The Good: Appropriately caffeinated, Good aroma, Tastes very good
The Bad: Very expensive
The Basics: A pricey but delicious coffee, Seattle’s Best Level Three Coffee will satisfy coffee drinkers who really love dark coffees, even as it leaves their wallets drained!
My wife looks out for me in a lot of creative and wonderful ways. Online, she took a test at Seattle’s Best Coffee to try to find what might be the ideal coffee for me (at least from them). When she learned that my ideal might well be Seattle’s Best Level Three coffee, she rushed out and picked up a 12 oz. bag of it for me. And it was good, though for the expense there are other dark coffees I have recently had that I enjoy quite a bit. But, Seattle’s Best seems to know what they are doing and Level Three is a very dark coffee that manages not to be excessively bitter.
Level Three is a standard-line coffee from Seattle’s Best where the name tells one nothing about its flavor, but it is exceptionally dark and satisfying to those who like bold coffee. That said, Seattle’s Best makes one really pay for that quality!
Basics
Seattle’s Best is a premium coffee company that tries to meet the specific tastes of each coffee drinker. The standard size for Level Three is a 12 oz. bag.
The Level Three Blend is an aromatic blend that smells potently of coffee beans and it is a caffeinated blend. This is intended to be a bold coffee and it does come across as that, from the aroma to the first sip!
Ease Of Preparation
Level Three Coffee is remarkably easy to prepare, no advanced culinary degrees necessary! First, open the bag. Seattle’s Best Level Three Coffee is vacuum sealed when first purchased, so when it is opened, the bag will likely plump up a little. Then, measure out one heaping tablespoon for every two cups of water in your coffee maker. Level Three Coffee is intended for automatic (drip or percolating) coffee makers. This is NOT an instant coffee. As a result, it needs to be brewed and I use a Hamilton Beach machine (reviewed here!) with Melitta coffee filters (reviewed here!).
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, which you put the Level Three Coffee in and then brew through your coffee maker. The directions recommend making a pot at a time and serving it within twenty minutes and brewing complete pots does seem to net a more unified taste to the coffee (nothing too weak or too strong - as if the latter is possible!).
Taste
Seattle’s Best Level Three Coffee smells strong, like an entire coffee house in a single cup. The aroma is not overbearing, but it does completely hint at a coffee that is powerful and unyielding in its flavor. The smell is the perfect embodiment of a very black coffee.
On the tongue, the flavor lives up. There is a strong, noticeably roasted flavor to the Level Three beans that is exactly what the smell foreshadows. This is a powerful cup of coffee; the flavor is entirely of coffee beans, concentrated. As an archetypal coffee flavor, this is predictably bitter, but what is surprising is how that bitterness comes after a very strong roasted, almost nutty flavor. The flavor is a concentrated coffee flavor, more than anything remotely unpleasant.
With a single teaspoon of sugar, the coffee flavor does not diminish, but the bitterness is cut almost completely out, making this a pleasant, strong coffee flavor. Creamer similarly cuts into the obvious bitterness of the coffee and makes this more drinkable.
Nutrition
This is coffee, not something that appears on the nutrition pyramid! Seattle’s Best Level Three Coffee does not contribute anything to one's daily recommended allowance of anything. In fact, the bag does not have any ingredients, so I am forced to assume all that is in this blend is coffee beans, which would fit what it tastes like.
This is a caffeinated blend and it feels like it! This has enough caffeine to pop one's eyes open between the taste, aroma and caffeine. Because it is a caffeinated coffee, it appears to not have undergone any of the chemical processes that sometimes cause complications in decaffeinated coffees.
Storage/Clean-up
Level Three Coffee ought to be stored sealed in its container with the top firmly closed. Coffee is known to absorb flavors of food nearby it, so keeping the top tightly closed is highly recommended. There are different schools of thought on refrigerating open coffee and I have a very clean refrigerator with a lot of ways to segregate coffee, so I tend to come down on the side of refrigerate it. The container makes no recommendations on that count , though the bag of Level Three Coffee my wife bought earlier this week had an expiration date of mid-May 2013, so this is not a great coffee for stocking up on.
After brewing, coffee grounds ought to be disposed of. These grounds may be thrown in the trash when used or put in a compost pile, if available. Coffee grounds make great compost.
Overall
Seattle’s Best Level Three Coffee is a wonderful coffee that it brought down only by the expense of it!
For other coffee reviews, please visit my reviews of:
Folgers Gourmet Supreme Coffee
Starbucks Cafe Estima Coffee
Kahlua Coffee
7/10
For other food or drink reviews, please check out my Food Review Index Page for an organized listing!
© 2012 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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