Heavy and sweet chocolate smell, but lighter on chocolate flavor
Amount of grounds:
2 tablespoons per 10 oz of water
Brewing time:
8.5 minutes
Additions:
None
Reusing grounds:
Not tested
Using grounds in food:
Not recommended. Contains husk.
General Thoughts:
It smells really good and chocolatey, but the flavor is lighter than you'd expect it to be from the aroma.
I actually tasted a difference! The Double Chocolate actually tasted slightly sweeter and more like chocolate, and it smelled way more like chocolate. In fact, it kind of hit me that considering that all of this is technically chocolate to begin with, there may be something strange afoot. I found that the Double Chocolate has "chocolate flavor and vanilla flavor" added, whereas the other varieties don't have extra added flavors. So that means that this is more akin to a flavored coffee, such as vanilla or maple or one of the other varieties that my wife likes to get.
It's good to know, but considering that the Double Chocolate is $3 more for a 10oz bag, I'm not sure if it's worth the price.
Rematch 1
It's been a long time since I've had the Nicaragua roast, and it's more bitter than I remember, but it's decently chocolatey. It does remind me a good bit of dark chocolate. Drinking the double chocolate next to it, the double chocolate comes across as almost sweet and very chocolatey, closer to milk chocolate, in a way. Going back to the Nicaragua after the DC, the bitterness is definitely more pronounced, but it's still decently chocolatey and quite good. In the end, I prefer the double chocolate over the Nicaragua quite a bit, although it still seems weird to me that it has added chocolate flavor. It almost feels unfair putting it next to any of the non-flavored roasts.
My last flavored side-by-side! It's pretty much what I expected. The double chocolate has a slightly more bitter flavor to it, I think because it's "just chocolate", but they're both good, and the caramel is the definite winner.
At first, and starting with the cinnamon, these two almost seemed quite similar to begin with. But once I went the other direction, from double chocolate back to the cinnamon, the similarity disappeared. The "sweetness" of the double chocolate really kind of makes some bitterness and blandness of the cinnamon flavor stand out. On its own, the cinnamon is okay, but when compared to something like the double chocolate, it really doesn't do well.
There isn't really a lot to say here. Spicy chocolate is spicy, chocolatey chocolate is chocolatey, and I prefer chocolatey over spicy.
For this round, there was a little extra of the peppermint grounds (about 1 tbs) in the french press because otherwise I wouldn't have had enough to do another cup, so this round is just a little stronger. I kind of wish I had tried this earlier because this is one variety that I think benefits from having a little extra grounds to process. The flavor overall is just a tad stronger, bringing out mostly the chocolate side a bit more. The peppermint is still very obvious, but it's not a "hit you over the head with flavor" type of situation. I think it's better than my previous cups, but I don't think that it would have necessarily changed any of my previous side-by-side preferences, though. Plus, I wouldn't have gotten this far with it if I had done 3 tbs in every cup.
As far as comparing it to the double chocolate, I just prefer the double chocolate flavor to the peppermint.
There's not much to say on the pumpkin spice side that hasn't already been said in other side-by-sides. The I strongly prefer the double chocolate to it.
As far as the double chocolate, this is the first time in a very long time that I've had it. In terms of side-by-sides, I've only ever compared it to the Nicaraguan Medium roast, and that was back before I had my brewing methods really dialed in to at least make things even. That being said, it really is very chocolatey. I'm not sure how they add more natural chocolate flavor to something that's already comprised 100% of chocolate, but they did it. It really does remind me of an unsweetened hot cocoa. The chocolate flavor and aroma are both pretty strong. It's good, and I can see why it's popular, but in a way I kind of feel like it's cheating to get there. But that being said, I'd have no problems drinking it if I had a big bag of it.
This is another one that I'm a little surprised that it's this hard to tell them apart. I can definitely taste the vanilla in the vanilla roast, but the double chocolate also has added vanilla flavor, so there's a lot of crossover. The double chocolate seems to have a flavor that is just slightly more bitter than the vanilla, which I think is just harkening back to the nature of the unsweetened chocolate. It's a really close call, but I think I like the vanilla just a tiny bit more than the double chocolate.