Onyx Geometery: A F1 car kind of coffee

The Story:

This review has a long backstory to bring you up to speed. I have to take you back into my past and the evening Bible studies I attended in college. You have to know that finishing college was a hard time for me. The academics are fairly straightforward. The schedule was not really a problem. It was that I’m not the best at social interactions. However, during these Bible studies enjoying coffee was a reprieve; also as I have said before, it is when I learned to appreciate coffee beyond the caffeine.

One of the brands that kept coming up during this time was Onyx. So I have to thank the leader of that group Corey Woodard and the rest of those guys. It was for me what an Opus X or Old Forester birthday bourbon is for you all. What does everyone do when you have a goal like this? Well, you look at prices and wait till it is the right time to buy. That time is now right, and I got a box of Onyx Geometry. I have brewed and sipped it, so let’s dive in to this coffee together.

Technical specs:

It is a blend of washed coffees from Ethiopian and Colombian coffees. It comes in a gorgeous pink box embossed with a floral design and a skull. Inside is a plain brown bag with a skull in the lower corner. I chose this coffee because it is listed as a medium roast with sweet and fruity notes, which sounded pleasant in my grey matter. It is self-described as a balance between traditional and modern.

I brewed this for the last week in a Cemex and once in a French Press. I paired this with a Camacho Fumas and a Espinosa Laranja, which is a cigar I have not been traditionally the biggest fan of, but with this coffee, it almost drove me to the psych ward. It was so good. Now that the specs are listed, and you know how I brewed it, let’s talk about my thoughts.

The Experience:

Drinking the Geometry from the Chemex by itself all week long has been almost wearisome. The bright and shiny fruit notes become overwhelming. In my opinion, it needs to have a partner. The notes on the box are accurate. It is sweet and has some fruit notes, like a plum or sometimes a tangerine. In a French Press, the same notes are there but muted to perfection. The shining brights of the pears and plums step aside, and allows the rest of the fallen leaves and earthy notes step out.

The Pairings:

The first pairing was the Camacho Fumas in a Gordo. I brewed the Geometry in a Cemex. There was nothing super exciting happening here. It did some smaller things to refine both the cigar and the coffee. The cigar muted some coffee and brought out some of the savory stone fruit notes and the cigar got sweeter with some wood notes like oak or hickory. Which made it nice and enjoyable. The problem for me here is that the coffee typically runs out way before the cigar does.

When I paired it with the Laranja is where things get interesting. Things were about to get heated up. It was like finding a magical land. I brewed the Onyx this time in a French Press. On the dry draw, the cigar tasted like blueberries. The coffee on the first sip before the cigar was muted, and it was kind of interesting; it was mellow and had hints of milk chocolate. With the Laranja, it tasted more balanced, and it coated my palate with maple syrup.

The lingering taste on my palate was Fried okra and BBQ from Lizards Thicket, a restaurant in South Carolina. It serves a home-cooked meal in a restaurant. This pairing was wild to me it was like being a driver on a road course. The experience was sweet blueberries and then maple syrup, and then boom, turn now onto the deep-fried veggies and smoky woodsy BBQ. It was the best possible time ever. It was truly exhilarating.

Final Thoughts and Score:

So, how would I score this? I would say it is an 8 out of 10. It loses points for me in the drinking sustainability. Meaning I would not drink this day to day without a pairing. In other words, it is not a breakfast kind of coffee. The other reason it can’t be a daily drinker is if you drink it alone, it is too hard to explore. Getting behind the curtains so to speak is near impossible.

Onyx does blow everyone else out of the water with the buying experience and the information it gives you. The team at Onyx gives you what kind of coffee, how it was processed, the blend (which is unusual to see in such detail), and lastly the expected tasting notes. The Geometry also excels like nothing else when paired with spicy, peppery cigars, cigars that would otherwise be a mountain to climb by themselves. This ignited in me the idea that maybe one day, a cigar coffee blend could be real a blend much like this one to enhance the cigar in your hand. I’m thinking something akin to Dalmore’s cigar blend.