Exotic Reviews
We found 278 reviews for Exotic. The reviews below appear in reverse chronological order by review date. Older reviews may no longer accurately reflect current versions of the same coffee.
Reader Ben Anderson calls this coffee "fantastic." That familiar adjectivefreshens up when applied to Sulawesi coffees, whose unexpected forest and fruit notes often doseem to express a sort of adventurous coffee fantasy. When hot, this Sulawesi displayed a richcup with a fine balance of acidity, sweetness and roastiness plus - the Sulawesi factor - carnally rich fruit notes reminiscent of cantaloupe. I started with a rating of over 90, but as the cup cooleda slight salty astringency in the finish lowered my assessment.
Classic Kenya profile: Austerely dry and acidy, with a crisp, astringent-yet-sweet fruit note that coffee professionals are fond of describing as black current. If black current does not ring any synapses, try dried cherries. However described, this flavor note is exceptional in the world of coffee. The discerning reader who nominated this coffee offered no description, but bravely rated it a 95 to 100.
The moderately dark-roast style mutes the Kenya fruit and gives it a roasty, tart pineapple twist that softens toward a toasty chocolate in the finish. The darkish roast may transform the Kenya character, but the transformation is quite pleasurable in its own right.
"Bright, acidy, but luxuriously sweet -- high-toned, citrusy fruit suggests grapefruit. Slightly astringent in the finish but richly so (rating 88)." Chris really liked this coffee, awarding it a rating of 96: "Started things off right with a mouthwatering floral and citrus aroma. Very much the lone wolf of the cupping owing to its winey Yirgacheffe/Kenya character."
Ken's favorite in the cupping: "Superb balance of dry and sweet tones. Crisp fruit notes suggest temperate fruit, perhaps pears. Slight but not entirely unpleasant bitterness in the finish" (rating 90). Chris: "The other stand-alone in the cupping, owing to its medium-intensity East-Africa-style acidity. Begins with suggestions of mandarin orange and dips toward a floral wine finish" (rating 89).
Ken admires this coffee's "almost chewy dry chocolate or cocoa notes" and its "sweet, rich balance and well-integrated acidity," though he had reservations centering on "a slight flatly potatoey, bitter mustiness" (rating 85). Chris finds a positive and colorful way of describing the sample's unorthodox aromatics: "Impressive variety of aroma in the cup, from honey baked bread to a sweet green-pepper spice, which caught me off guard at first. Finishes with smooth banana-muffin-like notes" (rating 84).
A delightfully sweet, balanced, deeply dimensioned coffee complicated by clean cocoa tones in the nose and floral and fruit notes in the cup.
The opulent, flower-toned sweetness of this coffee is overlaid by an effervescent, spicy mustiness. Imagine mildewed spice covered by chocolate.
Splendid aroma: voluptuously rich, chocolaty and perfectly balanced. In the cup deeply dimensioned with a pruny dry fruit edging toward chocolate, but marred by a slight but pervasive bitterness.
Sweet, opulently chocolate-toned fruit is turned pleasantly bittersweet by the roast. Full bodied and roundly pungent.
Pleasant and interesting, although to my taste the coffee component is not quite sweet or heavy-bodied enough to completely support the spice. A sharp tickle of pepper and clove with a hint of cinnamon sweetness complicates a straightforward, low-key cup.
Full yet majestically buoyant. The aroma soars with sweet nut notes, the cup glistens with fruit and flowers, the entire impression is gentle but enormous. The finish is aggressively dry but saved from astringency by rich cocoa tones.
A dark roast that tip-toes past burned to achieve a smooth, integrated bittersweetness, enlivened by a hint of acidity and a touch of fruit.
Superb aroma: rich, acidy, alive with nut and vanilla overtones. In the cup less range but still pleasingly high-toned: acidy, buoyant, and bright with hints of flowers and fruit.
Considerable dry-chocolate intrigue behind the dark-roast pungency. The aroma is extraordinary: light and buoyant with sweet vanilla-chocolate notes and a hint of nut. Settles down in the cup, where the pungency turns the chocolate tones pleasantly dry and smoky.
Judging by their comments, this Old Tavern Jamaica Blue Mountain peaberry was the clear favorite of the majority of the panelists, although they assigned slightly higher numbers for some cupping categories to the regular-bean Old Tavern also reviewed. Descriptions for this peaberry suggest a brightly yet sweetly acidy coffee, with floral high notes, full body, and good dimension. Some reviewers gushed ("Packs a punch! Love it"; "The nicest coffee of this Caribbean cupping. An outstanding flavor"); others simply approved or ho-hummed as they did with all of these coffees. I didn't pick up the hint of storage-related flatness that muted the regular-bean Old Tavern, although some reviewers did, groping to describe it with terms like "faded" and the like. I contributed some help to Alex Twyman, the farmer who developed the Old Tavern coffees, so my own assessment may be suspect, but on the basis of two rounds of rigorously blind cupping I agree strongly with the yea-sayers. I found this a clean, vibrant, subtly complete coffee.
The majority of panelists who had something to say about this coffee described still another classic Kona: a gentle acidity simultaneously sweet and bright, medium body, soft, balanced cup, clean aftertaste. Fewer grace notes were ascribed to this coffee than to some of the other mid-rated Konas, although this didn't dampen one panelist's ingenuity, who described the aroma as "donuts, [or] fresh-baked sponge-cake." Two dissenting panelists found fault with this coffee, both describing hard tones surfacing in aroma and aftertaste. On the other hand, several went out of their way to describe the aftertaste as "clean."
This Kauai peaberry cupped clean for most panelists, although three found a touch of herby or earthy hardness. The main complaint was lack of power: "mellow, well-balanced, [but] almost bland"; "flavor -- still waiting." Five of twelve panelists used the "bland" word. Nevertheless, several identified positive grace notes. "Dark chocolate overtones and very dry," said one.