Hello readers! You’re probably wondering what happened to the blog posts these past few months. Being frozen out is what happened. If you don’t live on the East Coast, you weren’t around for the massive polar vortexes (vortices?) which engulfed the area for the past two months. February was especially bad for us, and I had to cancel a major road-trip to Baltimore that I was planning simply because the cold made travel dangerous. That weekend I woke up to single digits and a forecast of snow for the next day, so I decided that discretion would be the better part of valor this time. At least it saved me money.

Anyhow, that’s why the posts on coffeehouses have been few and far between. Between the winter blues and the fact that frigid weather warnings existed for what seemed like most mornings this month, I made most of my coffee from bags and beans that I purchased. That brings me to this special end-of-winter post. Between Christmas gifts and runs to Wegmans, I actually managed to amass quite an impressive amount of coffee. This was a good time to try some really diverse, niche flavors and see what I could brew up. Here’s a few of the coffees I sampled during these cold months. Drink up.

This is a really good Hazelnut from Wegmans. Very nice, smooth, rich coffee. I don’t know if I agree with them calling this a “light roast” since it doesn’t have the airy, breakfast-coffee feel of most archetypal lights. It’s very flavorful; don’t be afraid to slurp it with some air (like sommeliers do with wine) to make the flavor pop on your taste buds!

Now this one, the Kona, makes a pretty decent go-to coffee, but I wasn’t hugely impressed versus my usual fare. Maybe because I was expecting it to be very flavor-forward and it didn’t seem like that to me. Still, a good bread-and-butter choice. It was a little too powerful for my stomach, so I’d recommend cold-brewing it. In fact, that sounds like a good idea. I should try that…

Now this Columbian coffee I hand picked. It had to be ground from the beans right there in the store; a process I like because I think that really lets it be as fresh as possible when you drink it. No vacuum-packing is perfect, and old grounds are old grounds indeed. This is an even better go-to I think. Truly smooth and flavorful.

This was a present from my Mom. The Archer Farms Christmas blend was really good. Pretty standard medium roast, and one that made a very tasty mug on those frigid mornings. And no, it doesn’t have any special “Christmas-themed” flavors in it like nutmeg or cinnamon. My Mom knows me better than that.