LATEST REVIEWS

A sweet, round coffee whose rich, low-key fruit notes suggest cantaloupe or apricot. The mild mildewed taste coffee professionals call baggy (acquired by green coffees during long storage in dampish conditions) shadows the cup, although the coffee's fundamental sweetness pushes these notes toward an agreeable reading as spice or malt.

Odd juxtaposition (more than balance) of dark roast pungency and a dry, crisp acidity. Bitter without harshness or astringency.

A subtle, lush coffee, richly sweet and gently acidy with shimmers of flowers. Notes of fermented fruit give the cup a juicy, decadent opulence that will please more adventurous palates but may put off coffee traditionalists.

Aroma is superbly rich, sweet and deep with chocolate notes. In the cup the powerful but low-key acidity is enveloped in richness. Ultimately more about solid balance and satisfying structure than nuance, though an apricot-toned chocolate makes itself felt toward the finish.

An intense but balanced coffee, its quietly powerful acidity enveloped in sweetness. The spice and sandalwood notes in the aroma fade in the cup, but the finish is clean, long, and lovely.

Low-toned, sweet, gently acidy. Fresh leather and milk chocolate in the aroma. The sweet chocolate persists in the cup with an undercurrent of fruit that suggests a spicy dark cherry. Excellent dimension when hot, though the profile simplifies a bit as the cup cools.

Attractive balance of chocolate-nuanced fruit, rich, low-toned but emphatic acidity, and a hint of roastiness. Ultimately, however, remains contained in its own quiet balance. Lacks the tonal range and dimension that would lift it from satisfying to remarkable.

Dry and forceful. The acidity is intense but sweet. The fruit is crisply austere: black currant, sauvignon blanc wine grapes. A challenging coffee that commands rather than seduces.

Giddily sweet, rich, balanced. Gentle wine-toned fruit (call it chardonnay) and low-key floral notes run through aroma and cup, rounding toward milk chocolate n the finish. A superb expression of the El Salvador type.

An outright and unmistakably flavor-defective coffee. The aroma literally smelled like a whiff of something out of a summer sewer and the cup combined bitterly sharp mildew tones with rotten, compost-pile ferment.

An example of what coffee professionals call a dirty or uneven coffee. At best nutty, midtoned, rather monotoned, without much bounce or resilience. At worst some cups displayed a rather unpleasant ferment while others were woody and cloyingly peanutty.

Either the green coffee was not up to the dark roast style, or the roast was conducted too aggressively: the roast dominates, producing a pungent and bitterly monotoned cup, with little to no nuance. The cup rounds and softens a bit as it cools, turning tenuously bittersweet.

Round, mild, sweet, with slightly fermented fruit notes that with imagination read as a sort of chocolaty peach or cherry. Turns slightly astringent in the finish.

Substantial body but shallow in dimension. Mid-toned, simple rather than plain, with clear vanilla-nut tones in the aroma and dry, prune-toned fruit with a tickle of dry herb in the cup.

This coffee provides about half the virtue of a great Sumatra: the full body and low-toned profile are here, but the vibrant dimension and complex nuance are missing. The cup is a bit monotoned and heavy rather than rich. Some bittersweet chocolate in the finish.

Sweet, mid-toned, with a lively but unobtrusive acidity. Distinct vanilla notes in both aroma and cup and richly dry fruit notes, dried apricot or plum, in the cup. The finish is rich but rather astringent and heavy.

Balanced, mid-toned, gently roasty, with a hint of low-toned fruit. Agreeable, though rather inert.

A fine monsooned Malabar with the usual low acidity and heavy body of this exotic origin, but here, in a skillfully executed light-roast style, unusually sweet with complex nuance: low-toned cantaloupe-like fruit and a pungent, gingery mustiness that easily reads as nut, and, with imagination, as malty toned chocolate.

Apparently the blender who created this faux Kona aimed at a richly sweet, winy, roundly fruit-toned cup. He or she largely succeeded, though the success is marred by very mild but flavor-flattening mildew tones.

Lovely balanced, low-toned, bittersweet, richly understated cup. A slightly darker-than-supermarket-norm roast mellows the acidity nicely and nudges the fruit toward chocolate. The finish is a touch bitter.