time for more action consumer review sort of stuff, then. following on from last month (as opposed or instead of the months to come, look you see), i have gone ahead and experimented with another kind of coffee bag thing. with the previous one seeming to be reasonably popular, going on readership figures, i presume someone out there somewhere will have interest in more of similar but not the same.
politically sensitive readers should (or if they wished could) note that the manufacturer of this brand of coffee bag coffee i have tried might distress their sensibilities. not so much the company itself, but rather the place from where they hail, and the elitist, superiority culture which they advocate. but, we shall get to such later. or will if you continue to read.
so, yes, then, Taylors Of Harrogate coffee bag coffee is what i am looking at this time. those of you familiar with legends of tales of interesting things from Harrogate will be aware of my warning, but as mentioned more on that later.
in terms of the provenance, and economic cost to coffee ratio, of these coffee bags, i do believe that once again the hook which caught the fish of my money was a price offering of £2.50 for ten (10) bags, or it may well have been 10p north or south of that figure. my, that was a long sentence. anyway, from what i remember, it was Tesco what sold me them at that price, after i had observed the item on the shelf as i set about doing some regular provisions shopping for the family.
an immediate difference between these and the other coffee bag coffee things what i tried would be the packaging. whilst by no means any more subtle, it is strikingly and discernibly smaller than the previous sort (link again in case you failed to catch it above). it is an interesting thing to note, but appears to make no difference to the coffee effect. should you be buying coffee based on the size of the packaging, well, it would be fair to suggest you may wish to reconsider what is the most important aspect of coffee.
one key advantage this coffee has over the previous one is time of production, or preparation, or if you like brewing. as you may have already noted, this one is one that "only" requires two minutes in a suitable cup (filled with boiled water) to be ready. contrast that to the five minutes of the other sort, if you will, and you are getting coffee brewed to manufacturer specifications in 40% of the time, or i suppose if you counted backwards 60% faster. ergo, if you are in a hurry for coffee yet have a peculiar insistence on coffee bag coffee over, say, regular instant, here is your triumph.
that is indeed one of the bags in situ, so to speak. no, it does not really present much in the way of an aesthetically pleasing image, does it, depending on any off the beaten track proclivities you may have. to my eyes, and maybe the internet has corrupted me, that looks like something else entirely different sat in the cup, and not a coffee bag of coffee.
it is possible that you have noted (or otherwise observed) this from the packaging, but the producers, Taylors of Harrogate, have a somewhat unnerving obsession with one squeezing these bags. hence the title of this post, although goodness knows what sort of google search may have brought some of you here. this does construct a circumstance under which making a cup of coffee bag coffee is far more labour intensive (subjectively and contextually) than when one does similar with, say, instant coffee or even filter coffee. nowhere near as many calories are burned off when making them two, probably, but i am really not the best person to ask of health related issues.
for the bags themselves, the ones which are required to be squeezed with passion if not sheer vengeance, they are more perfectly serviceable than they are eloquent or extravagant. i believe the intention of the maker here was to make them functional rather than pretty, or in some way engaging to consider and look at for a while.
more on the makers, then. it is, i imagine, interesting to anyone outside of the UK that they would call themselves Taylors of Harrogate rather than, say, just Taylors, which has a stronger branding sense to it. that would probably be because the Village Elders of Harrogate have commanded that all which is of Harrogate states so in their name, so as to make all who hear the name aware of the assumed superiority, because Harrogate.
how best to describe the Harrogate experience? if you are from outside of the UK but have seen the documentary Hot Fuzz, then Harrogate is why the film should be considered a documentary. my two favourite (for now) examples of this are that time a lady in Harrogate called the police because a carol singer "had a Leeds accent", and that time a chap in Harrogate called the police to report a suspicious van. when the police calmly explained it was a Tesco van doing a home delivery, the chap protested, pointing out that "no one in Harrogate would shop at somewhere like Tesco".
above is the ostensibly finished product, then. yes, it looks a bit gaunt, pale and sickly, does it not? the way in which, say filter coffee or even instant coffee does not. but, it would be wrong and unkind to judge on appearance, what with that whole "book by its cover" ethos. although i have yet to be misled by the often generic image placed on the front of any book.
what does it taste like, then? to be completely fair (for i strive to know no other way), mostly it does indeed taste kind of like the "rich italian" blend of filter coffee what they do. alas, and also, much like the other experimentation with coffee bag coffee, there is a texture of paper to the taste. confronted with such, then, my first choice would be to make filter coffee, my second (or first if rushed) would be some decent instant, and this coffee bag coffee comes in as a third option. it would be reasonable to argue that this was my expected outcome, so no real disappointment.
rather like the first instance of buying this type of thing, a lot of the motivation rested in the nostalgia of sentimental hygiene. i still indeed recall fondly a friend serving this kind of thing. perhaps his mother was far better than i could ever hope to be, both in general and with regards to the best way to prepare such. or maybe they just bought better ones.
exactly (but not precisely) how likely is a third instance of me purchasing this sort of coffee bag coffee, and then showcasing it here? not particularly great or grand, really. both the purchase of these bags and the composure of this post pretty much mark the conclusion of the process of me getting it out of my system. unless, you know, someone fancies that they have made better, and wish to give such to me for free so as to test it.
be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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