What's your poison?

Every morning we arrive at our desks with our preferred brew. For me, it's always a cup of tea, but for my colleagues, it has to be coffee. Our cafe at work has a reward scheme where you get your sixth free, but we worked out that on average each person spends between £15 and £20 per month on takeaway coffee. 

One has brought in a cafetiere, another has moved to the decent instant stuff (and is fully hating it in quite a vocal manner), and a couple have started bringing in their own made in a coffee machine at home. After I was sent some coffee pods to review, we decided to do an impartial comparison of all the options available rather than just one. 

Takeaway coffee from the work cafe:

• Cost - £1 with the sixth free
• Taste - It's better than instant, and you can pick from filter, latte or cappucino. I'm going to be honest with you, it's not terrible, but it's not the best either. Can taste burnt at times.
• Consistency of product - It's pretty consistent as they're using a decent coffee machine, however it sometimes smells of perfume, for unknown reasons...
• Summary - We buy these for sheer convenience.

Coffee pods - Nespresso:

• Cost - About 25p per capsule, which makes one cup
• Taste - Lots of flavour options, but my tester prefers the Brazilian ones. Tastes just like filter coffee without all the faff. 
• Consistency of product - Consistent as long as you're cleaning the Nespresso machine regularly. 
• Summary - we buy these primarily to enjoy at home, but save us money if we bring them to work in a little thermos mug.

Coffee pods - Gourmesso:

• Cost - They claim to be on average 30% cheaper than the Nespresso branded pods. The Brazilian counterpart is 21p per pod. 
• Taste - Very little difference between these and the ones mentioned above; if anything, these are a little smoother.
• Consistency of product - As above really, they behave in exactly the same way as the Nespresso ones, but come in plastic pods, not foil. 
• Summary: Depends how many you buy, but this could save you quite a bit of cash if you drink them regularly. 

Cafetiere - Loose coffee:

• Cost - Generally these cost around £3 for 30 cups, so 10p per cup. 
• Taste - Some are just as good as the pod types, but were described by one person as 'a bit dusty!' They smell great though.
• Consistency of product - As mentioned above, can sometimes be a bit dusty, and even with a decent cafetiere, you sometimes get bits of ground coffee in your drink.
• Summary - A tasty, cheaper alternative, but a real pain to clean afterwards.

Azera Americano Instant Coffee:

• Cost - £4.99 for 50 cups, so about 10p per cup.
• Taste - Not bad for instant coffee, but you cannot compare this to the others in all fairness in terms of taste. I can't see this one lasting long.
• Consistency of product - Not hugely consistent, but more down to human error in terms of measuring the coffee when tired!
• Summary: It's a much cheaper option, and better than a standard instant, but cannot replace that real coffee taste. 

I can't see our team giving up caffeine any time soon, but I can see us getting a coffee machine for at work!

Disclaimer: I was sent some of the Gourmesso pods to try, but we bought the other products. All my comments are my own.