Dunkin' Mint Chip K-Cups

My favorite ice cream flavor and my favorite big box coffee brand, together at last! What could go wrong? Well, as always, it's the artificial flavor of it all. I think I could ID artificial flavor like a medical alert dog and I'm not even joking. That said, this is pretty good for what it is. The smell is great, and the flavor is good enough to almost begin to compensate for the horrible artificiality. More chocolate than mint, honestly. It smells just like a cacao roller :9

Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 5/10 

Dunkin Decaf kcups

Decaf doesn't count as cofe (even though it still has some caf)!! I can have it as much as I want!!! So I decided to try these since the free hotel decaf was surprisingly comforting to me last time I had it. However, this tastes very little like regular dunkin (kcup or otherwise). I guess regular Dunkin tastes like caffeine!? This tastes fine, I guess, like a generic hot earthy drink. Wet wet dirt (neutral). I guess if you dolled it up with creamer or something it might taste more like cofe (TBD?), but plain it really doesn't taste like coffee, it's just hot and dark. Fine qualities, still. Kind of like a different kind of tea. Maybe a dark non-alcoholic beer (lol). Anyway, good experiment, but perhaps not to be repeated. We'll just suffer with our one coffee a day, yeah? 

By the by, as we all know, tariffs and inflation have increased costs of groceries and especially cofe. Luckily this isn't reflected in my local Dunkin (yet), perhaps because they already upped their prices 50 times in the last 10 years. However, it is definitely reflected in my grocery store k-cup prices: they used to be 9$ (sometimes 7-8 on sale) and now they are 13.99!! What!? And online they are 17$!!!! It's almost cheaper to go to actual Dunkin! Is this a sign to go back to the cumbersome and wasteful bagged coffee times? Well, although I have the same amount of job security as ever (none) and no imminent plans to die, I've gotten a lot less thrifty in the last few years, but 10-years-ago me would be in full starvation mode. So I feel really bad for the youth of today just trying to budget but also have a little treat. (Psychology hour: I don't think I'm more fatalistic than I used to be, I just really internalized some "live in the moment" messages from my meditation era, and one consequence is buying a lot of frivolous crap. I think still less than the average bear, although you wouldn't know it from the blog, but nevertheless. The dangerous of mindfulness! (I was not a very good student of mindfulness tbh, but some of it influenced me.))

Overall
Cost: 4/10 [13$]
Taste: 5/10 

Dunkin Smores K-Cups

An annoying consequence of leaving the house a lot (I get dunkin as a reward for leaving the house) and having a sensitive brain (I limit myself to 1 coffee/day) means I rarely have occasion to try Dunkin's at-home products anymore! But this is actually good because most of their products are bad. Sorry Dunks, I still love you. These, for instance, have the same artificial flavor that all of their flavored sugar-free coffees have (cinnamon, pumpkin, etc). The main note is just "chemical". If you really use your palate, you can notice some graham and some marshmallow, but it is extremely backgrounded and not delicious (even if you add milk or whatever). A real whatever the opposite of a slam-dunk is. Almost makes me look forward to leaving the house again (but not quite). 

Overall
Cost: 5/10 [13$]
Taste: 4/10

Green Mountain Breakfast Blend Decaf

You'd think I'd be into decaf coffee and alcohol-free beer, since I love the ritual of Drinking, but it's never really interested me. Maybe because the taste is basically bad without the caf/alc to make it worth one's while. This one in particular, at least, tastes pretty bad. I bet the decaf dunkin is superior. Anyway, it's not all that smooth or fruity or anything I would like in a cofe. Suddenly I get where the "cup of mud" metaphor came from. But this is still better than tea (regular or decaf). I know because I drank them back to back, because I have a problem.

Overall
Cost: 10/10
Taste: 5/10 

Green Mountain Colombia Select k-cup

It's been a minute since I non-Dunked! These are nut-free though. Another Holiday Inn room drink. A very smooth one. I forgot how different non-Dunkin' cofes can be. In fact, this didn't really even taste like coffee to me, to the extent that I was worried the machine was broken and just splooting water. So if you like that, take a hike up the Green Mountain. I don't hate it (but I don't prefer it).

Overall
Cost: 10/10 (free)
Taste: 6/10 

Mott's Hot Apple Cider K-Cups

Mmm, delicious packaged foods. This feels like it should be forbidden, but there's no caffeine or artificial sweeteners or citrus, so I guess... it's not! I needed a break from morning cranberry juice, so I got these instead, which are much sweeter and less bitter. I was worried because I once had a little kool-aid packet of Mott's Apple Cider and I think it was terrible. But either this k-cup is much better or I am much more desperate for Hot Drink (possibly both). It is cinnamony, appley, and pleasant. Thanks, Motts! 

Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 6/10

Dunkin' Hot Cocoa K-Cups

I know, it's August, but k-cups know no calendar. These have a nice cocoa smell, like Hershey's Chocolate World. Tasty too, basically a standard hot chocolate which is quick and easy, so I like it. You can't taste the sucralose, but I do dislike that it's in the ingredients list, so I wouldn't buy these again just out of protest for that - otherwise no complaints.

Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 7/10

Tim Horton's Dark Roast K-Cup

I want to like Timmy's as it's Canadian, but alas, it was impossible to find any allergy/ingredient info for this, and since I got it as a free sample, I can't even read the box! Anyway, it tasted very "hotel coffee" to me, which I guess I associate with kinda strong/dark roasts. It's OK, but a little too scary and a little bit grainy, too! Only Dunkin' for me, thanks.

Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 6/10

Dunkin' Blueberry Muffin K-Cups

Oh Dunkin. You keep burning me! Actually, when I first sipped this, I was pleasantly surprised -- it just tasted like the blueberry shot from the resto, which I sometimes get in a latte and which is pleasant enough. But a weird sweet/artificial/trash-like aftertaste soon followed. Why, Dunkin, why!? I gotta stop buying any flavored Dunkin products, because I hate 'em all (except pumpkin spice which is just OK). :(

Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 4/10

Dunkin' Cold Caramel k-cups

Dunkin' I love you, but you're bringing me down

I should have known these would be bad after the bad caramel instant cofe and the bad plain cold cofe. Indeed, they were bad. The exact same BITTER horrible "caramel" flavoring that even sugar didn't cover, so I needed to deploy the horrible milky starbucks can frapp again. Sigh. No more flavored dunkies for me!

Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 4/10

Dunkin' Chocolate Covered Strawberry K-cups

I thought this might be good because it's naturally flavored, but it still tasted pretty artificial to me. You know the chemical flavor in most flavored k-cups? Well, it's here too. It's OK, and I guess most strawberry flavored things are like that, but it's ultimately sad because I really like actual strawberries and this is nowhere near them. Would not re-buy -- best to have plain coffee and drop a strawberry in.

Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 5/10

Caribou Coffee Reindeer Blend KCup

 

This is it! The final random holiday kcup! Hooray! This is a very cute little cup, and I first read "cheery" as "cherry" and thought oh boy, but no, it's just cheery. Best I recall, this just tasted regular. I guess regular coffee is still kind of cheery, else I wouldn't drink it every day, but cherry would have been a more exciting note to end on. Anyway, 'til next year, cofe!

Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 5/10

Krispy Kreme Classic Medium Roast K-Cup

Well, Krispy Kreme Kcup, you aren't the worst KKK out there, but you aren't the best donut-chain k-cup either. (All hail dunkin). Props for trying though.

Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 5/10

Peet's Big Bang k-cup

Getting there, k-cup endurers! I knew a guy named Peet so I find the name of this extra comical. Otherwise, no big opinions. 

Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 5/10

Green Mountain Sumatra Reserve Dark Roast kcup

The whole "single origin fair trade" text on this kcup implies to me that the other Green Mountain cofes are not fair trade, which is having the opposite effect on me they intended here. Anyway, it sure doesn't taste any different. 

Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 5/10

Panera Bread Colombian Roast Kcup

Good news: this is almost the end of my unremembered kcup reviews. Just a few more to go! I don't like Panera because of their horrible peanut butter grilled cheese incident, but this kcup is Keurig brand so there's no peanut in it. But it didn't taste like anything special.

Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 5/10

McCafe Premium Roast Kcup

Ooh, premium roast. That sounds pretty special, but yet, I do not recall the taste of this coffee either. Shoulda called it Typical Roast I guess.

Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 5/10

Caribou Coffee Caribou Blend k-cup

I remember nothing of this k-cup, though I did drink it. So it can't have been very good. But it can't have been very bad, either. This is what I hope for myself as a person, to be honest. 

Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 5/10

Green Mountain Breakfast Blend kcup

This is apparently my mom's favorite kcup -- I think she just bought like a 120 pack at Christmas. I can only assume she hasn't tried Dunkin kcups yet because this is not as good. It is fine, pretty watery, but nothing to write home (or the 120-count store) about!

Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 6/10

Green Mountain Dark Magic kcup

Yep, this was a dark roast kcup! I think Green Mountain is a keurig house brand, so it's supposedly nut free. Well, I mean, it was, 'cause I drank it. It was just fine.

Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 6/10