Good site, +

Best in the past.

Blue Mountain at a coffee shop in Philadelpia's Chinatown. It was a Japanese coffee shop tha made each cup fresh. $8/cup in 1996.

I consider Kona to be very good.

I drink a lot of Kona when I'm at my pad in Oahu. I don't really find it to be any better than some of the other varieties of coffee, but I do think it is very good.

Coffee is definitely a "taster's opinion" brew. I've got friends that would rather fight than switch from their sacred Dunkin Donuts coffee. Others insist Peets coffee is the best. Others love Starbucks, and on the list goes for thousands of brands and hundreds of varieties.

A few things (SEVEN ACTUALLY) that I have found are important to at least try and get the best brew you can at home or on the road are listed below. This comes from over 25 years of chemistry in the Barista area of my kitchens, from watching people around the world enjoy the brew, and sampling different combinations.

1. I always start with COLD filtered water out of the fridge. No tap water at room temperature, and for heavens sake NO HOT WATER unless you are doing a coffee press... then boiling hot.

2. I store my beans in the freezer to preserve freshness. This is not as important as it is with ground coffee. Ground coffee starts to deteriorate via oxidation the moment it's ground and that's why vacuum sealing is used to preserve freshness. You should store ground coffee in a sealed container in the freezer to preserve freshness as long as possible. Beans have a more stable shelf life, so I prefer them. I only grind with a burr grinder, not with a blade grinder. I like my beans ground and not chopped to death.

3. I prefer perking when I have the time. Drip when I don't. I'm not a fan of French press. I did this exclusively for years when I lived in Paris and I think it's akin to boiling coffee. Just not my preference. What is? Old fashioned Perking IMO yields the finest coffee in the home, but you have to master the perking process and know when to stop so you don't bitter the coffee through over-perking. Or you may under perk and you've got coffee flavored water. I do a regular percolator. You can do electric percolators that time the perking process for you and shut off the perking process automatically, or you can do stove-top percolators that don't. If I do drip I NEVER do drip coffee into a glass or metal pot that sits on a burner. This tarnishes coffee unless you plan to drink it fast. I use a drip maker that drips into a thermal carafe like a Cuisinart. This gives you about an hour of hot coffee that does not continue to cook, but merely stays hot in the carafe waiting to be enjoyed.

4. Experiment with creamer, milk, skim milk, 2%, and maybe even evaporated milk. You never know what is going to tingle your taste buds when it comes to coffee. Black? With milk? With sugar? Cream and Sugar? After years of testing, the best for me is cold skim milk (about a quarter cup) poured in the cup FIRST, then immediately followed by steaming freshly perked coffee. to MY taste, this tends to mellow the brew just a tad and take any harshness away.

5. I can't choose an all time favorite. When you really master the perking or brewing process, it's more fun to move around between varieties and brands. One month it may be Kona. The next it could be Peets, the next could be Jamaican Blue Mountain, and the next... who knows. Variety keeps my coffee taste evolving. And you never know, you just may find a bean that you think is the bomb. One that takes you by surprise and you say "Wow. this is the greatest tasting coffee I have ever had".

6. When I'm out and about, I do multiple coffee shops that are different in each city. I prefer smaller chains or mom and pop places. Many are ONE SHOP WONDERS. Many of these tiny chains or mom and pop roasters do have online ordering and you can, if you find a fave while traveling, order some for yourself online. I remember once in the Dominican Republic I fell in love with a coffee served at a resort called "Cafe Lindo" and ordered it for about a year. You never know where your next discovery will come from.

7. I have different coffee varieties for different times of the day. I tend to be more Italian in scope with regard to coffee. I do MILK in my coffee anytime before 11:00 AM. After 11:00 I'd never do coffee with milk. It's too filling. I'll do a tiny bit of creme. For lunch I'll generally only do Espresso or Cappuccino For dinner I'd do something mild to relax after meal. I can use coffee to wake up, relax or just enjoy. Give me a ham sandwich, a cup of great coffee and a copy of "Le Monde" and I can spend two hours on the Champs Elysee enjoying life.

Strange. I've heard muuuch more bad than good about storing beans in the freezer, other than the "You can store them there, but once you take them out, leave them out" rule.

This. IMO, NEVER store in freezer or fridge.

Also, really a terrible idea to buy ground. Just remember the "Rule of 15s":

- Green Coffee should be roasted wirhin 15 months of harvest
- Roasted Coffee should be ground within 15 days of roasting
- Ground Coffee should be extracted within 15 minutes of grinding

That's what I've heard, as they can absorb smells from food in the fridge or freezer.

http://www.ehow.com/about_4577252_sh...s-freezer.html

I only take them out to measure my bean quantity for that brew, then back they go.
It's a fact that ground coffee oxidizes very quickly. There is proof that refrigeration and freezing the grounds after removing the vacuum seal helps tremendously with preserving freshness.
Beans, not so much, but freezing does help. Just not so much as with ground coffee.
The choice is yours. I'd never go without chilling my coffee beans.

I also find that a few European ground coffee varieties are supreme... IMO.

Jacobs Koenig is one of my all time faves. Rich and flavorful without being bitter. Always a top choice for me if I buy ground coffee.

But if you were reasonably concerned about quality, you wouldn't be buying ground coffee to begin with, would you?

Have you tried the pre-mix packets of Vietnamese coffee? Sweet and strong.

It might have been Merrild's, Douwe Egberts local brand in Denmark, and Iceland. I particularly like Merrild's Extra Strong.

As far as Jamaican Blue goes, I would say the quality varies by estate. I haven't had too many different varieties, but of the ones I've had I've liked the Flamstead Estate the best.

I lurk on FT, but joined just for this thread. I frequent coffee forums more often.

First, there's still great coffee in Scandinavia. Tim Wendelboe and Koppi are two that come to mind.

Second, your problem with getting good coffee is that you don't know what makes coffee good. Once you figure that out, you can lose the worries.

Here is a list of roasters that sell the best coffee you can get:

East:
Terroir / George Howell
Barismo
New Harvest
Ceremony
Stumptown
Intelligentsia
Blue Bottle
Craft Coffee (subscription service)
Dallis Bros.

Central:
PT's
Intelligentsia

West:
Coava
Stumptown
Intelligentsia
Gimme! Coffee
Ritual
Wrecking Ball
Sightglass
Blue Bottle
Tonx (subscription service)

And then on the other end of course is brewing:

www.Brewmethods.com

Spoken like a true amateur Seriously though, once you get into something culinary you'll realize the subjectivity that is perceived by a novice, may not be by someone more experienced. Prices for unique coffees are much much higher than the rest. Kopi, Jamaica, Kona, are all expensive due to low supply. They are mostly junk coffee. The last Kona I had tasted like wet cardboard, which is desirable by many people, but you won't find any industry or coffee geek people begging for it.

Exceptional tasting coffee is an elusive gift. I've only managed to find 2 places on earth that come close:

Cafe Volio coffee - I first had it in Costa Rica. Tremendous, ridiculously pleasant. Nothing has come close.
Latte Express: This is a small non-descript Vietnamese sandwich shop I walked into while visiting downtown San Francisco (48 5th St). The coffee was alarmingly good.

Yes, you might.

I can't find certain brands in bean form. I love Jabobs Koenig. Only available in Ground.