Reviews for Orleans Coffee Exchange
Rich, deep, sweetly pungent. Earth notes dominate in the cup, but a foresty, rather smoky dark chocolate emerges in both aroma and cup, complicated by hints or raisiny fruit. Full mouthfeel, roundly muted acidity, impressively long finish resonating with earthy chocolate notes.
Intense nut-toned aroma with complications of fruit, milky cocoa, and more faintly, earth and aromatic wood. In the cup, delicate mouthfeel, soft acidity, simple yet refined flavors of caramel, nut, and hints of flowers and pungent grapefruit. Flavor fades in the finish to a dry, bittersweet chocolate.
Rather muted, mildly sweet, gingerbready aroma. Plumps up nicely in the cup, however: full-bodied, round, deep, with toasty caramel and fat, banana-toned fruit. Cleanly rich, sweet finish.
(Pre-ground coffee and roasted chicory root) Chicory strongly influences but does not dominate the coffee in this rather lively blend. In the aroma warm, spicy fruit and aromatic wood notes. Brightly and sweetly acidy in the cup, with a gentle, peppery lemon complication. The chicory has the last, tingling word in the finish.
Complex, smoky/toasty aroma with chocolate and vanilla suggestions. Medium body with a roundly smooth mouthfeel. Crisply elegant in the small cup: apricot and semi-sweet chocolate. Rich, chocolate-toned short finish, slight astringency in the long, but the chocolate well outlasts it. Superb in milk: good presence, sweet, with distinct milk chocolate and vanilla tones and a long, (once more) chocolate-toned finish.
Pungent and smoky throughout the profile, with some suggestions of semi-sweet chocolate, cedar and rosemary. In the cup the mouthfeel is lightly and pleasantly astringent, bracing rather than bitter or heavy.
Crisply rich in the aroma, with sweet apple-toned high notes. In the cup simple and engaging as an early Beatles song, with an acidity felt rather than tasted and seductively fruity milk chocolate notes. W. Morris Brown Jr. nominated this coffee with a simple tribute: "I like it."
The rather aggressive dark roast simplifies the coffee, intensifying the bitter tones, dampening the sweet, and turning hints of chocolate toward spice. The aftertaste is attractively bittersweet but thin.
Rich, sweet and clean throughout, with a chewy fullness and a tickle of acidity in the cup, an excellent balance of sweetness and bitterness in underlying structure, and a gentle fade toward chocolate in aftertaste.
A splendid, high-toned cup, soaring but complex. Floral tones whisper at the top of the profile, wine-toned fruit fills out the middle; both float on a base of understated, toasty richness.
It is interesting. The solid, rather simple profile is centered on a deep, mouth-filling, pungent richness. Buried in the pungency is an odd but not unpleasant note that I don't quite remember tasting in coffee: a sort of dry saltiness.
A natural, vanilla-toned sweetness distinguishes a low-key but lively profile. Nut and spice notes complicate the vanilla sweetness in the aroma, but by finish and aftertaste the vanilla gently (and pleasingly) dominates. Little range or dimension; the vanilla is the main act.
First pungent then complex, the aroma is full of intrigue. We get a bit less in the cup, but given the darkness of the roast what remains is still impressive: enough acidity to keep the body lively, and generally an admirable balance between the qualities of the coffee and the impact of the roast.
I wouldn't have expected a coffee so subtle to stand up to a dark roast so well. The roast only slightly mutes the heady floral tones of the aroma, while the acidity in tantalizing Yirgacheffe fashion hovers between flower and fruit. The body is hardly robust, but substantial enough to support the top notes. Only a trace of carbon.
