Thumper's Law Applied to Coffee

This review is somewhat "lukewarm."  (Pun intended)

You may recall from the movie,"Bambi," when Bambi is presented to the forest, Thumper makes a comment that Bambi is "kinda wobbly."  It was then that Thumper's mother made the statement, "If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all."

I had to actually turn to wikipedia to recall who said what because for years I thought it was Bambi's mother who made that famous quote.  The moral (according to wikipedia) is now known as "Thumper's Law."

I said all that to say that I've grown to know Blue Bottle as one of the premiere coffees of the Bay Area, if not the country.

I only buy it occasionally because I never want it to become ordinary.  So, the other night, while eating at one of my favorite Mexican restaurants, I noticed a bag of "Retrofit" beans.  I remembered "Retrofit" was a darker roast, or actually an espresso roast. 

I picked up an 8 ounce bag which was somewhere in the neighborhood of $8.50.

The next morning, I dropped the bag of beans into the grinder and brewed up a fresh pot.

And while I would never say that the Blue Bottle Retrofit isn't good, I will say that it wasn't what I expected.  It was definitely good coffee, but not great coffee.  I don't like to give less than flattering reviews.  The fact is, I try lots of coffees that never make it to my blog because "if I can't say something nice, I don't want to say anything at all."

My principle behind that philosophy is that coffee is truly in the eyes or taste of the drinker.  And while I might not think a coffee is great, someone else might think it's "out of this world."  I'm not an expert.  I just love coffee.

That said, while it was a very good coffee, pleasant enough, and I drank it for two mornings in a row, I couldn't help but feel that it wasn't the "Blue Bottle" I had come to know and love.

In all fairness, it could have been my method of brewing (i.e. measurement, etc.).  When time permits, I plan to visit a Blue Bottle cafe and have the "experts" prepare me a cup of "the real deal."