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We have published thousands of coffee reviews and espresso reviews since 1997. The reviews below appear in reverse chronological order by review date. Older reviews may no longer accurately reflect current versions of the same coffee. To search for a specific roaster, origin or coffee use the Advanced Search Function.
Pungent, spicy or perhaps smoky aroma, with caramel notes and a hint of apple. In the cup rather sharply acidy with very distinct caramel notes and not much else. A bright, simple, limited coffee.
A contradictory coffee, with sweetly buoyant flowering grass and vanilla notes shimmering above a pungent heaviness in both aroma and cup. The pungent notes hint at semi-sweet chocolate in the aroma but turn rather bitter in the cup, compromising the continuing agreeable floral character.
Fermented fruit contributes to a glorious aroma dominated by a sort of dry, nutty chocolate. In the cup very sweet and floral but also quite astringent, netting a wildly ambiguous profile with intriguing fruit notes too astringent to call chocolate and too explosively fermented to call winy. Unorthodox palates might assign high ratings to this unusual coffee, while purists surely would choke and dismiss it. We compromised at 85 - buyers beware.
Sweetly roasty throughout the profile: fresh-cut cedar and hints of cardamom and flowers in the aroma; in the cup silky in mouthfeel, very sweet, with continuing cedar and intensified floral notes. Slightly astringent, almost turpenny in the long finish.
Fine aroma: delicate but deep, with milk chocolate, floral and caramelly fruit notes, apple perhaps. In the cup softly acidy, velvety in mouthfeel; the chocolate turns toward sweet cocoa with a richly tart floral twist. Surprisingly long finish, but also surprisingly heavy and even astringent. Cups were slightly uneven with occasional very faint musty fermented suggestions as they cooled, so a rating that started at 90 ended at an ambivalent 87.
High-toned, delicate (almost too) aroma: flowers, caramel, pipe tobacco. A bit sharp and astringent in the cup, but with a richly rounding caramel character and fine floral top notes. The caramel settles toward chocolate in the finish.
Simple, rather subdued aroma: cherry and chocolate notes. In the cup rich, pungent and sweet, but aromatically simple: dried cherries, a hint of chocolate, perhaps suggestions of merlot-like red wine.
Classic aroma: cleanly high-toned, slightly acidy, with flowers, peach, and a hint of milk chocolate. In the cup sweetly and brightly acidy, with continued floral, peach and black currant notes. The flavor drops off in a rather disappointing finish.
Rich aroma: semi-sweet chocolate and suggestions of apple, with floral notes at the top. In the cup rather big-bodied and rich, with continuing distinct floral top notes and a rather dominating, roundly tart acidity that nearly overwhelms but still allows further suggestions of chocolate, ripe tomato, orange and cedar.
A pungent, sweetly tart, tight-knit complexity - cedar, orange, semi-sweet chocolate - runs through the profile from aroma through the long, rich finish. Magisterial and consistent when hot; stiffens and simplifies just slightly as the cup cools.
Roundly delicate aroma: chocolate and caramel notes with suggestions of flowers and ripe tomato. In the cup silky mouthfeel and a classic profile: tart fruitiness enveloped in a giddy sweetness that harbors continued hints of chocolate and flowers. Clean, sweet - almost sugary - finish.
(As brewed in a Keurig B60 single-serve brewing device using a "K-Cup" capsule at a cup volume of 5.25 ounces): A complex and rather exotic profile. Round, low-acid fruit (apple?) in the aroma, leaning toward chocolate, with a hint of flowers. In the cup lively, wine-like acidity, with apple, floral, chocolate, nutmeg-like spice notes. Chocolate and apple resurface in the long, quietly rich finish.
(As brewed in a Keurig B60 single-serve brewing device using a "K-Cup" capsule at a cup volume of 5.25 ounces): Very mild, sweet, smokily cedar-toned aroma. In the cup simple, relatively rich for a K-cup brewed coffee, with dried fruit notes - raisins, cherries - that verge on a dark chocolate. Sweet, mildly astringent finish.
(As brewed in a Keurig B60 single-serve brewing device using a "K-Cup" capsule at a cup volume of 5.25 ounces): Mild but complex aroma: distinct caramel notes and hints of butter (perhaps butterscotch), vanilla and chocolate. Gentle, wine-toned acidity and sweet, delicate flavor with grapey red wine and floral notes and a hint of chocolate. Shallow but quietly persistent finish.
(As brewed in a Keurig B60 single-serve brewing device using a "K-Cup" capsule at a cup volume of 5.25 ounces): A coffee either pleasingly subtle and delicate or disappointingly subdued and shallow depending on taste and expectation. Caramel, flowers and a hint of smoke or perhaps cinnamon in the aroma. In the cup gently acidy, light-bodied but silky in mouthfeel and mild in flavor, with hints of caramel, cocoa, pear and sweet flowering grass. Very sweet but simple finish.
Most cups of this sample were very sweet in aroma and flavor, with soft earth tones (think the odor of freshly fallen, moist leaves that have just begun to compost), and pleasingly round cherry, cocoa and caramel notes. Unfortunately one cup of five was very, very foul tasting, probably owing to a bad bean called a "stinker," so we deducted 4 points from a coffee that otherwise might merit a 90.
Softly sweet-toned, rather simple aroma - raisin and chocolate notes. In the cup a lean but rather silky mouthfeel, with continued raisin and sweet pipe tobacco notes and a continued lean toward milk chocolate. Simple, straightforward finish with a shimmer of astringency in the long.
Simple but deep aroma, with resonant raisiny chocolate tones. In the cup lean-bodied, delicate, fundamentally sweet and rather lush but dryly smoky with a hint of fruit that reads as white wine or grapefruit. Concludes simply but richly.
Deep, sweet-toned, buttery aroma with a spicy, cedary chocolate and a hint of fruit, pear perhaps. In the cup delicately robust, with a roundly lush but continuing spicy, cedary, almost black-peppery chocolate and a suggestion of coconut, the sweet processed kind. Roundly rich finish.
Very sweet, caramelly aroma with milk chocolate notes and hints of earth and cedar. In the cup richly acidy, with continued caramel and milk chocolate notes. Rather limited in nuance but not a lazy cup; a simple, straightforwardly pleasing gesture.