Of special mention and also an update to this blog post is the coffee to be brewed for the 2 weekends:

Bean:   Sumatran Aceh Takengon
Wet Aroma:  Clean and intense
Body:   Heavy
Flavors:   Licorice, figs
Acidity:   Tartaric
Aftertaste:   Creamy aftertaste that lingers

Bean:   Ethiopian Sidamo
Wet Aroma:   Floral notes
Body:   Light
Flavors:   Sweet red wine
Acidity:  Citrus, more pronounced upon cooling
Aftertaste:  Florals

The coffees can also be found on Oriole’s website.

Freshly roasted and well-rested specialty grade coffee ground-on-demand, 2 Singapore national barista champions teaching a free-for-all class, award winning French presses. What are you waiting for?

Last words: As you all know, dear readers, Bodum in Takashimaya is also located next to Nespresso, which would most undoubtedly be showcasing their newest Nespresso flavor, the Nespresso Onirio, an extremely floral espresso by their standards, and a blend of Ethiopian Sidamo and Yrgacheffe. This is a call out to ALL Nespresso fans. Here is your chance to appreciate the REAL floral notes of Ethiopian Sidamo in an economically priced French Press. The money you save from this, you can get a good grinder. And please, you want good coffee every morning, you have to put in the effort. Scoop the beans into your grinder, freshly ground coffee in your french press and 4 minutes later, it’ll be worth it. It’ll be better than THE NESPRESSO ONIRIO EXPERIENCE.

Nespresso Pixie launches in Singapore

I just got back from Red Dot Design Museum where Nespresso has just launched their smallest Nespresso machine named the Nespresso Pixie. Read this post for the Previous Nespresso Experience.

A new limited edition Nespresso capsule called the Onirio accompanied the Nespresso Pixie’s launch as well. Before I tasted the Onirio, I was introduced to the coffee by the Nespresso staff, who explained the Onirio is made up of a blend of Ethiopian Sidamo and Yrgacheffe. They also reassured me it’s espresso.

Tasting Notes of the Nespresso Onirio
Bitter. Thin bodied. A bit hot on the tongue. Zero florals, opposite of what would have been expected from a blend of Ethiopian Sidamo and Yrgacheffe.

Verdict:

TCBE. Again. This Can’t Be Espresso.  If any nespresso fan is reading this, please head to the nearest Oriole Cafe, either the Somerset outlet or the Republic Plaza outlet and order an espresso. If Nespresso is reading this, do all of us a favour and stop marketing it as espresso. It gives Ethiopian Sidamo and Yrgacheffe a misrepresentation.

As bad as the espresso tasting went, fortunately, the decor for the launch was done up tastefully by Weber Shandwick, Nespresso’s PR agency and the people who invited me to this Nespresso event. I also have them and Nespresso to thank for a wonderful set of espresso demitasse cups. One of the highlights of the evening was the presence of Swissotel The Stamford’s Beverage Operations Manager and Mixologist, Richard Gillam who crafted a whole slew of signature Nespresso beverages. I tried his Oniru-zu made up of Onirio with ginger liqueur served in a champagne flute topped with a cloud of yuzu foam. Because of the thin bodied Onirio, the dominant taste went to the fluffy yuzu cloud. I could not discern the ginger liqueur.  I also tried another creation of Gillam’s – Nescesity, made up of Onirio with cranberry juice and orange water. Again, the dominant flavours were the cranberry juice and orange water. There were also some canapes made by Chef Janice Wong from 2am Dessert Bar, but I didn’t get the chance to try any. What I really wanted to try was another Gillam creation called D.N.A., made up of “a strand of Arpeggio espresso in a clear cacao and hazelnut suspension flecked with gold.”

An interesting fact brought up this evening was that there is a staggering amount of 12,300 cups of nespresso consumed every minute, or 17.7 million cups of nespresso consumed every day. Most of these Nespresso people obviously took the upgrade path from that of a Krups / Braun to a Nespresso. That is not an upgrade. It’s more of a downgrade, especially if they were buying freshly roasted beans for their Krups / Braun and then taking the misinformed jump to a Nespresso pre-ground coffee capsule. The Dark Side of Convenience.

It was an ominous feeling to have heard Steve say those words. You just had to be there.

We talked about the Aeropress. About how good a cup of coffee it makes. But it just was not espresso, the way Aeropress had marketed it as.

And then, Steve introduced the N word into our lives and we never looked at him the same again.

Steve talked about how good Nespresso really was at its price point. And then he mentioned the Nespresso ristretto as a must-try. And of course, the convenience of it all. I started going over Steve’s history of machines in my head. A whole series of Braun-Krups-Krap before the transition to the Rancilio Silvia/Rocky combo, and then, now the Expobar Brewtus. And this same guy who’s speaking to us now about the wonders of Nespresso also did tell me in a phone conversation a few months earlier of his next fictional if any, upgrade-itis which was to be the La Marzocco GS3, instead of the Kees Van Der Westen Speedster, mainly because of support issues. This seems to be the upgrade path most home baristi take after the E-61′s I believe.

And then, we called it a day, and we left. And no, Melvin, my journey towards the Dark Side did not end outside Steve’s gates. After you dropped me off, I eventually ended up at ION ORCHARD. Well, it was the path I took to get home anyway. Waitaminute, doesn’t ION ORCHARD also have a Nespresso Boutique?

THE NESPRESSO EXPERIENCE

I walked into the Nespresso Boutique. Wow! It’s a beautiful sight. If you’ve ever walked into a Nespresso Boutique, you’ll know what I mean. Wall to wall packed with Nespresso bricks of different Pantone colours. A whole line of Nespresso coffee pods in different colour shades. Right smack in the centre of the store is an island, where they have demo machines, and all the flavours of Nespresso with it.

Wait, the journey to the Dark Side cannot be complete until I’ve had a taste of, what did Steve recommend. . . “oh! Ristretto please?”

A saleslady made me one by dropping in a pod, and pushing the button. It was served in a clear plastic demitasse. I took a sip, and . . . .

TCBE

This Can’t Be Espresso. This Will Never Be Espresso. BUT, it wasn’t really swill either. I can detect very very slight hints of spice. . . tobacco maybe. It was under the temperature though, slightly warmer than room temperature. It was thin coffee.

The saleslady told me of the convenience factor, about how you could just plug in a Nespresso unit and just churn out coffee without having to wait for a warm-up period. Even my old Gaggia thermoblock required at least a 15 minute start up time. But that did make a different class of espresso as well.

In all fairness, the Nespresso is simple to use, doesn’t make a mess. It makes ok coffee for its price point and for the amount of effort put in. But just like our discussion on the Aeropress, I feel you cannot call this espresso. It’s just convenience coffee.