I'll be getting two bags in the mail in a few weeks. Anybody familiar with this blend? Recommendations?

Dear F1,

It is a wide, wide coffee world and everybody has opinions.

There must be some quality to Cuvee Coffee because they have saturated the Austin market and I have seen them as far away as the Chesapeake peninsula.

Having lived in Texas and traveled frequently, I like to visit new and different cafes; I used to blog about them.

Whenever I walk into a cafe that is pulling Cuvee Coffee, I turn around and walk out. Several food professionals and one barista trainer in Texas agree with me. Sorry to post a downer while bags of it are on their way to you.

They are obviously appreciated, so please post a reply with your observations and if you disagree with me, so be it.

BuckleyT

La Famiglia is the house blend that Cuvee Coffee developed for Caffe Medici, which is one of the oldest "third wave" coffee venues in Austin. Presumably I have had this espresso at Caffe Medici's downtown location. Unfortunately, my main impression of the shots I've had there is that with a little better training and attention to detail they could be getting better results out of their coffee. I've had similarly disappointing shots at some other cafes that serve Cuvee Coffee in Austin. However, it is unfair and inaccurate to conclude that the problem originates with Cuvee Coffee.

Just last summer, Cuvee finally opened its own retail venue. Cuvee's E 6th location serves consistently good espresso, coffee and cold brew. Having tried the coffee all across Austin, Cuvee's Coffee Bar is one of my Top 3 cafes in Austin.

http://sprudge.com/cuvee-coffee-austin-cafe.html

http://baristamagazine.epubxp.com/i/452945/67

I've also had excellent shots at the brewing lab at Cuvee's roastery outside of town. Based on that experience I've long concluded that any short-comings in the espresso service at cafes that serve Cuvee Coffee-which invariably have top notch equipment-generally trace to the venue and personnel and not the coffee.

Maybe the baristas at Medici or similar aren't very good at tasting and dialing in the they are serving? Maybe the cafe managers aren't putting the baristas in a position to be successful? Hard to say what the exact problem is since there are many way to ruin a perfectly good coffee during preparation. But the problem isn't the coffee. In other words, you could sub in a different coffee and still get suboptimal espresso at the coffee bar.

One thing I have noticed about Cuvee is that they don't really go in for high dollar coffees. They generally sell coffees at a more affordable price point. So Cuvee definitely isn't known for its sexy 90+ point coffees that sell for $40 a pound. But they do travel to origin to source high quality coffee; they have direct relations with some of their growers; and, they roast these products consistently.

I hope you enjoy the espresso. I'm sure Cuvee could pull a great shot with that coffee-even if the baristas at Caffe Medici can't.

In the beginning, I bought some Cuvee, so you will have to lump me in the unskilled baristas in whose company, I admit, I belong.
The problem is, compared to all of the other many roasts that I have brewed or infused, Cuvee tastes baked.
Cuvee tasted baked to me whether it is made at Oddfellows (Dallas), Once Over, Houndstooth, or my kitchen.
What surprises me is without sharing notes, a Texas roaster and a coffee consultant, a Cordon-Bleu trained chef all came up with the same opinion, independently of each other.
I have not sampled every roast that they have marketed and I have not tried them again in the last two years, so it may have been a temporary thing, but in some quarters they have a reputation for baking their roasts.
Whether this is true or undeserved - each of us has at least the rudimentary abilities to determine for our self.
B

Oh no! lol.

The only parameter I have found repeatedly mentioned is that this coffee requires a high temperature(203-204F) for extraction. I have never had any other espresso that recommends such high temperatures. I had a shot of this coffee once three years ago at the Café Medici location in downtown Austin. The one thing I remember the most was the shot being very, very red in color.

Well, my tastes are undoubtedly more pedestrian than yours, BuckleyT. After all, you were disappointed at G&B Coffee, which is owned by a couple US Barista Champs:

First visit to G&B Coffee in Los Angeles disappointing

I'm sure we can all find an esteemed list of detractors for any roaster or restaurant, no matter how highly regarded the venue. But based on my rudimentary capabilities, I'd recommend that visitors to Austin check out Cuvee's Coffee Bar. (Houndstooth's North location and Figure 8 round out my Top 3 ATX espresso destinations, as of February 2015.)

In terms of their latest offerings, I've probably had the best results at home with Cuberow, a dry-processed Ethiopian. It's not a show stopper so much as a good representative of the region. It's pretty clean and balanced for a natural-processes coffee. I especially like pulling shots with it, as it has a wide sweet spot, which makes it pretty forgiving to work with. It's also satisfying to brew with. I don't usually bring their blends home to play with, but I've enjoyed Meritage in the shop. But even in their shop, I tend to go with a single origin espresso, whatever the barista recommends.

I'm with David on this one, but we also happen to be pulling shots on the same machine. I prefer the Cuberow to others, but the Meritage is the only other variety I ever pick up. Your tastes and your machine may very well prefer blends to SOs, so perhaps you'll enjoy the LF blend just fine. I found it too dark a roast for my tastes, but the roast doesn't really appear to be dark. I haven't tried their Reserva blend because I never saw it for sale anywhere before.

I only buy Cuvée when I'm in a bind & need to pick a bag of beans up in the neighborhood. Similar to Buckley, I go out of my way to avoid cafes who only serve Cuvée (which is quite a few in Austin). I do hope this isn't a turn off, and that you do dial in some shots you're able to enjoy!

I forgot to report back.

So I went through two bags of this coffee and unfortunately the baked flavor profile described a few posts above was true. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't great at all. I will try their other offerings like Meritage, but I will never order La Famiglia again.

I ordered La Famiglia twice or three times, then stopped. Honestly, I had great moments with the blend but was bothered by its tobacco-ish notes. Maybe that is somehow related to what others have described as "baked." Altogether I think it's a good blend but not a great one.

I am surprised, however, that there are so many critical voices about Cuvee. In my experience, they're anal about their quality. They once even sent me a roast log when I had a question about their coffee.

I've had some incredible coffees from Cuvee. In my view their best current offering is the "San Jose Ocana." What a beautiful coffee that performs so well as an espresso and as a cappuccino. A milk-chocolate base with notes of toasted nuts and some nice tingly spices and a smooth finish. Very elegant and consistent. And the beans almost smile at you, the way they look. (Not that this really matters!)

They don't offer "The Wrestler" anymore. This was a coffee from El Salvador that stood out by the ginormous size of the beans. I've never seen bigger. It also was a beautiful coffee. Then they had a Costa Rican that I would put on par with the San Jose Ocana. Sadly, that one is gone, too.

Their recent Brazilian looks very promising. I've had the Meritage once, and I didn't like it at all. Somewhat strident and not what I was looking for in an espresso.

I think their prices are really reasonable and so is their flat rate shipping. In sum, I think that their single origins are much better than their blends.
I haven't tried their Spicewood house blend but don't care for the flavor description.

I don't mind cuvee. I have ordered from them many times, but not recently. Meritage wasn't my thing, but I have a feeling they sell a lot of it. My experience with cuvee is that they are kind of like "comfort coffee". No individual taste notes really stand out (some would say that's called 'generic") but on the whole pleasant. And to mirror the previous response, the price / shipping is a plus. I can see why for the average, not prosumer customer, they would be more than adequate. And let's not forget, there are far more customers and dollars in average consumers than prosumers. That is probably the market niche they are attempting to fill.