Review: Milka Hot Chocolate T-Discs for Tassimo

After our recent battle with a frozen downspout, we didn't quite feel like getting a coffee buzz once back inside the house, so instead, we started craving some good old-fashioned hot chocolate. This got us to thinking, it's been ages since we reviewed any hot chocolate T-Discs for the Tassimo system and there hasn't been anything available to our liking... until the introduction of Milka Hot Chocolate T-discs on tassimo.com several months ago.

More common to the European market than on "this side of the pond", Milka Hot Chocolate is a combination of chocolate syrup T-Discs blended with European milk creamer T-Discs. The goal is to create a creamier version of hot chocolate than what we're used to with the Tassimo system. We've tried to enjoy the only other option, Suchard T-Discs, through their original version to their larger creamer-sized version and back to their recent "European Recipe" version, but they're just too watery for our liking and left a lot to be desired.

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Tassimo and Starbucks Launch Primo Latte and Cappuccino Single Serve Coffee Beverages

TASSIMO and Starbucks have introduced two new single-serve coffeehouse-style beverages - Starbucks Cappuccino Primo T-Discs for Tassimo and Starbucks Latte Primo T-Discs for Tassimo. The brands worked closely together to ensure that each beverage would provide an exceptional coffee experience. Each Starbucks Latte Primo and Starbucks Cappuccino Primo for TASSIMO beverage is designed to bring out optimal flavor and provide the perfect combination of high-quality Starbucks coffee and milk creamer.

Just in time for the holidays, Starbucks Cappuccino Primo T-Discs for Tassimo and Starbucks Latte Primo T-Discs for Tassimo are ready to pre-order online with ship dates around December 16th. Suggested retail price for a package of eight beverages is $10.99.

The Starbucks Latte Primo and Cappuccino Primo T-Discs for Tassimo will work in your Braun Tassimo TA1200 or TA1400 models as well as the Bosch Tassimo T45 and Tassimo T65 hot beverage systems.

At Starbucks Cappuccino Primo T-Discs for Tassimo and Starbucks Latte Primo T-Discs for Tassimo

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Review: Tassimo T65 Single Serve Coffee Maker - T-Disc Brewer

Tassimo has launched a new Tassimo T65 Single Serve Coffee Maker that features a new Multilingual LC display. The multi-lingual display will help Tassimo launch into new and existing markets without the need to localize the machines for each market thus saving money. There's also a new set of lights for cup stand illumination.

The illuminated cup stand of the Tassimo T65 Brewer.

After a few weeks with this Tassimo model what stands out? Is it a better brewer overall? We have to say the addition of the illuminated cup stand and the LCD display does set this brewer apart but at a cost.

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Tassimo T65 Single Serve Coffee Maker Arrives for Review

Tassimo has sent us one of the new Tassimo T65 Single Serve Coffee Makers to review. Right away you can see the difference in the attractive packaging, and how the removable cup stand will allow you to use larger travel mugs. We also love any appliance in our kitchen that features a cool blue led light - and the Tassimo T65 Single Serve Coffee Maker illuminated cup stand is the bomb. We'll have a full review soon, but details on this new brewer are below.

The T-65 Tassimo Bosch single cup T-disc brewer features a new Multilingual LC display. We're pretty sure the multi-lingual display will help Tassimo launch into new and existing markets without the need to localize the machines for each market saving money. There's also a new set of lights for cup stand illumination.

• Multilingual LC display
• • User-friendly visual and linguistic instructions
  • Guides users through all functions and service steps in five languages (English/ French/German/Italian/Spanish)
  • Ultimate ease-of-use through self- explanatory instructions
  • Explanations for every step of use
• Cup-stand light
• • Three lights above the cup stand for illumination
  • Switches off automatically when brewer is not in use for more than five minutes
  • Highlights drink appearance

At Tassimo and Tassimo T65 Single Serve Coffee Maker

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Review: Jacobs Monarch T-Discs for Tassimo

We’ve been sampling some of the European T-Discs which started appearing on www.tassimo.com these past few months and decided to continue our tour of Europe with one of Austria’s preferred brands of coffee: Jacobs. As a result, today we’ll be reviewing the new Jacobs Monarch T-Discs which you’ll see are not that different from their previous Kroenung T-Discs.

Upon brewing, faint hints of caramel start to emerge from your typical aroma of medium-roasted Arabica beans. Billed as having an irresistible “verwohnaroma” (aroma) with “citrusy notes”, we can’t say we found any of that present except for the taste which had the characteristics of your average medium roast with the exception of the faintest caramel notes and, we could be mistaken here, perhaps a tiny hint of lemon as well. It seems most European T-Discs have profiles that are becoming more and more identical, so we had a bit of a difficult time differentiating this T-Disc from its Kroenung counterpart or other competitors such as Kenco’s medium roast and Carte Noire’s Petit Dejeuner had it not been for some key factors such as acidity and aroma.

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Review: Carte Noire Kenya T-Discs for Tassimo

As we've reported in the past, Carte Noire is quickly becoming one of France's preferred coffee brands and have always sourced the finest Arabica beans available worldwide. They also produce our 2nd favorite espresso T-Disc, so when we heard they were starting to introduce various single-origin flavors in Europe, we quickly ordered their Carte Noire Kenya T-Discs... the first one available "ce côté de l'étang" (this side of the pond) as the French would say.

Upon brewing, we were greeted with a unique mix of aromas which included predominantly dark chocolate with faint hints of molasses (what is it with coffee companies and dark chocolate lately?). The taste was just as unexpected with notes of what can only be described as bittersweet Baker's dark chocolate that contained at least 80% cocoa. Wow, talk about "exotic"... this caught us off guard and left our taste buds rather confused.

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Improved Tassimo T65 Single Cup T-Disc Brewer Now Shipping

Tassimo is now shipping a new updated Tassimo T-65 single serve coffee maker. The Tassimo T65 Single Serve Coffee Maker will either ship in addition to the current Bosch T-45 or completely replace this brewer at retail (read our review of the Tassimo T-45 brewer here). We'll have exact details on the replacement versus new model as we find out. So what's new? The T-65 Tassimo Bosch single cup T-disc brewer features a new Multilingual LC display. We're pretty sure the multi-lingual display will help Tassimo launch into new and existing markets without the need to localize the machines for each market saving money. There's also a new set of lights for cup stand illumination.

• Multilingual LC display
• • User-friendly visual and linguistic instructions
  • Guides users through all functions and service steps in five languages (English/ French/German/Italian/Spanish)
  • Ultimate ease-of-use through self- explanatory instructions
  • Explanations for every step of use
• Cup-stand light
• • Three lights above the cup stand for illumination
  • Switches off automatically when brewer is not in use for more than five minutes
  • Highlights drink appearance

Right now we only see the current shipping T-45 model at Amazon and other retailers here in the US, but CoffeeWiz.com should have the T-65 updated Tassimo T-Disc brewers in stock soon. We'll try and get our hands on a review unit, and do a side by side comparison soon.

At Tassimo T65 Single Serve Coffee Maker, CoffeeWiz.com, and Tassimo

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Tassimo Pro Office Coffee Brewer - Perfect for Your Small Business

Tassimo and Bosch are coming out with a pro line of single serve coffee makers aimed at the small office coffee market called Tassimo Pro. We don't have many details, but we do know the Tassimo Pro has an adjustable coffee cup stand, and looks to be hardier than it's consumer market cousins.

We're also not sure if you'll be able to get the brewer as a consumer, or will have to qualify as a small business. We're also wondering if consumer T-Discs will work in the Tassimo Pro brewer, or if there will be different sized T-Discs for the home business market. The Tassimo Pro small business brewer will debut in Q3 of this year.

At Tassimo Pro

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Starbucks House Blend T-Discs for Tassimo 30% Off

We've had several readers write in on this discount over at Amazon. You can get 24 Starbucks House Blend T-Discs for your Tassimo system at just $20.74. This put the cost per cup at roughly ~$.86 - still half the price of getting the same cup of coffee at your local Starbucks. We really like the House Blend (you can read our review here), and think this medium bolder blend fits most coffee drinking profiles.

Starbucks House Blend T-Discs  for Tassimo will work in your Braun Tassimo TA1200 or TA1400 models as well as the Bosch Tassimo.

At Starbucks House Blend T-Discs for Tassimo

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Milka Hot Chocolate T Discs for Tassimo

You may or may not know the Milka brand of chocolate here in North America, but in Europe the purple cow of chocolate rules the land. Milka is a delicious hot chocolate beverage with a tender Milka chocolate taste and a smooth velvety chocolate layer on top. Imported from Europe exclusively for TASSIMO, this package of contains 8 milk chocolate T DISCs and 8 milk creamer T DISCs at $9.99 per package.

At Tassimodirect.com and if you're looking for just chocolate - check out Milka Chocolate.

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Review: Nabob Breakfast Blend 12oz T-Discs for Tassimo

Nabob's latest Tassimo option is their new 12oz Breakfast Blend T-Discs which, according to the packaging, contains more than 30% Rainforest Alliance Certified content... something the company has been trying to achieve with all its discs recently, so hats off to them in that aspect. Any 16oz travel mug or coffee cup/glass should be enough to hold all 12 ounces (we chose a Bodum 16oz Pavina series double-wall glass) and needless to say, we were happy that the Bosch Tassimo didn't leak a small pond of water on the cup stand during the brew cycle (Braun users, we feel your pangs of annoyance as you'll surely be reaching for the paper towels).

Unlike the small variety of "morning blend" 12oz T-discs available on the American market, Canada had yet to see any 12oz discs until now and since Nabob is quickly becoming a top choice amongst coffee drinkers North of the border, we suppose it was only fitting that Nabob be the brand which was chosen to introduce this new size format (although we keep hoping to see a Dunkin Donuts or Tim Hortons disc on the horizon).

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Review: Kenco Medium Roast T-Discs for Tassimo

A quick view of the company's website reveals that Kenco was originally known as the Kenya Coffee Company which got its start in 1921 when they setup a shop in Mayfair (a district in the West end of London). They started selling roast & ground coffee locally from the shop although most of their sales were via mail orders through advertisements in magazines such as Tatler, Country Life and The Times. They would later be bought after the Second World War and diversified into several coffee shops across the UK by Gardiner Merchant, a food merchant company next door to the original shop. The name of the company was later changed to Kenco in 1962 when they stopped acquiring most of their beans from Kenya. The company would go on to change hands many times throughout the coming decades having such owners as Cadbury, Premier Foods and General Mills.

Before we start, it should be noted that this variety of T-Disc comes in 2 different types of packaging. Some of the older Braun-style packages still have "Classic Blend" listed as the flavor while newer versions (as well as the current Bosch-style packages) now list "Medium Roast". This had always been a bit confusing since the older packages still listed "Medium Roast" on the foil of each disc and left us wondering if we were getting 2 different kinds of coffees. Well, you can rest assured you're getting the SAME coffee out of either package (despite Kraft still listing "Classic Blend" on their Tassimo site).

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Review: Mastro Lorenzo Espresso T-Discs for Tassimo

Mastro Lorenzo embraces the Italian culture where fine espressos and crema coffees were born and are part of daily life. Unfortunately, a quick search on their French website did not yield any further information regarding the company's history. We've tried a few of their different T-Disc varieties over the past several months and have found that their aroma and flavor always seem superior to their competitors. Such is the case once again with their espresso T-Disc.

From the moment you first start brewing your first cup, you'll notice the intense scent of fine Italian espresso will soon fill the room. Close your eyes and you might think you're sitting at café instead of your kitchen. Give the cup a light swirl and let the nose develop… you'll smell the initial burst of acidic bitterness but you'll also notice slight notes of chocolate hiding underneath. Not surprising, these hints of chocolate are also present in the taste and the acid lends an almost citrus-like quality. Kraft describes this coffee as being 100% pure Arabica, but we can't help but wonder if they mixed-in a few Robusta beans without telling anyone.

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Nescafe Dolce Gusto and Bosch Tassimo Comparison - Which One is Right for You?

The Nescafe Dolce Gusto (read our full review) or
the Bosch Tassimo Hot Beverage System (read our full review)?
Which one is right for you?

We are currently getting a large number of write ins asking which machine we prefer - the Nescafe Dolce Gusto (read our full review) or the Bosch Tassimo Hot Beverage System (read our full review). We really like both machines, but do understand why some single serve coffee shoppers might be considering one over the other.

The big factor for choosing one machine over the other for most people writing in is price. Both machines are in similar price range - the Bosch Tassimo Hot Beverage System is $139.99 and the Nescafe Dolce Gusto is $169.99, and we can understand why this could be a big factor. The price per single serve coffee cup is also similar, with both machines at the $.50 for a single cup of coffee and the milk based drinks coming in at about $1.00.

As we stated above price is usually a big factor, but we always go on taste and coffee preference. Both machines make very tasty cups of almost all of the hot beverages you would want in a multi-hot beverage system.

The Bosch Tassimo Hot Beverage System can make a large range of drinks including the following:

• coffee, tea, espresso, lattes, cappuccinos, and hot chocolate.

The Nescafe Dolce Gusto can also make a large variety of drinks including the following:

• lungo coffee (larger cup of espresso based coffee), espresso, lattes, cappuccinos, and hot chocolate (iced drinks as well)

The big number to think about is also the total number of drinks available. The Nescafe Dolce Gusto has 8 different types of smart capsules you can purchase for it all under the Nescafe coffee brand. The Bosch Tassimo Hot Beverage System has 40+ coffees, teas, and other drinks it can make including coffee from well known brands such as Starbuck's Coffee and Seattle's Best. So if you just picked on the number of drinks the Tassimo is clearly going to give you more choice, but we also always pick on flavor as well.

Continue reading: "Nescafe Dolce Gusto and Bosch Tassimo Comparison - Which One is Right for You?"

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