A few weeks ago my mum called me three times in one day, not for our usual chat but for an update on my health. I had told her, some days earlier, I was going to do a coffee taste test for work.
“How many will you be trying?”
“Forty-one … actually 82, because we have to try each one black and with milk.”
“Nicholas – 82? You can’t be serious. Will you be OK? Why do you have to try that many?”
“Will I be OK? Who knows. But you can’t say something is the best unless you’ve tried all the options.’’
Maybe she was worried I would pass out, go into cardiac arrest or reach a point of such enlightenment I no longer needed a mortal vessel. Frankly, I was worried about the same thing. When I tasted 11 instant coffees, I spent the following afternoon feeling as though my brain had turned into a hurricane, and every little piece of flying debris was either an idea or moment of panic – I’d experience the first nanosecond of each before 10,000 more flew past.
This was 41 different coffees, done two ways. I’ve never been more anxious and stressed about a taste test, or any piece of work I’ve had to do, ever. But, I remind myself, I’m a food writer not an ICU nurse – my duty is not saving lives, it’s eating and drinking.
Getting obscenely high is the least I can do for my compatriots.
I identified 21 supermarket coffee providers with nationally available, pre-ground bags of coffee and I acquired the varying brands and roasts from each. (A whole bean taste test is another level of complex; but note: if you can grind coffee evenly and reliably at home, whole beans generally produce tastier coffee than pre-ground).
Condesa Co.Lab, a coffee importer and consultancy, helped me run the taste test as a cupping (an industry-standard way to judge coffee) at their Sydney lab. Each sample was brewed twice, with milk added to one. All were presented to the reviewers blind. Along with two Condesa representatives, Claire Liu and Keelan Brown, Rowena Chansiri (Ickle Coffee) and Matt Uramoto (Onta Coffee) joined as reviewers. We tasted the coffees over four rounds: medium roasts, medium-dark roasts, dark roasts and organic coffees. We scored each coffee for bitterness, acidity, sweetness, aroma, flavour and flavour with milk. The final score is a combination of aroma and flavour. The taste test took two-and-a-half hours.
I can’t remember when I next spoke to my mum. I think it was the day after. But I remember her asking, with considerable panic in her voice: “Are you OK?”
“Not really,” I said. I don’t think I was OK for the next four days, but I had found some winners, way more losers, and a few other interesting results.
This taste test is a little different from usual, and because of the sheer number of products and the fact that coffee is notoriously personal (even if they don’t know quite what it is, everyone has their preferred roast profile, brewing methods, milk ratios and flavour profile), I do not recommend defaulting to the winner we’ve chosen. Price, branding and best-before dates aren’t useful general indicators either – neither correlated with good scores. Instead, you’ll need to investigate your own tastes and pick the coffee that’s right for you. To help, we’ve put together a graph and some pointers.
Milk no sugar
If you enjoy the coffee of Italian servos and Parisian cafes that haven’t changed since the typewriter age, then sort by bitterness and score then pick whatever is in the furthest corner or, for the skim readers, search the shelves for Lazzio Dark, Daley St Medium Roast, Vittoria Coffee Mountain Grown, Campos Colombia and Sacred Grounds Groover Blend. If you want something a little smoother, Lazzio Medium, Lazzio Organic, Melitta Blue Mountain Style and Byron Bay Coffee Company Nero Espresso are less bitter options that have enough heft to carry a milk coffee. Those who want a lighter and fruitier experience, if a little unusual, go for Oxfam Australia Fair Ethiopia or Jasper Coffee Ethiopia Yirgacheffe.
Milk with sugar
If you have enough milk and sugar, you can make a tasty cuppa with almost any of these products (see below for what to avoid). Just sort by score and intensity, and pick whatever matches your inclinations.
Black no sugar
If you’re looking for nuance, the options are slim. There are very few coffees with noticeable acidity, sweetness or origin characteristics – most of that is lost in darker roasts, replaced by bitterness and a more generic roasted coffee flavour. The three options that stand out are Jasper Coffee Ethiopia Yirgacheffe, Oxfam Australia Fair Ethiopia and Sacred Grounds Olá Brazil. If you care less about nuance and more about having a generally punchy coffee experience try Melitta Blue Mountain Style, Lazzio Medium and Grinders Coffee Roasters Rich Espresso.
Black with sugar
The products mentioned in the above paragraph all work with added sweetness, but there’s also a pool of coffees that work with sugar but not without because they’re either too bitter, boring, earthy or vegetal. A bit of sugar or honey and you’ll make a great drink out of the Sacred Grounds Groover Blend, any of the coffees in the Grinders or Campos range and, for a budget option, Coles Urban Coffee Culture Strong, which was oddly sweeter and less burnt-tasting than the medium roast of the same brand.
The best overall
Jasper Coffee Ethiopia Yirgacheffe, 250g, $19.49 ($7.80 per 100g), available at select grocers
Score with milk: 6.5/10
Score black: 8/10
After trying more than 30 coffees, many of which tasted as though they’d been brewed in mulch, an ashtray or hell, I started to have doubts – is coffee for me? Is it for anyone? Have the last two hours been karmic punishment for something I’ve done – mean-spirited high school pranks, a reversal of the privilege I received at birth, or some deed I don’t even remember? Drinking this instantly dispelled my spiral. It was a reminder of what coffee can be: complex, bright and evocative of flavours not usually associated with coffee – the joys of fermentation! This one was like drinking the aroma of apricots, so powerfully so that I could have been convinced it contained natural or artificial stone fruit (it does not). It makes for a unique, if a little weak, milk coffee, but as a black coffee it’s easily the most interesting option in the market.
The best value
Lazzio Medium, 500g, $10.99 ($2.20 per 100g), available at Aldi
Score with milk: 5.5/10
Score black: 5/10
Excluding Jasper, which is a little harder to find than other coffees in this review, only 3.5 points separated the highest- and lowest-scoring milk coffees. The taste test was like reviewing local bus routes – everything sits in the four to six out of 10 range and any standouts were usually because of terrifying, rather than terrific, experiences. In a market like that, why wouldn’t you go for the cheapest option? This is a fine coffee. A little on the weak end, but horror-free.
Other notable options
Melitta Blue Mountain Style, 250g, $8 ($3.20 per 100g), available at Coles
Score with milk: 5.5/10
Score black: 5.5/10
Sorting the judges’ comments and scores for this taste test was like watching a preschool gymnastics competition; whoever doesn’t fall over is immediately going to stand out. This coffee is the very definition of mid-range – neither robust nor weak in flavour and neither terrifying nor interesting in character. It did get some points for being a bit nutty or cereal-y in flavour and having at least an iota of acidity, but its best feature is price. It is cheaper than almost every other product, bested only by the supermarket homebrands and Delta Chicco D’Oro Premium Blend, a coffee that was described as “smelling like dry grass” and tasting like ash, cardboard and dirt. If you don’t live near an Aldi, this is the best-value option. If you’re a black coffee drinker, this is the best-value option period.
Oxfam Australia Fair Ethiopia, 250g, $12 ($4.80 per 100g), available at major supermarkets
Score with milk: 5/10
Score black: 5.5/10
During a normal industry cupping, coffee professionals will often include a checklist for whether a coffee is fruity, floral, earthy, nutty, vegetal and more. If we had judged based on this criteria, Oxfam would be one of only three coffees to pick up any points. The reviewers described it as fruity, earthy and tea-like – like an older, more rugged version of the Jasper roast.
Losers
Harris Strong, 200g, $11 ($5.50 per 100g), available from major supermarkets
Score with milk: 2/10
Score black: 2.5/10
The coffee experts tried to be professional with their reactions so as not to prejudice each other, but my inclination towards the dramatic and inability to stay silent for more than a minute completely ruined that. By the third round (a tasting of 26 cups of dark roasts), everyone was letting their true feelings be known, and never was that funnier than during a stretch of four samples including this, Lavazza Espresso Barista Intenso, Vittoria Coffee Italian Blend and Daley St Dark. It was a nonstop slideshow of face-contorting grimaces, creative swearing and sideways glances as if to say: “Prepare yourself, anxiety and torment await.” This and Lavazza were, in the reviewers’ opinions, the worst of the worst.
Lavazza Espresso Barista Intenso, 250g, $18.50 ($7.40 per 100g), available at major supermarkets
Score with milk: 2.5/10
Score black: 1.5/10
The lowest-scoring coffees all shared the same rough flavour profile, described by tasters as a combination of ash, dirt, burning rubber and old freezer – what should be an educational cocktail of flavours designed to question if this is really for human consumption. But, to be honest, I don’t think the specifics are an issue. When something is this unenjoyable, does it matter why? Would you rather drop your ice-cream or stub your toe? Who cares. Both experiences are preferable to accidentally calling your teacher “Mum”. The magnitude of unenjoyment is what matters, and both this and the Harris Strong we tasted were several magnitudes worse than many other coffees I never want to drink again.
• This article was amended on 24 September 2025 to correct Claire Liu’s surname.
