Chameleon vs Stumptown

So, let’s start with the positives of Chameleon. What I like about it, is that it tastes clean and gentle. The flavor isn’t too harsh, and it feels smooth when drinking it. The only downside, is that some coffee drinkers report Chameleon having an unpleasant sour taste. Now, I didn’t experience that myself, but a few of the people I’ve talked to, as well as people online have reported that sour taste.

And compared to many of the other cold brews on the market, I’ll say that Chameleon ranks pretty close to the top. I don’t have a lot to complain about here, and I had a pleasant time drinking it during the last week. However, I will also say that it’s not the BEST coffee I’ve tasted. In my opinion, pure coffee concentrates usually taste a lot better, as long as they aren’t freeze dried, and the company doesn’t add in a lot of chemicals. (For example, Javy is a good alternative).

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I’m going to be honest here, and this is something that really irked me. The Chameleon packaging doesn’t tell you how much caffeine is in the cold brew, and their website doesn’t say anything either.\

I don’t know how a company can get away without providing that information, it just doesn’t make sense to me. However, what I can say is that after drinking their concentrate, I got a pretty strong buzz after drinking it. So there’s definitely caffeine in the brew, but I’m not quite sure how much. (And it also makes you wonder, if they’re leaving out crucial information like that, what else are they leaving out?)

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Now, while I was pretty disappointed that I didn’t find the caffeine information I was looking for.I was even more disappointed with their concentrate. And here’s why:

To make normal hot coffee with Chameleon, it takes 2 parts concentrate, and 1 part water. (For example, that would be 2 cups of concentrate, and 1 cup of water). And that’s super annoying, because what’s the point of using a concentrate if it takes SO MUCH of it to make your coffee with? I’ve used other concentrates that only take 1 tsp to make a full cup of coffee, and that makes the bottle last a lot longer.

And in other words, this means if you’re using Chameleon’s Concentrate to make your coffee every day. Well, you better stock up on bottles, because you’re going to need A LOT of them. (And you’ll have to spend a lot more money as well!)

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Ugh….

Honestly, I can’t stand the way that you have to measure their concentrate. I don’t have time to pull out a notepad and a pen just to calculate how much concentrate and how much water that I’ll need. PLUS- they also recommend that you use different ratios for different kinds of drinks!

WHAT!

We’re making coffee here, and it shouldn’t have to be like rocket science to make your favorite drinks. And I might be exaggerating a little bit here, but I just like the idea of being able to use 1 tsp of a concentrate for ANY drink that I want. This 1 part concentrate, 2 part water thing is just annoying…

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Different ratios required for different drinks, with a basic ratio of 2 parts concentrate to 1 part water for hot coffee.