The Good: Surprisingly accurate flavor! Reasonably priced.
The Bad: Not overly dark coffee flavor, Lacking a nutty flavor.
The Basics: The Coffee Fool Fool's Caramel Nut Coffee is a wonderful blend that is a well-executed flavor of caramel and coffee!
Suddenly, my area is inundated with coffee from The Coffee Fool. There is a wonderful little chain of discount stores that has popped up in my area of Michigan that seems to get in coffee from The Coffee Fool. At this point in my reviews of coffee, I have had a tough time finding flavored coffees that genuinely live up to their promised flavors. One of the recent flavors I have tried that actually did live up to one of its named flavors was The Coffee Fool's Fool's Caramel Nut coffee.
Basics
The Coffee Fool is a well-established Minnesota-based coffee roaster that is expanding its influence outside the Midwest. Fool's Caramel Nut is one of the light to medium blends by The Coffee Fool and it comes in a twelve ounce foil bag. Fool's Caramel Nut is fairly (but not overly) light, but that allows the flavor of the caramel to actually compete with the flavor of the coffee and hold its own. Because it is not whole bean coffee, no grinding is required. The Fool's Caramel Nut Coffee is easily protected from absorbing scents of other foods and the bag can be resealed using the wire-based tie.
Fool's Caramel Nut Coffee is a moderately aromatic blend, but it makes up for the lack of aroma from the bag with actual flavor in the coffee when it is brewed.
Ease Of Preparation
Fool's Caramel Nut Coffee is remarkably easy to prepare, in either the french press or an automatic coffee maker! Open the bag. The Coffee Fool Fool's Caramel Nut Coffee is vacuum sealed when first purchased. After opening foil bag, procure a scoop (not included) and measure out one heaping tablespoon for every two cups of water in your coffee maker. Fool's Caramel Nut Coffee is intended for automatic (drip or percolating) coffee makers, like my Hamilton Beach coffee maker (reviewed here!). This is NOT an instant coffee. As a result, it needs to be brewed.
Consult your coffee maker's instructions for how to brew the coffee. However, as far as the basics go, you'll need a coffee filter, like the Crucial Coffee #4 permanent filter (reviewed here) we use, into which you put the Fool's Caramel Nut Coffee and then brew through your coffee maker. The directions recommend making a pot at a time.
Taste
The Fool's Caramel Nut smells sweeter than straight-out coffee, which gave me an initial hope for the blend. The scent is clearly that of coffee, but it has a mild underscent (the nasal equivalent of an undertone) of something sweeter.
On its own, in the mouth, the Fool's Caramel Nut tastes like pre-sweetened coffee. The flavor is distinctly that of coffee, but without any real bitterness to it. Instead, the sweetness competes with the pure coffee flavoring. As the coffee lingers on the tongue, the true caramel flavoring actually presents! Especially as the coffee cools a bit, the Fool's Caramel Nut begins to embody a very true flavor of caramel, blended into the more overt coffee flavor. While there is no clear taste of nuts in the Fool's Caramel Nut, the caramel flavor was surprisingly evident and that makes it winning to me!
With even a basic creamer, the coffee and caramel flavors get entirely muted. This is a well-flavored coffee, but it is not at all a strong flavor of coffee.
The Fool's Caramel Nut does not have a noticeable aftertaste, which is a pleasant surprise for a coffee.
Nutrition
This is coffee, not something that appears on the nutrition pyramid! The Coffee Fool Fool's Caramel Nut Coffee does not contribute anything to one's daily recommended allowance of anything. In fact, the only ingredient for the cofee is 100% High Grade Arabica Coffee.
This is a caffeinated blend, but it does not feel like it, given that it is a somewhat mild blend. This has enough caffeine to energize the consumer, but not pop one's eyes open. Because it is a caffeinated coffee, it appears to not have undergone any of the chemical processes that sometimes cause complications in decaffeinated coffees.
Fool's Caramel Nut Coffee is not marked as Kosher or with any other dietary notes.
Storage/Clean-up
Fool's Caramel Nut Coffee ought to be stored sealed in its container with the bag’s top folded down. Coffee is known to absorb flavors of food nearby it, so keeping the bag folded tightly closed is highly recommended. The bag came to us fresh and would have lasted until its October 31, 2016 expiration date had we not consumed it all before then!
After brewing, coffee grounds ought to be disposed of. This is not an ideal coffee to make a second pot with (second brewings I attempted came out 1/4 as potent as the first brewing), so this is not an ideal coffee for the coffee miser. These grounds may be thrown in the trash when used or put in a compost pile, if available. Coffee grounds make great compost.
Overall
The Coffee Fool Fool's Caramel Nut Coffee is surprisingly good for anyone looking for a sweeter, lighter, dessert-like coffee!
For other coffee reviews, please visit my reviews of:
Dunkin’ Donuts Cinnamon Coffee Roll Coffee
Four Sisters Coffee Caramel Coffee
Leelanau Snicker Cookie Coffee
7/10
For other drink reviews, please check out my Drink Review Index Page for an organized listing!
© 2016 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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