As I've been going through my side-by-side comparisons, almost everything that's non-flavored has been single-origin. Ecuador. Volta. Ivory Coast. Ghana. For the most part they seem to follow a similar theme on flavor and aroma depending on roast level. In this time, I've also had a couple of the darker roasts that were hard to drink black. They're usually ok if I doctor them up with some vanilla almond milk, but it makes for an uneven playing field when comparing one variety to another.
I got the idea a long time ago to blend some of the harder to drink ones with varieties I like better to see if it made them easier to drink, but it wasn't until I started doing a full comparison of Crio Bru's Uber Dark against everything else that I started giving it a try. In that scenario, though, I'd usually start with a separate cup of Uber Dark and whatever I was comparing it to, and once I got down to below half in each cup, I'd pour one into the other and drink the last bit together.
The really surprising thing when I did this was that no matter what I paired it with, it seemed to muddy all the flavors so much that anything that was normally a stand-out for a given variety was just about completely wiped out in the blending process. For example, Uber Dark's really dark roasty flavor seemed to go away, sometimes completely, even if I mixed it with a french roast. And likewise, if the other variety was, say Ivory Coast, with a strong earthy component to it, that would be gone as well. The resulting blend was like all the flavors were just snapped to the middle and all variety was gone. In fact, the whole thing felt like the beginning of my brewed cocoa journey again, with everything tasting the same! That was when I decided I needed a more formal testing structure around blends, and that's what this is the beginning of.
It's easy enough to compare one variety to another, but once blends are introduced, I can't just do a simple win/lose anymore. I don't know that I'll ever score these, but I at least want to keep track of my experiences for a bit.
At this point I've done post-brew blends with probably about eight varieties against Crio Bru's Uber Dark. This is the first one I've done where I blended the grounds before brewing rather than blending after. I did one tablespoon of each variety for each blend, making it an even 50/50 split. So the first question I wanted answered is: Does it matter if I blend before or after brewing? In short, I think the answer is no. From what I can tell, it seems to work about the same either way.
I tried to pick two fairly different origins to blend with Uber Dark for this test. I'm not sure that I did well enough in that, though. I maybe should have chosen Ecuador and Ivory Coast, as I feel like the differences between those two are a little stronger. Given all of that, these two blends are so similar that even side-by-side, they're really hard to tell apart. The flavor differences that the Ecuador and Volta bring to the table are so barely imperceptible that these may as well be the same. The main difference between the two is in the aroma, not the flavor.
The Ecuador blend maybe has a slightly sweeter and more pungent and roasty aroma, which is even less pronounced in the flavor. On the Volta side, I can pick out a slightly more earthy tone in the aroma, but it's pretty much gone in the flavor. What each does have going for it is that it mutes the strong roasty flavor of Uber Dark enough that it's pretty enjoyable to drink.
In some ways, this is what I expected, but it does leave me with some questions to answer in future blend comparisons:
If I do a comparison where none of the 4 parts are the same variety, how much does that change the flavor? So if I did, say, Ecuador + Volta versus Ivory Coast + Uber Dark, how would that turn out? Would the blend with Uber Dark still have a much more roasty flavor?
If I alter the ratio of the blend, how much does that alter the end result? Would a 25/75 split of Uber Dark to [something else] make much difference?
The first sip of EIC actually has all the flavors of both roasts: the roasty and pungent flavors of Ecuador and the earthy flavor of Ivory Coast. It's a bit of chocolatey all over, although the Ecuador comes out stronger in the aroma. In comparison, the VUD has a good bit of roasty aroma and flavor, too, and is also fairly chocolatey. In my opinion, both blends are better than their darkest component on its own.
Even at half strength, as I switch back and forth, the Ecuador comes out quite strongly. It's not nearly as strong as drinking it on its own, but at the halfway point through each cup, the Ivory Coast earthy tones are nowhere to he found. I like the VUD more than EIC.
Adding vanilla almond milk to the VUD really brings out the chocolatey flavor. Actually it does the same for EIC, but the chocolate flavor is slightly different due to the Ecuador's pungency. They're both really good like this, though. I think the EIC keeps a tiny bit of the smoky roast flavor, which is the main difference, but the VUD is really almost like straight chocolate, with just a hint of grainy flavor first. I still like the VUD better.