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I'm not brand-loyal, but I use whole bean, and prefer African coffees. Trader Joe's has an Ethiopian blend I like, and World Market carries a Kenya AA that is good.
Stumptown French roast, fresh roasted and ground at home for every pot. Here in the PNW we know coffee. The rest of the country is hopeless.
Like he said Not that the Stumptown is my favorite, but the choices in the poll don't include any of the good stuff, except Starbucks. I buy Allan Brothers coffee, whole bean, and grind it for each cup.
The reason that it is very hard for most people to brew good coffee at home, despite the quality of the beans, is their coffee maker doesn't heat the water hot enough. This crosses the gamut from cheap makers to the very expensive. Their guts are all mostly the same and essentially consist of a thermo-siphon made mostly of plastic. They fall far short of the 192F-195F needed to brew coffee.
At one point, a couple of years ago there was only one brand that would reach and hold the required temps, the Technovorm. This unfortunately is an expensive coffee maker, but if you are spending a lot of money on beans, then it would be worth it. Your other option is to learn to use a vac pot, but good stainless steel vac pots are hard to find these days They make excellent coffee however.
The other option are the K-cup brewers. These do reasonably well with brew temps, but the issue there is the coffee. Ground coffee goes rancid rather fast and purchasing it in those cups, you are paying prices far more than it's worth if you were buying the beans. It's best if you fill your own cups.
I don't use a coffee maker. I put a filter in a melitta cone, put in the coffee beans, and pour hot water from a kettle. It's pretty easy if you're making just one or two cups.
I drank different Starbucks flavors starting in 1993, when they rescued us from the "flavored" coffee that had become endemic in Washington, DC. I drank two cups a day until 2003, when I got bronchitis at Thanksgiving, coffee tasted awful, and I drank tea for ten years. In late 2013, I started to drink coffee again, but only a cup a day, made in a Melitta single-cup cone. I've tried Starbucks Pike Place Roast, which I like a lot, some from Trader Joe's and a local supermarket. I haven't yet found one I like more than Pike Place, but I mean to buy a bag of Intelligentsia next. When I was younger, I bought coffee at McNulty's in Greenwich Village, but I don't live there anymore.
I'm not picky, I can drink store brands and they're fine with me. Right now I'm drinking Krispy Kreme coffee I bought at Sams.
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Not that the Stumptown is my favorite, but the choices in the poll don't include any of the good stuff, except Starbucks. I buy Allan Brothers coffee, whole bean, and grind it for each cup.
