The Big Championship - Round 1!

Round 1 - Costa Espresso!

Happy Monday everyone! Hopefully the last time I ever say that! Sorry for the delay, I don't really have much of an excuse bar getting caught up on Arrow, Flash, Supernatural and other TV shows over the weekend and getting abit sidetracked. But watching them gave me a great idea to blog about for the next couple of weeks (first ever topic! I'm so excited! Woop Woop!). Most of the people reading my blog are from the United Kingdom and according to the analytics tracker on the site, also from parts of America and Ireland (I'm shocked it has actually reached far!). But that is great becuase we we all share the same major coffee shops.

So getting down to my idea, I'm going to go out and challenge all the coffee shops and compare them for the world (or small amount of people that care) to see! The plan is to go into each of these coffee shops, have a coffee or 2 depending on how quickly I am able to write up some notes, then buy some of their own ground coffee and try it using my normal method as well. Meaning I get an all round feel for how the coffee of the shop tastes and should taste. All these results are going to be published on Sunday as usual (hopefully!) and will be non-bias and completely based of my tastes alone, although atleast it will be fair. So without further adieu, the first coffee shop to step into the ring, give it up for COSTA!

Costa Espresso coffee is packed with flavour and a delightful aroma to go with, a smell which a coffee shop would expect to have. The flavour of the coffee really hits the tongue and fills the mouth with an intense impact, and the aroma from the ground coffee is so divine and the slow roasting is what has produced that great smell. These quality's are both great, bursting with flavour and an aroma that makes my senses tingle, yet this coffee is just not up to the quality I would expect for a major coffee shop. The unwelcoming after taste not to mention the dry tongue feeling that you get after taking a few sips are not great for a coffee you are paying a lot of money for. That all being said the coffee is nice and with a touch of sugar (which I don't take, I'm sweet enough!) could be fairly enjoyable, but lets dive in deeper.

The Bitterness is its major downfall. It hits as soon as you have swallowed, leaving you with an intensely bitter after taste and a dry tongue to rival sandpaper. As much as the coffee fills your mouth with flavour for the few seconds that it is in there, that flavour quickly betrays you, turning bitter and leaving a dry feeling which lingers far longer than the rich flavour. Making this its biggest downfall.

The Richness is great (not fantastic but better than mediocre), yet as explained above, this lasts for no longer than a few seconds before betraying you. Although in that time this coffee's flavour really blasts around your mouth. It has your typical coffee flavour with a burst of intense sensation which really gets the senses on the tongue going. Yet I would say this is not great for your non intense coffee drinker, although would be good for the morning get me out the door to work coffee drinker!

The Aroma is 50/50, meaning that half of it is great and amazing, when your smelling the ground beans and they are pulling the senses in and making your mouth water with the smell. Then the other half being when the coffee is brewed, this is the complete opposite effect and basically terrible, the smell basically vanishes and their is no pulling on the senses or mouth watering, it is just 'meh'.

As I said I was catching up on TV as my excuse I think it only fitting I use an introduction from one. So let me introduce The WINBEANS and BEANTIEL!

Bitterness - 1 out of 5 Beans

Richness - 3 out of 5 Beans

Aroma - 3 out of 5 Beans

**A wise man can learn more from a foolish question than a fool can learn from a wise answer.**