over stripped to its bare essentials: a conical spring that can hold a paper filter, and then compresses nearly flat when not in use.

But although the brewer itself is as low profile as it could possibly be, there is still the bulk of the associated coffee paraphernalia to consider: the cup (or cups), coffee grounds and thermos paper filters.

When brewing for one, the Soto Helix actually works out a little bulkier than the Stanley Pour Over (when the latter is used with an Elephant Box coffee tin). But when it comes to making coffee for two (with cups that stack neatly), Soto’s Helix does take up a little less room than either the Stanley Pour Over or the Aeropress GO.

Straight out of the box, the entire process of using the Soto Helix isn’t as simple as it could be. First, you have the question of where to keep the filters, cups and the Helix itself. I used plastic bags for the first two, and the perforated pouch that the Helix came with for the last. This was a functional, if inelegant, storage solution. It also meant there were a lot of different components rattling around in my bag.

A solution which I’ve considered is stitching a sleeve out of some beeswax cotton sheets, and integrating an internal divider. The flattened helix is about the same size as the folded filters, so those would slide in each side neatly. To keep things cleaner and neater with the cups, I’d make a lid out of the wax cotton, put that over the top of the cup and secure it in place with a silicone band.

I’ve not yet pulled all those bits together, so can’t say for sure if this would really be a workable solution/modification (like the Stanley Pour Over accommodating my coffee tin by chance).

So, for now, I have to go on what I actually have experience of – and that’s of a system which is impressively compact (especially when used for two), but is quite inelegant and quite bitty in the bag compared to some of the others on test.

For this reason, I rate it second, with the potential for first place. www.sotooutdoors.com/product/helix-coffee-maker/