Coffee pod of the day - Emeril’s Coffee Pods - French Quarter Roast

This will be the easiest coffee review ever:

No.

That word encompasses everything you need to know about this product.  No.  No to the taste, no to the aroma, no to the fact that they exist, and no to Emeril.  I’m so sick of that fat face of his getting slapped on every freaking thing imaginable.  He’s gone from selling a limited line of very good spice mixtures to selling any slapped-together shit product.  Emeril Lagasse can kiss my ass.

Emeril’s French Quarter Roast Coffee Pods taste like nothing.  I mean literally...hot water with a vague hint of coffee.  The first cup I made was so weak I thought I made a mistake, so I made this one instead.  I have a cup here made of three 9 gram pods and a measly 10 ounces of water.  This should be strong as hell.  It’s the opposite of that.  The only thing I can taste is the sugar I put in it.

I think that some faceless coffee company has paid Emeril to endorse the dregs and left-overs they can’t sell to other brands.  Or maybe it;s crap they scrape off the industrial grinders once a month.  I’d rather drink Folger’s from the grocery store.  Or...and I’m serious...Chock Full O’ Nuts.  That is some shit coffee right there, and these Emeril’s French Quarter Roast Coffee Pods are the suck as well.

No.

Posted by JimK at 01:09 PM on October 26, 2007
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Coffee pod of the day - Fratello Yemen Moka Sanani Single Estate

That’s a hell of a name...Fratello’s Yemen Moka Sanani Single Estate may not roll off the tongue when spoken, but it certainly wakes up the tongue when consumed.  I’ve been drinking it for three days now, so it’s time to review it.

First, the construction.  I’ve been through maybe 30 brands of pods in the last couple of years, and it’s not easy to find a brand that works well.  Some have dense filter paper that resists water, some are paced so densely that they give the brewer fits, some are so loose that they collapse inside the pod holder (even the smaller, shallower holders) and all the water rushes past the pod, unaffected by coffee grounds in any way.  Gourmet Cafe has a well-made pod with all factors perfect for my simplehuman A40.  Now I think I’ve found another; Fratello.

These are standard 60mm pods for most pod brewers.  9 grams each...and I randomly picked three out of the box, they all weighed 9 grams on the nose.  Well constructed, with enough of a lip to stay firmly in place and packed in the right balance to give optimum extraction.  With a bit of pre-wetting, they brew a perfect 4-7 oz cup of coffee, depending on how strong you like it.

Taste: Very good.  It’s a light-ish roast, probably smack in between “light” and “medium.” The aroma is exactly what you would expect coffee to smell like if it were lightly roasted, with a sweetness mixed with that earthiness that a roasted bean gives off.  The first burst of flavor has a roasted coffee body, but the light sweetness dominates, especially after cream & sugar are added.  It’s vaguely fruity without being identifiable as any one fruit flavor, but definitely berry-like.  They call it blueberry at Coffeewhiz (where I bought it) but I wouldn’t be that precise.  It also has that subtle kick of earthy, almost chocolate taste.  It gives off all this flavor and body without feeling heavy and dark in your mouth, which is great for people who don’t like a dark, bitter coffee. It’s a great early morning coffee.  It would be perfectly at home next to a danish or a bowl of fresh fruit.  Might even be good as a dessert coffee.

Fratello gives you 18 pods in a box, and Coffeewhiz sells them for $8.99.  It might be bit costly to drink every day if your coffee budget is small, but it’s really worth it for a change of pace, once-in-a-while box.  If the price sounds perfect for you, this could easily be an everyday drinker.  Highly recommended!

Posted by JimK at 02:53 PM on October 07, 2007
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Kübler-Ross in action

I can’t believe this is happening.  I just killed my burr grinder.  If you love your coffee, you know how I feel right now.  If you get a few moments, please think kind thoughts for Grindy as he makes his way to that big appliance graveyard in the sky. 

I just can’t believe he let me down like this.  To hell with him!  He’s off to the North Haven landfill.  That cheap piece of Cuisinart crap don’t deserve a decent burial!

No, that’s not right.  God, if you’re listening, I will be a better person if you just give me back Grindy.  I will give to charity, I will treat my fellow man with love and respect...I’ll stop thinking about putting you-know-what in you-know-who’s you-know-where.  Just give him back!

Life isn’t worth living without him.  I just don’t see the point.

OK, That’s silly.  I can move on.  It’ll be alright.  I can just nip ‘round to Bed, Bath and Beyond and buy an exact copy of Grindy!  I shall call him...Grindy.

Posted by JimK at 04:24 PM on October 03, 2007
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Categories: Humor,  Personal,  Coffee

It might be National Coffee Day

There’s a little confusion about the date.  Some have two dates in May, some say it’s today, or last month, or some say it’s a myth, like a fiscally responsible Republican or Jessica Alba’s acting talent.  Whatever.  I drank some and enjoyed it .136% more just in case it really is National Coffee Day.  I don’t mess around, man.  If it is National Coffee Day, I want to be prepared.

Posted by JimK at 03:45 PM on September 29, 2007
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Coffee of the day: Kenya AA Lisura Estate

Right off the bat, I must admit to a terrible thing.  I got this from Jersey Shore Coffee Roasters and then let this coffee sit in the freezer, in whole bean form, for eight months.

I know.  I really cannot give a fair assessment of the flavor based on letting freshly-roasted beans sit around for so long before using them.  That having been said, it is still about sixteen bajillion times better than any coffee - ground or whole - you can buy in a supermarket.  Plus, I know exactly what taste component gets introduced by aging...I don’t know if I could describe it, but I know it when I taste it.  These beans are barely affected.  I ran through a batch of this last December and the flavor of this bag is just a tiny, hardly noticeable bit off.  Anyway, enough hemming and hawing.  How’s it taste?

Like a Kenya.  It’s bright, which is a component of the acidity.  If you’ve been reading my coffee posts, you know I like a medium-to-darkish roast with a bright taste...Kenyas fit that profile to a T.  This Lisura Estate has some fruity elements too, a sweetness that isn’t quite anything, but is obviously present.  It’s not cherries, it’s not “currant-y,” but it’s definitely fruit-like in the finish.  Maybe even vaguely citrus-like, if oranges tasted more like coffee.  All of this adds up to bright and even a bit tangy.  The medium roast adds depth and boldness.  A really great cup of coffee, is what I’m trying to say.  Even beans this old are pretty damn good.

Unfortunately for you, it’s out of stock.  If you find it anywhere online, the stock is old.  Don’t buy it until you see it in stock at Jersey Shore again.

Posted by JimK at 02:25 PM on September 21, 2007
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Coffee pod of the day - Molto Tanzania Peaberry

Oh Molto...why did you forsake me?  This week’s coffee has been a box of Molto Tanzania Peaberry pods.  Given the fact that I think Tanzania Peaberry is one of the brightest, flavorful and awesomest coffees ever, one would think I would be gaga over this.

I am not.

Molto Tanzania Peaberry is...old-tasting.  You know how you get that particular funky taste from all old coffees, regardless of where the beans were grown?  That canned, stale kind of bitterness that masks any real flavor that may have once resided in your coffee?  These pods are fill of that.

Construction of the pods is excellent.  In fact, they’re some of the firmest, well-shaped and consistent pods I have seen.  Each one is filled to capacity with no loose grounds sloshing around inside.  Each one is uniform, the edges are all equal, in short, the machine that makes them is precise.  But the contents?  That leaves something to be desired.

The favor is somewhat hard to pin down, due to the stale factor I mentioned.  I can taste a hint of the bright, almost sweet body of Tanzania peaberry, but it’s simply overwhelmed by both the stale factor and the fact that I think these beans were roasted too long.  A good peaberry from this region will have some fruity tones to the flavor, almost cherry-like.  It will be bright (meaning somewhat acidic) and yet full-bodied, with a strong, full, smooth coffee feel in the mouth.  This Molto Tanzania Peaberry is missing all the subtly and complexity of a good Tanzania peaberry.  It;s all strength and harsh body with no...soul.  There’s no fruit, no acidity to lighten things up, just a stale flavor and something that is trying to be espresso, or maybe a dark Columbian.

On top of all that, it’s ten bucks a box at BetterCoffee.com.  Why should I pay two extra dollars over the “limited edition” price of the Gourmet Cafe version of this regional specialty?  The GC version is so far superior to this I can’t even quantify it.  Unfortunately, it’s rarely for sale, as Gourmet Cafe actually buys micro-batches of these Tanzanian beans and sells them as fast as possible.

I say stay far away from the Molto Tanzania Peaberry pods.  Not good, sirs and madams.  Not good enough for the price, anyway.  Maybe if they were $2.99 a box, I’d say pick them up for when you run out of anything better.

Posted by JimK at 04:16 PM on August 19, 2007
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Cofee pod of the day: Gourmet Café Limited Edition Guatemala Aurora

Been awhile since I got new coffee in...today’s new pod is the Gourmet Café Limited Edition Guatemala Aurora.  It’s a Gourmet Café pod, so contruction is tailor-made for the Simple Human/Senseo type of brewer.  Good size, excellent filter material, etc.

Taste is what we’re after here, so how do the Guatemala Aurora pods taste?  First, the marketing blurb:

Grown on the Finca Aurora estate farm in the southern region of Guatemala where the temperate climate allows the coffee to mature slowly resulting in an intense concentration of flavor

Yeah, I didn’t get that.  The “intense concentration of flavor?” Someone forgot to put it in my batch, apparently.  What I got was a plain-jane, generic-tasting dark roast with just a touch too much bitterness.  No distinguishing flavor characteristics at all, really, other than it was somehow smooth and bitter at the same time.  Now, I like a bitter dark roast, but this was the bad kind of bitter.  It was a tangy, bright bitterness.  I thought maybe I’d brewed them too strong, so I tried a cup the next day using more water per pod.  Same flavor, only diluted.  Today I brewed them as I have every other pod I’ve tested and made my decision - not worth the extra money.

You see, boxes of Gourmet Café pods generally cost $5.99 a box.  There are some truly great daily drinkers in that price range.  The Columbian Supremo, the Kona Blend, the Estate Costa Rican, those three alone could keep a cup happy for a very, very long time.  At $7.49 per box, the limited edition pods come with a premium price, and one should expect a premium taste as well.  The Tanzinia Peaberry pods from Gourmet Café are exactly that; premium taste at the slightly higher price.  These Guatemala Aurora pods get a pass from me. I’ll finish the box, but after that?  No mas, senors and senoritas.  Back to the Hawaiian, Costa Rican and Columbian for me.

Posted by JimK at 03:07 PM on August 05, 2007
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Coffee pod review - Melitta FilterPads

It’s been awhile since I did a coffee review of any kind, but that’s mostly because I’ve been sticking with what I’ve already written about.  I am especially fond of the Gourmet Cafe line of coffee pods, and that’s been my go-to morning cup for months and months now.  When I saw these Melitta FilterPads on a coffee blog I had to try them though...what a premise!

The Melitta FilterPads sound like a single-serve coffee lover’s dream come true.  The theory is that you can buy the best beans in the world (that you can afford), grind them ever so fine - we’re talking espresso/Turkish powder here - and then stuff 6 grams or so into these pads.  You are then supposed to tuck the bottom edge flap into the top edge fold and viola’; you’ve created your very own gourmet coffee pod.

Now here are the problems that should have you running away from these useless things:

1. The filter material is rice-paper thin.  One wrong move, a twitch, and the whole thing is torn.

2. The tabs don’t close well and at the corners of the opening, guess what happens?  That;s right, that powder-fine grind you put in there is making a jailbreak.  Ever seen what a single-serve coffee maker does to loose grounds in that massively-pressurized steam?  Embeds it everywhere or shoots it out at you because the grounds broke the seal and the pressure escaped via the easiest path, which is no longer through your coffee pod and into your cup.

3. The pods cannot be evened out before being inserted into the pod holder.  See number two for why.  Escapees.

4. Given number three, it’s almost impossible to get a seal, so you end up with a cup of brown water.

5. The time it takes to grind and fill two or three of these (depending on the size of your mug) is almost twice what it takes to brew the same amount of coffee using the Aeropress, and three times what it takes to brew using a pod brewer and regular, store-bought pods.  Of course not all coffee making is about speed, but this is ridiculous.

6. The dealbreaker; capacity.  At most, you could maybe shove 7 grams of coffee in here.  But then it really wouldn’t close or make a seal in the brewer.  6 grams is the limit as far as I can tell.  They say 6-8, but I call shenanigans.  The limit is 6 grams.  And that’s one weak cup of joe, pre-supposing you could get it to seal and extract well in the first place.

Big, big two thumbs down to this waste of a product.  Better to use some kind of press or a drip brewer with your good beans, and buy pods from BetterCoffee.com.  You won’t find a better taste-per-dollar value than the Gourmet Cafe line.  In fact, they have a new limited coffee out, the Guatemala Aurora pods, and I’m placing an order right now.

Melitta FilterPads are terrible and not worth your money.

Posted by JimK at 03:56 PM on June 23, 2007
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Late breaking JimK report - Gourmet Cafe Kona Blend pods and 2006 Georges DuBoeuf Beaujolais Nouveau

Only on Action News Six, your news leader!

“Today’s continuing coverage of every detail of Jimk’s day continues in this continuing story.  We continue now with a live update from Asian reporter Tricia Takasomethingthatendsinichiormora.”

“Thank you Brick.  Coming to you live from Hamden, I’m Asian reporter Tricia Takasomethingthatendsinichiormora.  JimK earlier today drank a new kind of coffee pod, the Gourmet Cafe Kona Blend.  He remarked that he found it brighter and lighter than say, the Tanzania Peaberry.  Sweeter as well.  He mentioned that even though it was a blend, the Kona aroma was present and that obviously, the body of this pod comes not from the Kona, but from whatever they blended the Kona with.  JimK went on to say that he would recommend it especially to those looking for a good dessert or after dinner coffee.  His last remark was that it was simply “light and airy and excellent on the tongue.  Not like the nasty, pungent Mediterranean taste of say, Antonella Barba.” I’m still not sure exactly what part of Ms. Barba tastes pungent and Mediterranean, and neither Ms. Barba’s pimp nor her parish priest could not be reached for comment.

Later, during an airing of Sci-Fi’s Battlestar Galactica, JimK enjoyed a glass of the 2006 Georges DuBoeuf Beaujolais Nouveau, which he found to be quite drinkable, fruity, fresh and excellently priced as well.  He said he couldn’t understand why he hadn’t tackled this before, but that he felt the bottle would, as he put it, “do me well over the next couple of days.” He also mentioned that he would like to thank Ryley R. Hayes for putting the idea in his head and Antonella Barba for putting it in her mouth.

At last sighting, JimK was preparing to write something about the Battlestar Galactica episode he had just finished watching and he was overheard muttering something that sounded like “Antonella could suck-start that Raptor’s engine.” Over to you in the newsroom, Brick.”

“Tricia, thanks, hey listen, did you offer to do your Thai wine bottle dance for him?  You know the one where you stick a full bottle up your pus////”

“Brick, no, I’m afraid I did not.  That’s just for office parties.”

“Oh, well, his loss.  I call first sip next time.  Well, that’s our report for this evening, for Asian reporter Tricia Takasomethingthatendsinichiormora and me, Brick Bigdouche and the entire Action News Six news team at Six with Action and the news, good night Internets.  And stay classy.”

“CLEAR!”

“Brick, you you have to do that stupid Ron Burgundy thing every night?  We know you liked Anchorman and you’d blow Will Ferrel if he asked.  Is it necessary to make an ass of yourself and our news team?”

“Yes.  It is.  Now call my car service and make sure that this time they bring those two whores I ordered.”

“Whatever.  Hack.”

Posted by JimK at 12:54 AM on February 26, 2007
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Categories: Personal,  Coffee,  Recipes and Food
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Coffee of the day - Panama Hector Vargas La Milagrosa Lot B

Today’s coffee has a long name - Panama Hector Vargas La Milagrosa Lot B.  The beans were roasted yesterday 14.2 miles from where I am sitting.  I think the same driver that picked them up last night delivered them to me today, that’s how close this place is.  I should have just started the car and drove over, but the gas would have cost as much as shipping.  :)

Here’s what the roaster has to say about it:

More

Panama Hector Vargas La Milagrosa Lot B

In recent years the very top coffees from Panama are auctioned in the Best of Panama auction. The small lots being auctioned have already been distilled by a panel of professional cuppers from a larger group of entrants in a pre-auction competition. This live, internet auction is worldwide and attracts firms that seek exceptional coffees. This year 31 coffees were auctioned. In advance of the auction we roasted, cupped and compared all 31 in a process that takes a week. When finished we emerged with a small group of coffees we liked best and which we wished to acquire. The bidding was long, fierce and arduous and when completed we were successful at buying 2 of our picks. The first has been sold out and now we offer our favorite: Panama Hector Vargas La Milagrosa Lot B.

La Milagrosa Lot B from Hector Vargas’ farm Cafetales Don Alfredo is an intriguing coffee which belies a complex combination of varietals (by the way, it was much different than Lot A). This tiny lot of specially grown cherries blends Typica, Gesha and Catuai cultivars. The Gesha component is noteworthy, but not overbearing as it can sometimes be. Here it adds complexity and another layer of taste. A mere 650 pounds of this coffee is available and we have it all. While expensive, it is fairly priced.

Hector Vargas’ farm is in Panama’s Jaramillo, Boquete zone, near the Baru Volcano. This particular coffee is grown at 5400 elevation on a site which gets about 170 inches a year of rainfall.

Cup Characteristics: La Milagrosa Lot B is a mildly acidic coffee possessing a distinctive, subtly exotic flavor. It has both sweetness and citrus in the cup, with a lingering, chocolaty aftertaste. La Milagrosa is an exceptional coffee.

My feeling is that it’s not so much chocolate as it is a kind of roasted wood/roasted meat flavor.  It’s just amazing.  This is the first medium roast bean I have found that offers the strong, bold flavor of a darker roast without that bitter, heavy flavor darks can sometimes have.  It’s light in the mouth and very smooth.  Light body, but it’s not a bright, acidy coffee.  I agree with their assertion that it’s mildly acidic.  Quite a good cup for the first of the day.

If I have a complaint, it’s that Willoughby’s doesn’t use good bags with one-way valves in them to keep the beans fresh while letting out the nasty gases.  They just use the el-cheapo plastic-lined paper bags that fold over.  I’m going to have to store the other two roasts I got in something else now.

By the way, remember when I said I probably wouldn’t be using the Aerobie Aeropress every day?  Yeah.  Well.  That didn’t last long.  I pretty much ONLY use the Aerobie now unless I just don’t feel like grinding and cleaning up after.  I have it down to a science, I know the perfect grind settings for amount and consistency, I have the amount and time of the water down, I know exactly how much coffee to put in the press.  I’m getting consistently great cups of coffee, although each new bean is a bit of trial and error.

I think after Christmas I’m going to get one of the French presses that my friend Doug suggested and try that out, but I am pretty happy with the Aerobie these days.  It’s like playing chemist every morning, only at the end you get to drink your potion and not turn into a hideous monster that has such an interestin’ hair-do.

Less

Posted by JimK at 05:37 PM on December 19, 2006
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