MudHen Espresso just opened maybe two or three weeks ago. It is a drive-through operation in the Lowe's grocery parking lot.
I was unable to time the shot, or check for tamping, or see how full the doser was due to the nature of the "building".
Drinks Ordered:
Double small cappuccino (8oz)
16oz. Iced mocha
The reviews:
Double Cappuccino
The foam was not very dense. It very much resembled dirty dish-soap bubbles in a cup.
The espresso was bitter. Extremely bitter, and very astringent. No amount of sugar could have salvaged this drink. As soon as I arrived at my destination, the cup and all of its contents went directly into the garabage.
There were fairly coarse-looking coffee grounds on the inner wall of the cup. This leads me to believe that the grind setting was much too coarse, and that the work-space is littered with stale coffee grounds. These coffee particles were much too large to have squeezed through the filterbasket perforations.
Overall, I give this drink a score of:
0 out of 10
Iced Mocha
The espresso in this drink was every bit as horrible as the cappuccino, but the Hershey's syrup used helped to cut the astringency, so only the bitterness was noticable. There was no sign or visual of a Hershey's chocolate syrup bottle, but the tart twang and synthetic mouthfeel of the product is unmistakeable.
The appearance of the slightly-mixed drink was very unique, and visually entertaining. It's a shame that the actual drink quality did not match the appearance.
Total score:
.5 out of 10 (for the nifty appearance)
