Blend Reviews

Rich, simple aroma: cedar and butter. In the cup agreeably deep-toned and round, with chocolate and continued butter notes. Good body, soft acidity. Continues consistent into the simple but sweet, rich finish.

A quiet, sweetly rounded coffee. Cherry and a hint of chocolate in the aroma, softly acidy and rather full-bodied in the cup, with candied walnut, cacao and pipe tobacco notes. Simple, gently rich finish.

A quietly exotic, complex blend of impressive originality. Smoothly midtoned, gently pungent aroma. In the cup displays lively, almost peppery acidity and full body with some tingle in the mouthfeel. Lyrically and richly sweet, with a wine-like, black grapey hint of ferment and a slight musty-malty edge. A surprising shimmer of flowers in the long finish.

An exhilarating and intense blueberry and wine character dominates the profile from aroma to finish. In the aroma the blueberry and wine tones are particularly pure and sweet. In the cup things grow more complicated: the blueberry takes a chocolate turn and the wine may strike some palates as too aggressively fermented. The finish is even more ambiguous, as the blueberry fruit persists nicely but takes a slightly soapy, salty direction. There are some coffee professionals who would give this unorthodox coffee a rating of 95; others would throw it off the table at 75.

Sweetly smoky, fruity aroma. In the cup light to medium body with a silky mouthfeel and quiet balance between a gentle acidity and a discreetly roast (cedar and toast) character. A hint of dark chocolate in the cup and butterscotch in the simple but rich finish.

Sweet-toned, deep aroma with a tight-knit complexity: dried cherry, raisin, moist leaves. Almost syrupy sweet in the cup, with a slight roasty edge. The dried cherry and raisin-toned fruit take on a port-wine richness before settling toward chocolate in the richly bittersweet finish.

Smoke, toast and a hint of flowers in the aroma. In the small cup medium-bodied and smooth in mouthfeel, balanced, rich, simple, with hints of cedar, dark chocolate and toast. Sweet finish. In milk lean-bodied but lush, dominated by a smoky semi-sweet chocolate.

(As brewed in a Keurig B60 single-serve brewing device using a "K-Cup" capsule at a cup volume of 5.25 ounces): Delicately complex aromatics: suggestions of flowers, chocolate, peach, sweet orange, all of which take on a Riesling-like sweetness and delicacy in nose and cup. Gently bright acidity. Fades rather quickly in the finish.

(As brewed in a Keurig B60 single-serve brewing device using a "K-Cup" capsule at a cup volume of 5.25 ounces): In the aroma buttery and round with low-acid fruit, apple perhaps, and a hint of flowers at the top. Softly acidy. The aromatics consolidate in the cup but remain quietly rich through the short finish, though they fade quickly in the long.

(As brewed in a Keurig B60 single-serve brewing device using a "K-Cup" capsule at a cup volume of 5.25 ounces): Shifting, complex, sweet-toned aromatics: distinct butter and caramel notes, with suggestions of peach, walnut and flowering grass. In the cup very sweet, and delicately but assertively acidy. Think tartly sweet green apples. Continued peach and floral nuance in the rich but quickly fading finish.

(As brewed in a Keurig B60 single-serve brewing device using a "K-Cup" capsule at a cup volume of 5.25 ounces): Smoke, toast, caramel, prune-toned fruit in the aroma. In the cup rich, low-key, with continued toast and pruny fruit notes and a hint of flowers.

(As brewed in a Keurig B60 single-serve brewing device using a "K-Cup" capsule at a cup volume of 5.25 ounces): Delicate, caramel-toned aroma: flowers, berries, chocolate. In the cup continued caramelly and quite sweet with ongoing berry notes, but slightly cottony in mouthfeel and woody in flavor. The sweetness prevails in the finish.

Co-cupper Danny O'Neill and Ken both admired this coffee's sweet floral- and chocolate-toned aroma, cleanly bright (Danny) acidity and silky body. Danny (89) cited its quintessential balance, Ken (90) a "delicate, restrained giddiness" animated by floral, apple and pear notes.

Complex aromatics: flowers, pear, hints of brandy and cherry in the aroma. In the cup delicately acidy, roundly supple in mouthfeel, with a continued complex fruit that co-cupper Danny O'Neill (87) read as sweet raisin and Ken (more elaborately at 91) as dried cherry, fresh pear, brandy and flowers. Rich though surprisingly short-lived finish.

Gently pungent cedar and pear-toned fruit in the aroma. In the cup sweetly and richly acidy with a continued pungent edge that hints at chocolate. The long, robust-on-the-edge-of-rough finish suggests that the attractive pungency of the profile may in part be powered by a slight, felicitous mustiness in one of the blend's green coffees.

In the aroma distinct semi-sweet chocolate notes and cherryish or raisiny fruit with a lush twist of ferment. Crisp cedar and toast notes complicate the cherry-toned chocolate in the small cup. The fruity chocolate persists in the splendid short finish, though a shadow astringency barely implied in the cup eventually dominates in the long. In milk a slightly lean body is more than made up for by crisp toasted rice notes and a voluptuous, milk-softened version of the fruity-fermented chocolate.

(As brewed in a Keurig B60 single-serve brewing device using a "K-Cup" capsule at a cup volume of 5.25 ounces): Subdued aroma, with dry fruit (cherry?) and fresh leather notes. In the cup shallow in sensation but crisply balanced, with suggestions of Meyer lemon, white wine, tart cherry edging toward chocolate. Thin but pleasantly sweet, cherry-toned finish.

(As brewed in a Bunn My Cafe MCP single-serve brewing device using a 62mm pod at a cup volume of 5 ounces): Distinct sweet cocoa notes in the aroma, along with hints of low-acid fruit, cherry perhaps. In the cup richly acidy, lean-bodied but rich, with continued sweet cocoa and tart cherry notes with a shimmer of vanilla. Rich, tart but not overly astringent finish. The same pod brewed in the Krups 1010 at a cup volume of 6 ounces scored an 85 with a basically similar profile and description.

(As brewed in a Keurig B60 single-serve brewing device using a "K-Cup" capsule at a cup volume of 7.25 ounces): Sweet, simple, caramelly aroma. In the cup medium-bodied but lean in mouthfeel, with a thinly pungent, musty/malty character and hints of cherryish fruit. A mild musty astringency in the finish leans toward rich.

Dominated by a sweetly fermented fruit that reads as a rich, brandy-toned, cherryish chocolate. This lush flavor complex is heady in the aroma and sweetly refreshing in the cup. As the coffee cools, however, the ferment reveals a very slight bitter edge.