A Milestone For Coffee Pods?

Coffee pods have come on a long way in both quality and sustainability, providing you know where to look for the best Nespresso pods…

With the promise of freshness and convenience, coffee pods first came on the scene back in the mid 1990’s. From households to hotels, this method of coffee delivery became an instant hit, but the question over flavour quality remained. Despite the tidy little pods knocking out a mess-free hit of caffeine, coffee purists remained unconvinced. This is in large part due to the fact many big brands have remained reliant on lower quality, commodity coffee. But time has moved on, newcomers have entered the fray, and innovations in design & function have led to dramatic breakthroughs.

The new era for coffee pods

In recent years, coffee pods have been taken more seriously with the flavour profile and overall quality steadily increasing. Speciality coffee in pod form became more frequent and alternatives to mass-market pods were now an option. What this is all building up to, is the fact that our Ethiopian coffee capsules were awarded a Two Star Great Taste Award 2020. This is in addition to our Which? Magazine Best Buy rating in their 'Best compostable coffee pods' review in both 2019 and 2020, so does this make them the best Nespresso pods in the UK? The Independent Newspaper thinks so if their Best Tasting Award is anything to go by. We're biased but we couldn't agree more so to receive three such high honours gives our Ethiopian coffee pods an independent mark of excellence in the field of speciality coffee, but this stands for something much more than our own fair praise.  

Until recently, even the best Nespresso compatible capsules just never ranked very highly in blind taste tests and competitions. Only a few short years ago, coffee pods just weren’t up to the quality to garner a Great Taste award. The fact industry-respected judges gave our Ethiopian pods Two Stars, heaping the below praise on them shows just how seriously coffee pods are now taken.

Best plastic free & compostable coffee pods?

Here's a quick insight into what some of the UK's leading coffee experts think of our Ethiopian Yirgacheffe speciality coffee in plastic-free pods:

Which? Magazine Best Buy eco coffee pods

Which Magazine judge comments: "Fruity acidity, a toasty aroma and a pleasing sweetness characterise this milder coffee, which is typical of the region it’s from. One expert praised the lingering aftertaste but some experts thought adding milk could overshadow the sweetness, so this might be best served black."

2 Star Great Taste Award plastic-free coffee pods

Great Taste Judge 2020 “The advance in the quality of coffee pod coffee is well demonstrated in this product - a single origin Ethiopian arabica.”

Great Taste Award 2020 Judge comments "What a truly wonderful citrus and tropical rich coffee bean aroma your coffee has. Along with the fruity acidic sharp bitter notes, this coffee performs the perfect front stage ballet of flavour."

Best Tasting Eco Coffee Pods 2021 - The Independent National UK Newspaper, 2021

The Independent newspaper in the UK declared our Ethiopian eco coffee pods as the 'Best Tasting' in their September 2021 judging, saying “Blue Goose’s Ethiopian pod is the only compostable coffee pod so far to have been awarded two stars by the Great Taste awards. And it’s not hard to see why. Grown in Yirgacheffe, Ethiopia, this coffee has a lighter, easy-drinking floral flavour and a rich crema….you can taste the difference.”

The sustainability conundrum

But even with better quality coffee now available in pod form, recent years have seen a rising concern over the sustainability of Nespresso compatible capsules. Most coffee pods are unrecyclable as they are mixed materials and require environmentally damaging processes & resources to manufacture.

At Blue Goose, we use a plastic-free coffee pod made using a waste wood product from the European paper industry. These innovative capsules are also GM-free and can be placed in council food waste collections. Depending on local processing facilities, they are turned into compost or liquid fertilizer.

Of course, skilled home composters know the right mix of conditions will help our capsules break down in around three months. Especially if composting in hot compost bins or hot composting. All of this makes our eco coffee pods more sustainable than the plastic and aluminium pods omnipresent in this industry. 

The Tipping Point

Until recently, compostable coffee pods carried their own stigma, seen to underperform against the aluminium and plastic varieties… or was this just the big pod producers trying to avoid reality?!

Either way, the evidence is clear and this award has helped us prove one of our original aims as a small business; that speciality eco-coffee pods can perform to the highest level and taste exceptional. So this is an important milestone for the humble coffee pod. It's taking its journey into a dynamic new realm where quality, provenance and flavour reign supreme. 

Experience the best Nespresso compatible capsules for yourself!

We're confident that the independent awards our Ethiopian coffee pods have received make them not only the UK's best Nespresso pods but the most environmentally friendly coffee pods too as they are also compostable, underlining the fact that you no longer have to compromise on ethics, sustainability, convenience or, of course, taste when deciding on where to buy Nespresso pods!