What coffee roast do you prefer?

Black, no sugar — keeps me focused all morning.

Definitely light/medium -- I like being able to actually taste the origin notes instead of just bitterness from dark roasting. Plus a clean espresso is basically my fuel for getting through any work day.

Medium roast definitely because dark roast tastes like charcoal and I had this terrible experience in Prague where someone gave me a 'special blend' that literally set my tongue on fire for three days, which is an exaggeration but it felt that bad at the time — there was this cafe tucked into a cobblestone alley behind the Old Town Square with a green door and I remember thinking what a beautiful place to drink coffee before my mouth becomes lava. The owner had these huge hands stained black from something, maybe ink or oil or just decades of working around roasted beans because you can't tell by looking at them which is ironic since the whole point of roast levels is visual differentiation. My grandmother used to make this strong brew in a percolator on Sunday mornings and it smelled like burnt sugar and woodsmoke and I don't know why I keep trying to replicate that flavor with modern methods because every coffee shop has its own brand of bitterness that just isn't the right kind of bitter. Anyway, medium roast is the sweet spot between underdeveloped acidity and overdeveloped ashiness and I've been drinking a fair-trade Colombian from this subscription service for about six months now and it genuinely changed how I think about caffeine because you actually taste something besides the jolt which is probably why people keep arguing about roast levels on forums when most of us just want to feel awake.

I'm honestly split between light and dark -- I used to drink that very cheap bitter espresso from the diner down the street which was a crime against beans, but then my cousin gave me this bag of Ethiopian Yirgacheffe medium roast and it had like floral notes that were totally insane. That reminded me of when we lived in Seattle for three years because everything revolved around coffee there -- I remember one time there was an actual blizzard and the power went out so they opened a community center with generators just to serve lattes, which is peak Pacific Northwest culture if you think about it. Anyway back to roast preferences -- honestly light roast has more of the original flavor profile but dark roast gives that toasted chocolatey finish I crave in the morning when I'm not fully awake yet and can't decide what my brain wants.

I usually go with medium roast because it hits that sweet spot where the acidity from the light roast has mellowed out but you haven't completely lost the origin notes, though honestly I have been drinking a lot of French Roast lately which is darker than I should probably be doing on a regular basis and my sleep schedule is suffering for it. My father used to make this coffee every morning at 4:30 AM in our old kitchen where he had that chipped mug with the logo from a diner downtown, you know the one where they served those huge blueberry pancakes on Saturdays? We would sit there before school started and I'd eat whatever breakfast food was left over from dinner because my mother never cleared the counters. The house smelled like roast for hours after he made it. I don't have that mug anymore but I keep thinking about how every morning in our childhood had that same scent, which is weird because coffee doesn't actually smell like anything specific to me now — it's just a memory of an old kitchen and a person who used to make the best coffee without realizing he was making something special. So yeah, light or dark roast I can't really say anymore since my preference has been hijacked by nostalgia for a cup someone else made twenty years ago in a house that doesn't exist anymore and now it all feels kind of pointless but anyway I keep drinking French Roast because the caffeine helps me pretend everything is organized.