Estate Reviews

Crisp but juicy in the aroma, with butter, honey, flower and marmalade-like orange notes. In the cup smoothly and gently acidy, delicate in mouthfeel, with a continued tart, marmalade-like, orangy sweetness complicated by cocoa, cedar, and continued flower and honey notes. Oranges and flowers carry into a cleanly sweet finish.

Sweet-toned, quiet aroma with nut, dried cherry and chocolate. Elegantly balanced cup: softly acidy, silky in mouthfeel, with continued dried cherry, cocoaish chocolate and a slight brightening hint of lemon. The chocolate notes in particular carry into the long, rich, complex finish.

Sweet-toned, crisply rich aroma with chocolate, cedar, flowers, ripe tomato notes. In the cup powerfully but sweetly acidy, with continued flowers, cocoaish chocolate, tart cherry notes and a pungent hint of cedar. Rich, sweet, chocolate-toned finish; very slight astringency in the long.

Lightly and sweetly acidy with delicately crisp floral, walnut and orange notes running from aroma through cup to the particularly impressive finish, where the sweetness peaks and the flavor notes consolidate and survive a slight tightness.

Delicately but richly nuanced throughout the profile with cherryish fruit, flowers, honey, milk chocolate. In the cup the acidity is tart but luxuriously sweet and the mouthfeel lightly syrupy. Flavor saturated and flawless finish.

The aroma has great depth and range of sensation: flowers, butter, cherry, hints of chocolate and cedar. In the cup rich acidity, supple mouthfeel. The aromatics simplify slightly in the mouth but retain great depth and power: tartly pungent though ripe cherry, distinct honey, a continuing hint of chocolate. Clean, sweet finish.

Rather simple aromatically, but sweet-toned, balanced and rich. In the aroma butter, cedar and a hint of white wine. In the cup gentle, deep acidity, round mouthfeel, continued cedar and white wine notes with a hint of flowers.

Deep, lush aroma: cherry, semi-sweet chocolate, flowers. In the cup smooth acidity, supple mouthfeel, sweet- and low-toned fruit and floral character suggesting semi-sweet chocolate, molasses, pipe tobacco. Simplifies a bit in the finish, particularly as the cup cools.

A soft, balanced, gently lively coffee. In the aroma orange, flowers and a cedary chocolate. In the cup medium body with silky mouthfeel and quiet but distinct floral and orange notes, perhaps with some molasses-toned hints suggesting moist pipe tobacco. Sweet, clean, floral-toned finish.

Crisp, rather limited aroma: caramel and milk chocolate. In the cup sweet, delicate, rather shallow and lean, with a pleasant dry nutty chocolate character. Unexpectedly, the finish stretches out splendidly, rich and chocolate-toned.

In the aroma delicately complex: berries, flowers, sweet lemon, honey. In the cup opulent: syrupy mouthfeel, sweet acidity, crisply powerful berry notes, continued hints of honey and flowers. Only a rich but simple finish prevents this coffee from rating in the high 90s.

A classic cup: pure, simple, intense, refined. Sweet-toned but crisp aroma: tomato, cedar, cardamom, chocolate. Richly and sweetly acidy in the cup with the classic complex of flowers and fresh coffee fruit with rounding hints of chocolate.

Very sweet-toned, exquisitely balanced aroma with floral, candied lemon and sweet herb notes. In the cup intense, tartly sweet acidity and buoyant mouthfeel with white wine and continued sweet lemon notes. The barest hint of chocolate in the cup blooms with soft explicitness in the surprisingly sweet finish. The cup stiffens ever so slightly as it cools.

Cocoa laced with citrus in the aroma. Flavors are as complex and sculpted as a top Alsatian Riesling, with intense lemon and orange acidity, chocolate, and a suggestion of fresh chive or tarragon always associated with this variety. A powerful, aristocratic grand cru. This fragile, low-density variety is a major challenge to roast (and cannot handle dark roasting); this is a particularly masterful roasting job.

Cocoa and caramel aroma. Blazing acidity, dark chocolate and caramel, regal balance. A nicely conducted, relatively light roast makes this balanced but assertive coffee particularly well-suited for vacuum pot and drip brewing.

Cherry notes dominate in the very sweet-toned, pungently acidy aroma. Relatively light-bodied in the cup, but sweetly and buoyantly acidy, with striking and complex aromatic notes: cherry, tea rose, Meyer Lemon, orange, honey. Honey in particular persists in the rich, sweet, though slightly astringent finish.

A whisper of an aroma, but a complex one: flowering grass, caramel, honey, a hint of chocolate. Amazingly sweet and delicately lush in the cup, with the honey notes intensifying and the floral notes declaring as spicy tea rose. The honey and floral notes persist in the surprisingly long, resonant finish.

Fine aroma: high-toned, elegant, combining suggestions of flowers, lemon, cedar and peach in a single suave, tight-knit aromatic gesture. In the cup delicately rich, light-bodied but not lean, gently acidy. The peach-floral-lemon gesture deepens and leans toward chocolate. Only the finish is disappointing: short and slightly but distractingly astringent.

High-toned, delicate aroma, with sweet flowering grass and cherryish coffee fruit notes, hints of flowers, milk chocolate, apple-toned pipe tobacco. In the cup rich but still delicate with flower and apple notes and a wine-like, or perhaps apple cider-like, character, crisp yet lush. Clean, sweetly tart finish.

Flowers dominate in the lush, buttery, apple- and cherry-toned aroma. Gently and sweetly acidy in the cup, light-bodied, delicately rich, with more giddy floral notes, a sweet, orangy citrus, and an underlying roundly chocolaty fruit. Richly delicate finish.