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The Pact Advent Calendar – Day 12

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Ladies and gents, boys and girls, it’s finally happened. Day 12.  We have our first one that goes straight into the “Dislike” column.  Because dang.  Yeah, didn’t get on with this one at all.  If that’s all you want to know, then I’ve saved you reading the whole review!  You’re welcome for the time back, try not to use it all on the same website (unless you’re spending it reading more of my reviews, in which case fill your boots).

If you’re still here, let’s go into some more detail about why I didn’t get on with day 12’s offering.

Man, the smell of this one jumps out the bag the moment you open it, that was my first indication that I perhaps wasn’t going to entirely get on with this one. When I was younger, during my University days, I used to live on stuff like the infamous “Hot Lava Java” that Taylors makes. I was less concerned about  the taste than I was about how strong it was and how much caffeine it seemed to contain.

These days I favour a much milder roast so with this one I had reservations from the get go. As you can see above, a dark shot with quite a dark crema compared to the others. The smell of the shot was even more overpowering than the grounds, strong and a little harsh, the raisin tasting notes overwhelming almost everything else.

And yet, when I took a sip, it was surprisingly far less harsh than I was expecting it to be, at least at first. The raisin flavour was definitely front and center, but the aftertaste was, at least for me, kind of unpleasant. It was, weirdly, a kind of sweet and sour coffee.  Sweet at the beginning, but then harsh and rough and the combination of flavours just wasn’t doing it for me.  Didn’t like it at all, didn’t finish the cup.

Still, the “Likes” still far outweigh all the others and we’ll put this one behind us and move right on to Day 13.  Roll on tomorrow.

TTFN.

 

The Pact Advent Calendar – Day 10

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So here we are at day ten and I’m still mostly managing to keep to schedule. It’s such a hardship, a new coffee every day. I dunno how I’ll survive the next two weeks (plus one day) but someone has to do it and I’ll be damned if it’s someone else!

Because it’s my calendar, dammit, and I ain’t sharing. Get your own.  Let’s look at what day 10 had for us.

This one was quite a contrast to yesterday. While the Planalto is rich and chocolatey, this is far more floral. A very strong scent of, again, something akin to dried apricots on opening the bag, so I went in expecting something bright and potentially acidic.  Turns out I needn’t have worried as it was far more well rounded than that, the floral taste not too sharp or overwhelming.

All in all a very lovely coffee, though again I’ll be curious to see what my friend makes of it as she’s not to big on the more floral flavours.

TTFN.

The Pact Advent Calendar – Day 8

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Send help.

I genuinely might need an intervention at this point to stop listening to the Moana soundtrack.  Oh god, why did nobody tell me this thing was like crack for your ears? Seriously, best Disney soundtrack in years.

Ahem. Right. Coffee!  Let’s see what Day 8 has for us.  Again, I forgot to take a picture of the shot this time round. I’m sorry, but it was 10am when I did this one and I just really wanted my first coffee of the day!

So after yesterday’s disappointment, we’re right back on track. Seriously, Pact, I’m loving this calendar so far. This one was nice, slightly fruity, apricot notes came through VERY strongly when you have a sniff of the grounds, though somewhat more muted when made into a drink it was still really lovely from first sip to last and one I’d happily buy again.

Also the shot had what has to be the crema-iest crema I think I’ve seen in a while, it was seriously like silk.  Lovely stuff all round, a big thumbs up from me and another tick in the Like column (Also, I love the name. Not a thing I’d change with this one).

Current stats!

  • Like – 6
  • Meh – 2
  • Dislike – 0

TTFN.

The Pact Advent Calendar – Day 7

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Ever see that movie Memento?  How about Paycheck (that one’s actually kinda fun) or, really, any movie about someone with amnesia?  Oooo, Amnesia: The Dark Descent, there’s a great game to play in the dark with the lights off and your headphones on.

Anyway, we’re here to talk about coffee. Specifically Day 7 of the Pact Advent Calendar! So let’s go.

Man, this one is going to be a short review. See my previous comments?  That’s kinda how I feel about this one.  It wasn’t great, it wasn’t bad, it wasn’t particularly malty or acidic, had no massively standout flavours it was just….it was a cup of coffee. A really forgettable cup of coffee. So forgettable that I forgot I drank it and forgot to do the review yesterday.

~Shifty look~

That’s totally my excuse and I’m sticking to it and you can’t say otherwise!

Fire Station Coffee – An Update

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So as readers of the blog may remember, I had a lovely Ethiopian coffee from this particular roaster but was unhappy about the customer service, specifically about the lack of feedback I got from them when I had questions about my order. I’d chalked it up as, sadly, just one of those things and moved on.

So you can imagine my surprise when, just over a week or so ago, I got a very nice message on Facebook from Jacqui at Fire Station Coffee, apologising for the breakdown in communications and saying that they’d sent me a bag of their new season Colombian beans as an apology!

Unlike the last bag, which was three weeks past roasting when it got to me, this one was a mere three days old.  Yay!

I asked Jacqui about the roasting schedule, whether they had a specific day they roasted on, and so on, and this is the response I got –

​We do not currently have a strict roasting schedule – being such a small operation at current, it can fluctuate depending on the time of year and demand. But our roaster does generally roast on a Monday and Tuesday, and will collate her orders together as our Roasters batch size is 7kg. If our demand increases Amelia may roast again later in the week.

Which is fair enough! So it’s possible that with the lot I got, there just hadn’t been a great demand for it. So that’s fine, it still tasted delicious.

Sadly (Sorry Jacqui!) I can’t say the same for the Colombian coffee. I couldn’t even tell you what it is, there’s some undercurrent, some flavour note in a lot of Colombian coffees that I just don’t like.  I’ve tried this as a flat white, where it’s perfectly decent, but nothing to write home about, but as an americano it’s very strong and just…man, it makes me want to screw my face up thinking about it.  Not a fan, really not a fan.

But I still appreciate the gesture a whole lot.  They didn’t need to do that, and it was lovely of them to make the effort to make good with a first time customer.  Top marks, Jacqui and Fire Station coffee.

Also, psst, if you look at their website (which I’ve linked above), they’re doing a 20% off all their coffee in the run up to Christmas! Give’em a looksee! They’re not doing the lovely Ethiopian coffee anymore but you can choose between Rwanda, Brazil and Colombia instead.

Also, for a second, I totally thought that “Santa’s Grotto” was the name for a Christmassy blend of coffee. I was slightly disappointed. 🙂

TTFN.

The Pact Advent Calendar – Day 5

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~Insert random song lyrics here~

Listening to White Zombie at the moment. They’re a great band, but not particularly…Christmassy.  So let’s forego the preamble and get stuck into day five!

I liked this one! Definitely quite milky and chocolatey notes there, reminded me of Cadbury’s Dairy Milk with one important distinction – I actually enjoyed it. I’m more of a Galaxy chocolate kinda guy, but this was a really pleasant coffee. We can chalk another one into the “Like” column.

I might have to try hunting some of this up again so I can try it with hot milk rather than water. I think it might make a delicious little drink like a cortado or something.  I think you’d need to go easy with the milk to avoid drowning it out as it’s quite a subtle flavour.

Right, that’s it for day five! So far this advent calendar is turning out to be a great purchase.

The Pact Advent Calendar – Day 4

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Moving on up! Your love keeps lifting me higher! Okay, cheesy lyrics aside, let’s get into day four.

So yeah! I’m pretty impressed so far.  For those keeping score we’re currently at “Like, Like, Meh” and this one is another for the “Like!” column.  Opening the bag, those floral, rich notes are immediately apparent and I will admit to spending slightly longer than usual just enjoying the scent. Yum. The grounds seemed to be a bit of a darker coffee than the ones before it as well.  It promises good things.

In the cup it’s really pleasant, I’ve gone back to making all these drinks with water as well, to ensure that I’m not skewing my opinions by mixing up the ways I’m preparing them.  It’s slightly more, well, sharp than the ones that have come before it, but not unpleasantly so, and I enjoyed it from the first mouthful to the last, with no last minute acidity lurking at the bottom of the cup.

You’re on a roll, Advent Calendar.  Keep it up!

The Pact Advent Calendar – Days 2 & 3

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Right!  More days, more coffees, mo’money, mo’…wait. No. Sorry. Off on a tangent there. Let’s crack on with days 2 and 3 so that I can start the week all caught up and on the right days.

Day 2

Day two brings us a type of coffee that, as I think I’ve mentioned before, I don’t have a good track record with.  I just dunno what it is, but a lot of Colombian varietals I find have a funny aftertaste that I just don’t get on with at all.  These days I tend to give them a very wide berth.

That said?  This one wasn’t half bad at all. I’m pleased to be able to say that the ‘Villa Rubiela’ coffee was surprisingly pleasant!  It had a lovely sweet aftertaste that lingers nicely in the mouth. I might have actually found a Colombian coffee I’d buy again. Gonna be sure to make a note of this one.

Day 3

Day three and this time we’re scooting off to Guatemala for the ‘Villaure’ coffee. One thing I immediately noticed with this one compared to the previous two was the aroma on opening the bag. I dunno if it’s just my imagination, but this one smelled much more potent than the other two.  The card says “plum tart” notes and I’d have to agree. It’s got a really rich, plummy scent when you open it up, it’s really lovely.

And again, seriously, there’s just something about the smell of fresh coffee. Tickles the pleasure center of your brain, at least it does for me!  I’m sure my long-suffering wife would inform me that “it smells like coffee” but I’ll kep trying! One day I’ll find one where she can tell the difference.

Anyway, this one I made with milk with the previous two were made with water. Just because I fancied a change, although that might not have been the best idea.  In milk this coffee was….okay.  It was nothing special, nothing particularly memorable, just smooth, pleasant and a bit forgettable. I might have done it an injustice by using it as the basis for a milk based drink, I think from now on I’ll stick with making each with water.

That’s it for days two and three, thanks very much for taking the time to read my thoughts.  We’ll be back tomorrow with day four.

The Pact Advent Calendar – Day One

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Hello folks,

So this year I’ve got my hands on a Pact Coffee advent calendar.  Now Pact and I have a bit of a love/hate relationship, I’ve been an on again/off again customer of theirs since at least 2014 if not before. I can’t see anything beyond that as they only show my last twenty orders.

Now with Pact, you can rate the coffees with a like/dislike and my order history with Pact basically goes –

  • Like
  • Dislike
  • Like
  • Like
  • Dislike
  • Dislike
  • etc, etc,

It’s nothing about Pact as a company, they’re a damn good company to do business with, very responsive and with great customer support, but I just didn’t get on with the choices of coffee a lot of the time. In fact if you look at my history, it’s an even split, 50-50 likes and dislikes.

In the end I stopped ordering from them and instead embarked on my current adventure of working my way through as many UK based roasteries I can. That said, I keep an eye on what they’re doing so when they did advent calendars for the first time last year I was intrigued, but held off.  This year, though, I decided to take the plunge with a friend of mine and she ordered two of them for us.

Hey look, round pictures. Because Christmas.

Anyway, it’s a nice thing. The box is sturdy and well made, and the coffees are all contained in individual pouches within. They appear to be a medium-fine grind while the previous year they were all specifically ground for aeropress/drip/cafetiere.  Pact haven’t specified the exact grind this year but, as I said, they seem to make a perfectly fine espresso with no indication of under-extraction. My Barista Express certainly seems quite happy to use them to make espresso and so far they’ve been nice and tasty.

We’re going to do this one day at a time. This post will be the longest as we need to set a little background, the rest will be shorter, talking about each coffee in turn, showing you the package, the info card and giving my opinions.

Without further ado, let’s crack on with day one.  You can see the pictures of the packaging above.

Silly me forgot to take a picture of the shot this time. Ah well, it was a bit late and I really wanted to actually try the coffee as I’d heard good things about this one from my friend who had already tried it. “Los Andes Honey” it’s called. I made this one with water, added a splash of milk and sugar and immediately noticed that the sweet, nutmeg notes on the info card were definitely evident.

It made very pleasant americano, no lingering acidity, a very pleasant cup all in all and one I’d think about buying a full bag of, I gotta say.  A really positive start all in all. So that’s day one down, let’s move on.  The next review will be days two and three together so I get all caught up.

24 to go because Pact, bless’em, even include one for Christmas day.

Review #7 – Ozone Coffee Roasters

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Today we’re going to be looking at an offering from Ozone Coffee.

They’ve been around since 1998 and have two locations, one in New Zealand and the other in London. I decided to give them a try as they sent me an email inviting me to sign up for a coffee subscription and offering my first bag free so I figured I’d see what they had on offer.

ozone

Now, I did have some trouble when it came time to place my order, the site initially refused to accept the code for my free coffee so I needed to ping them on twitter about it and eventually speak to someone by email to get it resolved.  They did sort it out very quickly and I was able to place my order without any further issues.

Ozone not only sell coffee, they also offer barista training, equipment and merchandise.  Their site is fairly easy to navigate, with everything being accessible through the dropdown in the top left corner.

They offer nine different kinds of coffee consisting of four house blends, four single origin choices and one decaf. I won’t list them all here, but prices range from £9 to £80 depending on the type of coffee and how much you want to purchase in one go.  They offer 250g, 1kg and 2kg options for those who like their coffee in industrial quantities!

For 250g the shipping was £3 and for 2kg the shipping was £3.50, both with Royal Mail. I encountered no issues placing my order beyond the aforementioned problem with the discount code and my order was dispatched and delivered to me quite briskly.

As you can see, it doesn’t come flat packed and it’s not what I’d describe as properly re-sealable, coming with those little twisty-tie bits instead of a ziplock like some other roasters use. Booo! But it does come with a clearly marked roasting date and one of those little cards that gives you more information about what you’ve bought.  Yay! I have a little collection of those cards now, helps me decide what I’m going to buy in future.

Now here’s where this review becomes slightly problematic.  I’ve tried this one in both my Barista Express and my syphon filter. I’ve tried it as a latte, americano and a filter drink and really all I can say about it is….it tastes like coffee. Now I’m sure some of you are going “Well what else should it taste of, Mr Coffee Blogger?” and by that I mean that I couldn’t really detect any of the tasting notes listed on the bag.

Unlike others where I can go “That tastes of berries, that tastes of spice, etc” this one simply tasted like coffee. A very pleasant coffee, I must add, but there was nothing in it that made it stand out compared to any of the others I’ve tried for review so far. That’s not to say it’s by any means a bad coffee, it really isn’t, but nor was it a standout one.

Which, as my wife pointed out, is not necessarily a bad thing depending on who you plan to be making coffee for.  One of my friends is an avid coffee drinker, but she doesn’t like coffees with a strong berry or fruit flavour to them while I tend to favour them.  My wife, also, bless her though she does try, has no real nose for coffee. I’ve plied her with multiple different beans from multiple roasters and her opinion at the end, without fail is “it smells/tastes/looks like coffee”. I could serve her coffee that costs £50 a bag, but in her words, it would be utterly wasted on her as she simply can’t tell the difference, so there’s always a place for those beans that, well, simply taste like coffee.

I’m trying not to sound like I’m damning with faint praise, the Ozone “Brothers” blend is a perfectly decent coffee, the kind of beans I’d buy if I knew I had a lot of folks coming round who really weren’t all that bothered about the kind of coffee they were having as long as it tasted good. I did enjoy it, but I don’t think it’s one I’d rush back to purchase.

Next time we’re going to be looking at what Strangers Coffee Company has to offer. Mainly because I was fascinated by the name!