I get a lot of coffee as presents. It’s part and parcel of who I am. Run a coffee website? People know what to get you when the time comes. OK I get a lot of coffee and beer, but this isn’t about beer, this is about coffee.

Death Wish Coffee boasts that it is the strongest cup of coffee out there. and while I’m not a lab and can’t tell you how many mg of caffeine are in each cup I can tell you it gets the job done. But how does it taste? How is it so strong? I can only guess. Coffee comes in two different species. Coffea Arabica and Coffea Robusta. Arabica coffee is more flavorful and has less caffeine, which is why most coffee you drink is Arabica coffee. Robusta is used in some espresso blends, has a higher caffeine content but is a bit blander in terms of flavor. I think Death Wish is using robusta, its the only way I could see of naturally increasing the amount of caffeine per cup. All of the D3eath WIsh coffee is dark roasted, which doesn’t affect the amount of caffeine its just a flavor thing.

Roasting coffee actually expands the beans and does not in any way affect the amount of caffeine per bean. But it does affect the amount of caffeine per pound since lighter roasted coffee is heavier and packs more punch than its airier brethren. So Darker roast coffee has less caffeine per cup. because you use less coffee to make it unless you are brewing by weight. Because you can’t taste caffeine really, other than a slightly bitter flavor, which coffee naturally has. The lighter a coffee is roasted the more flavor you get from the bean the darker you roast it the more flavor you get from the roast. Death Wish coffee is all dark roasted, and while it advertises whole-bean a lot of the beans are broken and cracked. This could be because of the quality of the beans, the treatment of them, or just the process of roasting them.

If you are drinking Death Wish coffee for coffee flavor then you are out of luck. All of the flavor is from the roast process. It’s not quite burnt, but just shy of it. there is a heavy carbonization flavor profile. So if you are a fan of really dark roasted coffee, with no real taste preference then by all means go for some Death Wish.

But I love coffee because of the many flavors I get from a truly unique blend, I’ll look elsewhere. What are your experiences with coffee? do you have a favorite origin or do you just go by the roast? Either way is a perfectly valid way of consuming my favorite beverage. I’m just curious about what other people thought of the product.

I do appreciate that Death Wish is still shipping full pounds of coffee and not the more common 12 oz packages. To me, it’s all about flavor and nuance. And that’s just not what I get from this product. I get in your face dark coffee, which is fine.