COFFEE -- favorite brews and flavors?

[applestar]

I like coffee and I'm a coffee snob enough to not buy ones sold in supermarket, but I'm not a connoisseur-- nor have the palate to discern anything more than "yuck" or "Oooh, this tastes great!"

We have a Keurig 1 and DH and I both like Newman's Own special blend, but I mainly buy roasted beans and grind in small batches to use in refillable pod (Ekobrew). I sometimes use a personal French press. I like to change up so have been trying French Roast, Columbian Especial, Sumatran Reserve ...Organic and mostly "free trade".

DH likes the hazelnut flavored creamer -- combination of Newmans Special Blend and hazelnut creamer smells absolutely delicious, but to me the creamer actually has a chemical aftertaste. I have to use soy-free non-dairy to avoid reactions, so most of the time, rice milk or just honey, occasionally sprinkle of ground cinnamon, sometimes blackstrap molasses. Hazelnut milk if I can find it.

Recently read about using coconut oil as "creamer". A teaspoon of coconut oil and a sprinkle of cinnamon is just DIVINE. ...I'm also planning to get the hazelnut flavor oil from King Arthur or other source at some point for the hazelnut aroma.

What's *your* favorite way to drink coffee?

[sweetiepie]

I am not near that fancy, but I definitely need my coffee. Usually a breakfast blend like Folgers. It can not be dark and yes I cover it up with Hazelnut creamer. I guess being a Norwegian I like things bland. I can't seem to find the peppermint creamer around here anymore that I like.

[webmaster]

Whole Foods Light Roast El Cheapo Special Coffee Beans for $4.98.

I grew up in San Francisco, had my first espresso in the early eighties in Northbeach, the Italian neighborhood in SF. From early adulthood I've had some great coffee from truly old school cafes around the city. I bought beans from the Castro Beanery and Graffeo from Northbeach (so good their roast is imported into Italy). I'm confident I know good coffee when I taste it and having compared a wide variety of beans, cup to cup against the El Cheapo Light Roast, I'm happy with it. Yes, there are some roasts that are better, but the El Cheapo is not bad at all, it's actually pretty good. Not the best, but it's darn good.

[catgrass]

I live in Southwest Louisiana-Community Coffee or Seaport, please. A little bit of sweetner, sometimes a little hazelnut creamer. Folgers? Maxwell House? Yuk.

[gumbo2176]

Living in New Orleans, I grew up drinking coffee. My coffee of choice is CDM Coffee & Chickory. No de-caff or straight coffee for this guy as I find them to be weak tasting.

My first recollections of coffee making was how my grandmother made it many years ago. She'd take a pot of water, get it boiling on the stove and dump her coffee directly into the pot to brew. Then she'd take out her white porcelain pot with the cheesecloth strainer and pour the coffee into it to strain out all the grinds. On another burner she'd have a pot of milk heating and when it was all done she put each pot over the pilot lights of the gas stove and let them stay hot. When she wanted coffee she'd take the pots, one in each hand and pour them equally into a coffee cup for a great cup of cafe' au lait. With today's stoves you can't do that since they don't have pilot lights. Progress pphhhhttttt!!!

When we lose power for one reason or another, I will make my coffee this way, and did so just last week when I woke up to a power outage and the coffee maker couldn't work. It brought back some fond memories.

[GardeningCook]

My husband doesn't drink coffee, but did gift me with a nice Keurig, which is perfect for me since I only drink one morning cup - rarely another one during afternoon winter months.

I enjoy trying different blends, but have yet to use the recyclable pod that was included only because since I only have that one cup a morning, grinding the beans yadayadayada just seems like too much trouble for just that one cup. But since I do have a sack of Dunkin Donuts beans (I DO love their coffee from back in my corporate office days), guess I'll be giving that a try soon.

(Oh - & for those who want to feel more "green" re: those plastic K-cups? They make excellent little seed-starting containers.)

[Sweyn]

Simple ways are often the best, like coffee with cream stirred in.

If you find a kind of plain chocolate that you like eating on its own, it will be good if broken into a few pieces, then melted in steaming coffee and stirred in. Coffee and chocolate go very well together. They are also combined in baking, not just as a drink.

[imafan26]

I am not a coffee drinker and I have definitely been influenced by my co workers

I do like the mocha coffee flavors. Summatra dark roast, and Kona Fancy (not blended 100% pure Kona coffee).

[HoneyBerry]

I am a coffee addict and a coffee snob. My favorite brand is Equal Exchange Coop - fair trade, organic, small farmers. I like dark roast and usually buy French Roast and grind it myself. Currently the coffee harvests are coming from Peru and Bolivia. I read a heartwarming story about how they transformed a drug plagued area into a cacao farm. They make the best chocolate. I used to buy their milk chocolate and it is heavenly. I don't do dairy anymore so I don't do milk chocolate at all anymore. I usually use coconut milk creamer. I love the smell of fresh ground coffee.

www.EQUALEXCHANGE.coop

[ahl389]

I love coffee, but I'm not too knowledgable on the subject. I drink it with cream, no sugar. Occasionally with a small scoop of vanilla ice cream

There is this coffee shop in Belmar, NJ called Turnstile Coffee Roasters - they roast their coffee beans there, and it's definitely some of the best coffee I've ever had. They also have great cold brew - I drink a lot of iced coffee in the spring and summer! It's nice not to drink cold brew and not have to dilute it with ice!

[applestar]

I'm still drinking Green Mountain Coffee (now Keurig) medium roast Sumatran Reserve (FT,O) and Newman's Own Columbian Especial (FT,O), and add a dash of Vietnamese cinnamon and (most recently buckwheat) honey.

But I get bored sometimes so I sometimes add "flavors" when I grind the beans. Yesterday, I added two dark chocolate Hershey kisses and a good sprinkle of stevia powder to Sumatran Reserve beans -- yum yum! No need to add anything else with this blend. I grind a re-used salsa jar full at a time which get used up in a few days.

[digitS']

I remember when you first posted this thread, AppleStar. I was trying at the time to make coffee-drinking changes.

The changes were prompted by stomach problems for which one doctor said, "no caffeine" and another said, "no coffee." The stomach problems were mostly in the past and I allowed 12 months to go by before even trying to make any changes for the request by MD#2.

I drank Yuban Colombian coffee for something like 20 years and after visits to MD#1, brought on by using anti-inflammatory meds, I switched to a blend of freshly ground decaf/caf, 2:1. I just couldn't switch to 100% decaf; I needed more/better flavor than that!

My change this year was to not drink coffee until 4 hours after rising. Early morning is just about the only time of the day when my stomach is empty . No more coffee before or with breakfast. My stomach, which had been much less trouble than 4 or 5 years ago, became even less troublesome . Making sacrifices in one area led me to toss the decaf, completely. I now drink whatever I want but I admit that I will miss an entire day of coffee drinking fairly often. Not usually, and it is more out of busyness and forgetfulness than any choice ...

A friend has suggested that the coffee acidity may have been part of my problems. I have come across information on a ground coffee called Puroast which is supposed to be 50% - 70% less acidic than others just because of roasting technique. I'm looking forward to getting some!

By the way, I really like hazelnuts but also find the creamer to have some kind of "chemical" taste. My coffee is usually black but I like many of the additions, altho honey would not even have occurred to me.

Steve

[HoneyBerry]

I love my coffee but the acid does affect my stomach. I am trying to diet and the acid-caffeine combined effect of the coffee stirs up my appetite for food. So lately I've been trying to drink less coffee. I found a great product that really works for me. The brand is "teeccino" (lower case). It is a herbal coffee substitute that tastes great, just like coffee. It is non-acid & caffeine free. Hazel Nut and Vanilla Nut are my favorite flavors. I'm making some right now. It comes in an all-purpose grind just like coffee or as 'tee bags'. For a little caffeine effect, I mix in a little real coffee or green tea. I love coffee so I was sceptical at first. I didn't think that I'd like this product, but I tried it and I love it.

[HoneyBerry]

Here are some Amazon.com images of the product:

image.jpg (5.01 KiB) Viewed 2386 times

image.jpg (5.01 KiB) Viewed 2386 times

image.jpg (5.68 KiB) Viewed 2386 times

I find it at the local health food store. Some of the big box stores stock it. Fred Meyer stocks it.

[applestar]

Sounds interesting! I'm going to keep an eye out for them.

[applestar]

OK today's surprise yumminess is a non-dairy "chai" coffee --

- Started with Enriched Rice Dream enough for half of a very large mug in a two-cup sauce pan, heated on the stove on med-low heat.
- Added two level coffee measures of my current grind (med-roast organic Sumatra Reserve ground with one square of Trader Joes dark chocolate, hefty dashes of stevia powder and China cinnamon). Not stirring at this point.
- Once the rice milk started to steam, gently swirled the sauce pan to make the coffee "bloom"(coffee grounds submerge and foam develops on the surface of the milk), added some classic Chai tea spices -- freshly ground nutmeg, ground coriander, cardamom, black pepper, a good pinch of my own hot paprika, China cinnamon, then swirled again to make them bloom, too.
- Immediately poured into a mug through a strainer,
- ...then dumped the grounds back into the empty sauce pan and added another 1/2 mug worth of vanilla flavored Coconut Dream (sweetened coconut milk beverage)
- once the coconut dream started to steam, swirled again for another bloom then strained and filled the mug.

Nice lightly foamed top. Deliciously spicy.

[digitS']

Wow!

I've said that before! AppleStar, you inspire wows!

Over the last several weeks, I have been involved in my own, simple experiments. Mostly, they have involved using soymilk in my tea . What I had to learn was that neither tea bags nor my tea ball could be used with hot soymilk. I had to make strong tea using just a little boiling water and heat the vanilla flavored, sweetened soymilk as a later addition ...

Anyway, my cabinet now has several nice (for me) tea choices. I also have the Puroast coffee beans which are fine and a can of coffee/chicory blend. I have had that before and liked it. I have also roasted and ground dandelion roots (chicory family) and used that with coffee. I mean, why buy decaf?!

Steve

[Gary350]

I have a lot of fun experimenting with coffee at home. I don't like espresso and I refuse to pay $5 a cup at Starbucks.

We have a store that has about 60 different over priced $9 lb coffees. They have free samples every days. When I find a sample I like I buy a small about 1/4 lb. I was drinking $9 Kona for a few weeks but now I am drinking French Roast the cheap grocery store brand $5 for a 2 lb can. I have a 1 cup French press, 2 different type electric coffee makers, and 3 old fashion 1950 vintage coffee pots. I can make the coffee taste different a lot of different way. I always measure the coffee with kitchen measuring spoons so I know what I have done. I also buy beans and grind them at home at breakfast. If I put a cast iron skillet in the kitchen oven on 350 or 375 or 400 or 425 degrees I can put my morning coffee in the hot skillet stir it around with a fork to change the roast flavor then make coffee with it. I have learned the longer the coffee stays in the hot water the stronger the coffee gets. 1 teaspoon of coffee in the French press for 10 minutes has the same flavor as 2 teaspoons of coffee in the electric coffee maker that only takes 3 minutes to make. The old 1950 percolator makes strong coffee if you let it cook too long, my mother use to time her coffee exactly 3 minutes with the second hand on the wall clock then it was ready to drink. Some coffee irritates my stomach, I don't like the after taste that last all day, I don't like it strong, and I like low acid coffee. I often put 1/4 teaspoon of Hershey's cocoa in my coffee with 1/2 teaspoon of Dark brown sugar and a little squirt of Carmel flavor creamer. Most people would not like my coffee I make it weaker than most people like it. If you buy a new different coffee that is to light don't throw it out, roast it in the skillet to give it a better roast flavor you might like it better.

[Gary350]

Some days coffee does not agree with me. I had coffee with breakfast this morning as usual. 3 drinks of coffee made me sick at my stomach. I poured it out.

[applestar]

It's 37°F and drizzling outside today. I had to go run an emergency errand around 8:30 before I even had the chance to have my first cup. So I filled a travel mug with a brew made with my latest batch --

Newmans organic Columbian especial ground with a H's dark chocolate kiss
+ added a heaping teaspoon of Dutch process cocoa, a REALLY good pour of pure Grade B maple syrup (a little over a tbs I think?) and a serious shake of ground cinnamon.

-- I put the lid on, rushed out to the car, got the engine started and pulled on the seatbelt, THEN took a sip... And, seriously, my lips would NOT come off the mug. I had to chuckle and settle down for several hot but tasty sips before I could back the car out of the driveway.

[digitS']

Well it makes me smile, AppleStar .

Here, I may have come up with a good decaf. It was whole beans in a bag and just sitting beside the cash register, says DD, who picked it up before Christmas. It may have been mislabeled. The little coffee shop doesn't do it's own roasting and, the company went outta business almost 3 years ago! I think the coffee shop was just using up the leftover bags! Hopefully, it wasn't mislabeled as decaf.

What do you suppose "Swiss Water Process" is, AppleStar? Don't we "process" coffee with water every time we use it? Have I already complained about this??? Bears repeating -- decaf tastes to me like reused grounds. You don't suppose that they did something like that to those beans? Anyway, this stuff from Christmas is really, very good!! DD will go back soon and ask about it.

Steve

[Brent]

I am not a coffee snob or anything, but I have not gone without a cup every morning for as long as I can remember. I LOVE this company:

itsaboutcoffee.com

They strive to sell/ship the freshest coffee possible since the best flavors in coffee can diminish quickly after roasting. If all you have ever bought is coffee from the grocery store that was roasted ages ago, you might be in for a surprise!

[applestar]

I was looking for an appropriate thread to post in and re-discovered this one

Keurig is discontinuing their rewards point program so I have to use up mine before they expire by the end of the year.

Since summer, we’ve been exploring different flavors to see if we have any new favorites. We have more coffee drinkers in the family, too — before, it was just hubby and me.

So far, we have chosen
- Newman’s Own Organic Special Blend
- Green Mountain Dark Magic
- Green Mountain Dark Magic decaf
- LavAzza Espresso Italiano
- McCafe Venice Café
- McCafe Paris Café

(another favorite not from Keurig is
- Shoprite bowl&basket Columbian medium roast)

We also decided to try to find our favorite seasonal flavors and decided we like
- Green Mountain Brew over Ice Dark Chocolate Coconut
- Starbucks Fall Blend
- Swiss Miss Peppermint Hot Cocoa mix

Rice Dream Original Enriched organic rice “milk” drink is my “creamer” of choice and I usually add to “Capuccino” line in the milk warmer/frother then add Fiesta Tropicalé organic full fat unsweetened coconut milk to the “Latte” line for extra body and froth. (standard addition is honey or vanilla infused organic cane sugar and a sprinkle of ground cinnamon Sri Lanka or China cassia)

But I’ve also discovered alternatives like
- replace cinnamon with ground pumpkin spice mix
- add unsweetened cocoa mixed with sea salt from salt shaker

Latest addition is
Califia almond milk Holiday Nog
(ugh! WHY is this image so big!!? will replace asap )

to sub for the coconut milk to add a touch of holiday flavor.

…right now, I’m enjoying a Green Mountain Double Diamond (another former fave but has lost to Dark Magic in the latest round of tasting) rice “milk”/almond nog latte with the vanilla sugar and generous sprinkling of cocoa/sea salt
— with my black sesame seeds/chopped walnut sourdough bagel slathered with butter, Violife non-dairy cream cheese St. Dalfour French Grape spread, and scattering of Violife non-dairy shaved parmesan