Kohana Panama is silky smooth with  flavors of smoky cinnamon toast and rose.

The one thing I can say about Kohana coffee, at least so far, is that the coffee is unique. I think at this point I could pick out a cup of Kohana in a blind taste test.  The aroma is smokey and slightly exotic…You guys know how weird I am when it comes to personifying coffee, right? Well this coffee is a mysterious, wealthy traveler on the Orient Express. Very Art Deco. Miss Scarlet in a game of Clue.

Panama is a coffee for curling up in a comfy, slightly faded chintz chair, by a fireplace on a chilly autumn day. Pair it with a good mystery and slice of fresh brioche, toasted and  slathered with butter.

On the Marye Coffee Scale Kohana Panama gets a 4.75 out of a possible 5. I love the uniqueness of this coffee.

images:Marye Audet

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This morning we tore into the bag of French Konnexion.

French Konnexion is a Peruvian coffee (I just typed Koffee ), French roasted and the site describes it as chocolate-caramel-hazelnut. Hmmm.

As usual, I am tasting something totally different. Geez y’all, I hope my taste hasn’t been affected by the surgery! I just thought of that. Naaah….

I liked French Konnexion but not as well as the Morning Mayhem.. Here’s what I thought:

Very smooth, slightly smoky. Not burnt, mind you, but a nice smokiness like if you were drinking coffee in front of a campfire in the early morning, with a couple of trout fryin’ in the pan along with your bacon. That kind of smoky.

A little more acidic than the Mayhem and not as sweet or rich. Cumin, Cinnamon,Herbs, and Anise make this seem more Aztec than French! Bright finish flavor reminds your tongue you have been drinking coffee. I liked it alot and I am giving it a 4/5. Point lost because it was a little too acidic for my idea of perfect coffee.

While I found Morning Mayhem to be elegant and complex, I found French Konnexion to be straightforward and obvious. Plaid flannel, canoes, and hiking boots, with a day’s worth of beard stubble. My money says that Mike at Daily Shot of Coffee is going to like Konnexion better than Mayhem…

I am going to be ordering coffee at Kinetic Koffee. Although Mayhem will ALWAYS be in that order I am interested in trying some of the other coffees. Added bonus? Organic, and they donate to excellent causes. The price is amazingly reasonable.

image:Kinetic Koffee

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Light Up Las Olas is a dark roast, blended from Columbian and Brazillian coffees. The aroma of the beans is spicy and licorice-y.  Nice.

The flavor is described on the site as having notes of cocoa. Eh. Maybe.

The flavor is warm and smoky, a bit too acidic at the end for my tastes. Slight nuances of marshmallow on the intake, makes you think you are going to have a toasted marshmallow flavor but at the last minute it morphs into almost an amaretto-pecan.

Oddly, with the flavors invoked this is not a smooth coffee. After the first few sips you lose track of the flavor of it and it becomes just coffee.

On a scale of 1-5 it gets a 3. There is nothing outstanding about it and yet it isn’t bad. I liked it much better sweetened and cream added.

By the way? If you are interested, you can follow me on Twitter… never a dull moment I promise.

Image:Boca Java

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Inspired by the international favorite and original New Orleans dessert, this is a triple-treat pleasure! Bananas Foster Float mixes banana, cinnamon, brandy and brown sugar into a base that’s full-bodied and complex. It offers an outrageously delicious taste sensation.

The flavor is somewhat subtle, lingering in the aftertaste rather than identifying itself in the fore-taste.  This was somewhat disconcerting to me…I am not sure why.  There was the sip of a medium to light roast coffee, bright and with moderate acidity and then after the swallow the banana flavors wafted back around my mouth reminding me that the coffee had been flavored.  It was a unique experience.

I have had coffees that have more intense flavor, but none that had the subtlety of this coffee.  I am not saying that I liked it better or worse than other brands I have had…just that it was unique in the way the flavor presented itself.

I did not taste brandy, brown sugar, nor cinnamon.  I have rather a sensitive sense of taste, I am generally able to recreate a recipe after having eaten it one time, but this coffee did not bring any of those flavors to mind.  I would drink this again, but I don’t know that I would buy it again.

The coffee I liked best from Boca Java was the first one I reviewed, South Beach Rhythm.  The two flavored coffees I tried came next, with the Tropical Kiss coming slightly ahead of the Banana Foster Float.  The Boca Villa was last on my list, and my least recommended.  I have ordered 4 more coffees from Boca Java, and will be reviewing these in about a month.

image: Boca Java

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Boca Java Tropical Kiss has an intense coconut flavor that fades out into lingering Belgian chocolate euphoria.  Usually with black coffee the flavor is not apparant.  This is not true with the Tropical Kiss.  The flavor is a bit more adult, a bit less sweet, maybe somewhat more subtle but it is there in the black coffee.  Add a few tablespoons of cream and sugar and you are back to drinking an Almond Joy bar.

This is a great afternoon coffee with a light snack of carrot cake, white chocolate macadamia nut cookies, or coconut macaroons.  It is not  rich enough to be an after dinner coffee, in my opinion.  Not enough richness in the mouth…but as an afternoon pick me up? Perfect.

Give it a try, and let me know what you think.

image:Boca Java

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This was the second coffee that I tried from Community Coffee.  FIrst of all, if it has been awhile since you tried their coffees they ahve a totally different flavor than they used to.  I loved the Sumatra that i got.

The Rwanda is a medium roast.  I was interested to read that the coffee trees used were form fifty year old root stock.  That guarantees that there has been no tampering with the DNA!

But there is more.  This is from the website:

After the civil war and genocide of 1994 in Rwanda, Community Coffee Company took steps to cultivate personal and business relationships with the country’s coffee growers. In fact, we were the first U.S. coffee company to import Rwandan coffee beans. In order to help with the recovery, we offered to pay premium prices for Rwandan beans. Our partner, the Maraba Coffee Cooperative, distributes these proceeds responsibly and evenly throughout its local community with one-third of the monies received used for medical, educational and social programs.

I was all set to love the Rwanda coffee even though it was a medium roast.

The beans were dry looking and less oily than the Sumatra that I tried.  In fact there was no oil visible.

This has a nice aroma with a faint smokiness and the coffee brews up dark.  The coffee has a distinct flavor and a definite acidity.

In trying to come up with the flavors I have typed and erased several words.  It is very unique.  Herbal and woody come to mind, with an aftertaste that is almost like grapes. This is not the rich coffee that the Sumatra was.  This is an afternoon pick me up cup, bright and lively.  Definitely not one to pair with pastries or sweets.

This would be a good coffee to enjoy with a full flavored sandwich ( maybe rye and swiss).  It is not my favorite.  I prefer the rich, smooth coffees and this one is too in your face for my taste.  But it is an excellent coffee in its own right, and well worth trying.  But try it soon.  This is a seasonal coffee and will only be available through March.

images:marye audet (c)2009

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I am seriously going ot have to start ordering coffee since I think I have gone through all of the Starbucks coffees.  It stinks that I can’t pick up coffee locally because it makes it so much easier…I am sort of spontanious (read that unorganize) so it is hard with my time constraints to hunt down coffees.  Anyway..Just for you.I tried the Komodo Dragon Blend, from Indonesian grown beans.

Starbucks describes it as “earthy, herbal, and spicy.”

How do I describe it? Hmmm…

Have you ever bit into the white part of a grapefruit?  It has that bitter taste that makes the sides of your tongue feel numb.  I did not taste spice at all.

It is a bold roast, but has none of the complexity of the Kenya.  The acrid bitterness stays on your tongue long after you have swallowed the coffee and cream and sugar only intensifies the experience.

Nope.  I didn’t like it.   I can’t find anything redeeming about it except that it is hot and caffeinated…Buy this one at your own risk.

Image:Starbucks

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When ever I see an email from Peggy I promise you I open it up pretty quick.  She is, after all, the one that pointed me in the direction of Ugly Mug.  So, when I got her email the other day I stopped what I was doing and read it.

She had tried a new Fair Trade coffee that was Decaf…and liked it.  Her taste is very close to mine so I trust her that it is great.  I would try it and review it myself except De-caf and Di-vorce are very similar terms here at the Audet house..we take our caffeine seriously.  Check out her review on her very cool blog,Light Green Stairs (which always sounds like an Alfred Hitchcock movie to me.)

Don’t forget to check out the Kettle and Cup Holiday Gift Guide…You might find something you want..You will definitely find something I want.

image: (c) marye audet

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I liked it!

This coffee is blended from beans from East Africa, Latin America and Indonesia.  In a word I would describe it as….

Yummy.

The company describes it as roasty sweet.  Now, when I think of roasty sweet I think of campfires and toasted marshmallows so I am not describing it that way, ‘k?

First of all it is smooth.  That is the first thing you notice about this coffee.   It is slightly sweet, low acid and, yay, no weird aftertaste.

Best of all it is organic and Fair Trade…AND it has a pretty package.  Really…can you do better than that? I think not.

Of all of the Starbucks coffee I have had I like this one the best.  It is mellow, strong, rich, and the aroma will pull you out of bed in the morning.

And continuing the house tour….

This is where I often have my first cup of coffee. Marc brings it to me every morning, or he used to before…

Anyway.  I love my room. I have alot to do yet, we are changing out the wood trim.  You can’t see the fireplace to the right of the cradle.  My dad made that cradle for my first child and all of our kids have slept in it.  The antique hatbox at the bottom of the bed was my mothers and is full of hats from the 40s, and 50s…including a leopard skin looking pillbox with a matching clutch handbag.

The quilt hanging over the end of the cradle is called Crown of Thorns, I made it for my dad as a Christmas gift years ago.

I have added a large ocmfy chair by the window that has fabric that matches the border and bedpread, the theme of this room is roses.

I sponge painted the walls in two colors of a buttery creamy yellow, one about 2 shades darker than the other…you can’t tell in the picture but it looks like parchment.

The window to the left of the bed used to be a door out to an upper porch. We are trying to decide whether or not to go to the expense of restoring that porch.  It is just the den roof now. :/

So..where do you have your first cup of coffee in the morning?

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Celestial Seasonings has been one of my favorite grocery available teas for years.  As an artist I really love their packaging, and as a *greenie* I love the organic/Fair Trade mentality.  This is a warm, fuzzy company if I ever saw one, and I know that somewhere there is someone at Celestial Seasonings wearing birkenstocks and an organic cotton shirt, and reading 19th century poetry.

Imagine my glee, absolute and complete, to read this morning that they are sauntering in tot he coffee market with a new line of organic, fair trade coffee.  100 percent natural they are available in five flavors, Morning Thunder(TM), Decaf Morning Thunder(TM), French Roastaroma(TM), Caramel Mocha and Vanilla Hazelnut.  The coffees will be available in ziploc bags to help keep the flavors sealed in.

The coffee are shade grown, as if we loyal fans of Celestial Seasonings would expect any less, to help create a healthy environment for the migratory birds, the local eco-system, and as an added bonus, the beans mature more slowly in shade giving them more depth and intensity of flavor.  Celestial Seasonings is using a indirect heat, hot air roasting process to pull the most flavor out of the beans without scorching.

And look..they kept the really cool artwork, too!

The coffee should be available at your grocers in the next few month or is available at the Celestial Seasonings Website.  I am going to try to get some and  I will let you know what I think.

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