Tuesday, January 10, 2012

A Great Scent Cannot Overcome The Weak Flavor Of Taster’s Choice Hazelnut Instant Coffee!


The Good: Easy to prepare, Great aroma
The Bad: Fairly expensive (especially in prepackaged tubes), Environmental impact of packaging, Weak flavor
The Basics: Taster's Choice Hazelnut instant coffee is a very weak instant coffee that is unlikely to please any serious coffee connoisseurs.


I make no apologies for my views on hazelnut coffees. Hazelnut, I assert, is a somewhat ridiculous flavor for a coffee beverage. My reasoning is simple: coffee is a bean, hazelnuts are nuts and the two are not exceptionally dissimilar in tastes when roasted. As a result, the obsession with flavoring coffee with hazelnut seems utterly ridiculous to me. Moreover, Hazelnut just seems an awfully vague flavoring for lighter coffees. As one who loves the darker roasted coffees, Hazelnut is seldom a flavor I give a second taste to.

Taster’s Choice Gourmet Hazelnut Instant coffee is not exactly changing my mind.

Basics

Taster's Choice Hazelnut instant coffee is part of Taster's Choice's new premium instant coffee line and one suspects that the company is trying to compete with the flavors from the International blends instant coffee line. This mix now comes in plastic containers easily found in the grocery store, though for my review, I was provided with premeasured samples which each create a 6 oz. cup of coffee.


Ease Of Preparation

Taster's Choice Hazelnut instant coffee mix is exceptionally simple to make. The single serving is the packet and six oz. of water. There is no measuring of the product involved, though with the canisters one needs to measure out the Tablespoon of instant coffee. This is a very simple beverage to prepare.

The top of the single-serve packet has a perforated edge and one need simply tear open the top, which is quite easy, and pour the contents of the packet into a mug that is at least eight ounces large. Then, simply pour hot water - near boiling, but not actually boiling as boiling water cooks the ingredients as opposed to simply dissolving them - over the powder and stir. Stir the powder until there are no blobs of coffee granules visible in the water. The beverage will have a translucent light brown color to it.

Taste

In the “credit where credit is due” category, Taster’s Choice Hazelnut Instant Coffee smells delicious. The aroma that comes from the mug of this coffee is nutty and delicious and actually inviting. I never thought I would describe a hazelnut coffee as “inviting,” but there you have it!

The flavor of Hazelnut coffee from Taster’s Choice is surprisingly weak. There is a slightly toasted quality to the beans that gives the favor a mildly buttery, nutty taste before the water in the coffee overwhelms the tastebuds. This is an unfortunately weak instant coffee.

The use of sugar or cream with the Hazelnut instant coffee instantly overwhelms what flavor the coffee initially had, making it taste either like sugar or milk. This is a poor instant coffee to attempt to garnish.

Nutrition

Taster's Choice Hazelnut instant coffee is a coffee mix and therefore is entirely lacking in nutritional value. There are no calories or fat in this drink, though there is caffeine. How much is a bit of a mystery to me. This is not a beverage intended to be a health drink or a drink one might survive on.

Storage/Cleanup

So long as one gets Taster's Choice Hazelnut instant coffee mix in the packet, it ought to stay usable. Visiting my local supermarket, most of the packages of this instant coffee had an expiration date over two years away. One assumes it will last quite a while and dissolve appropriately when one attempts to use it. The packets, for those of us who consider the environmental impact of such things, are terribly wasteful and expensive. The foil/plastic wrappers are not recyclable anywhere I've been.

Cleanup is very easy as well. If the product spills while dumping it into the mug, simply wipe it up or brush it up with a dry or damp cloth. If it has already been reconstituted with water into coffee, simply wipe it up. Light fabrics are likely to stain if this gets on them, in which case consult your fabric care guide to clean it up.


Overall

Taster's Choice underwhelmed me with their Hazelnut Instant Coffee, but at least they did not produce a beverage that tasted bad. This was less flavorful than I would have liked, but it was not inedible, which puts it ahead of some beverages I have had lately!

For other Nescafe Instant Coffee drinks, please visit my reviews of:
Taster's Choice Vanilla Gourmet Instant Coffee
Nescafe Peppermint Mocha Instant Coffee Drink
Taster’s Choice French Roast Instant Coffee

4/10

For other food or drink reviews, please visit my index page by clicking here!

© 2012 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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