What to Order First (If You Have Never Bought Coffee or Tea From Us)

People ask us this in the DMs, so here it is in one place: if you have never bought anything from us, start here.

There are three good first orders, and which one is right depends on how you actually drink coffee. Not on what you want to try someday. On what you drink tomorrow morning.

The three-minute version

If you drink coffee with milk: start with the Latin American Blend, 12 oz, $24.99. It is built to take milk without disappearing.

If you drink black coffee and you want it to taste interesting: start with a single origin — Colombia, 12 oz, $24.99, or Nicaragua if you want chocolate and orange.

If you mostly drink tea: start with the Taster Flight, $49.99, which is three of our teas in one order, and you will find out what you like before you commit to a 3 oz bag.

That is the whole recommendation. Everything below is the reasoning, in case you want it.

If you drink coffee with milk

Milk flattens acidity and pulls sweetness forward, which means a coffee you enjoy black can be a completely different coffee with milk. Most people who drink coffee with milk want chocolate, caramel, and body rather than citrus and florals.

The Latin American Blend, 12 oz, $24.99 is our answer to that. It is a blend built for exactly this: it tastes like milk chocolate and brown sugar whether you take it black or with milk.

If you want one bag, that is the bag. If you want to step up, the Starter Ritual Kit at $45.00 includes coffee, a mug, and the rest of the morning setup, which is a better deal than it looks and a better present if you are buying for someone else.

We have a longer piece on coffee versus espresso if you are still working out what you like, and if milk is the part you are stuck on, how to brew a heavier cup of coffee at home is the practical version.

If you drink black coffee

Black coffee is the hardest way to drink coffee, and the easiest way to learn what you like, because there is nowhere for flavor to hide.

Start with Colombia, 12 oz, $24.99. It is the most forgiving single origin we sell. Milk chocolate and orange peel, medium body, sweet, and it does not punish you for a sloppy brew. If your pour-over is slightly off, it still tastes like coffee instead of like an experiment.

Start with Nicaragua, 12 oz, $24.99 if you want something a little brighter and more citrus-forward. We wrote about what that actually tastes like in the taste of Nicaraguan coffee.

Start with Tanzania, 12 oz, $24.99 if you want the most interesting cup and you are willing to brew a little more carefully. It is a lighter roast, which means you have to treat it gently — cooler water, no soaking the grounds, no pushing it past the first stage of extraction. We have a lot more on that one in what a cup score actually means.

Start with Brazil Santos, 12 oz, $24.99 if you want the softest, sweetest, lowest-effort coffee on the shelf. Low acidity, nutty, round. It is the coffee we suggest to people who say they do not like coffee.

And if you drink coffee black and you like the idea of comparing two coffees side by side, our guide to tasting coffee at home without the official gear is a fifteen-minute setup with three cups and a spoon.

If you mostly drink tea

Tea is a bigger world than most people think, and the mistake we see most is buying a large bag of one tea and then discovering you do not like that tea.

The Taster Flight, $49.99, is three of our teas. It is the right first order for a tea person because it turns one decision into three, and because you find out whether you like jasmine, or hibiscus, or a caffeine-free herbal, without committing to a bag of anything.

If you already know what you drink, here is the short list:

Jasmine, 3 oz, $19.99 — green tea scented with jasmine. Light, floral, good hot. We have the method in how to brew jasmine green tea.

Hibiscus Berry, 3 oz, $19.99 — tart, red, good iced. It is the one people are most surprised by, because it looks like a berry infusion and drinks like a very serious tea. See how to brew hibiscus berry tea.

Mango Treat, 3 oz, $19.99 — caffeine-free, sweet, herbal. If you are drinking tea in the evening, this is the one. The method is in how to brew mango treat herbal tea.

Peach Paradise, 3 oz, $19.99 — also caffeine-free, also fruit-forward, a little softer than the hibiscus.

Matcha, 1 oz, $24.99 — if you want green tea energy without the brewing, whisk it. We wrote the full story in the story of matcha, and if you have never had it properly, start there rather than with the tin.

If you are buying for someone else

This is a different problem, because you do not know their taste and you cannot ask.

A mug, $15.99. We make four. "But First, Coffee," "cats > dogs," "Tea > Coffee," and "Rescue, Sip, Repeat." They are 11 oz, they are the right size for a proper cup of coffee, and they are the easiest thing we sell to give someone who does not drink coffee.

The Starter Ritual Kit, $45.00, if you know they like coffee and want them to have a morning, not just a bag.

The Taster Flight, $49.99, if they like tea and you want them to have options.

We have more on the gift side in the coffee lover holiday gift guide and the coffee and tea lover gift guide under $40, including the timing thing that catches people every year: if you order Friday through Wednesday, the coffee ships after the next Wednesday roast. We explain why in why we ship on Thursdays.

What we would order first

If you want one recommendation from us, it is the one we drink in the morning.

A 12 oz bag of Latin American Blend, plus the "But First, Coffee" mug.

That is $40.98 for what is roughly a month of weekday mornings, it works with milk and without, and if it does not work for you, you have learned something specific about your taste for the price of one bag. We are not going to talk you into the 5 lb bag when you have never bought from us. You should earn the big bag, and we will still be here in six months.

One more thing. Every order supports our rescue partners — the specifics are on our impact page.

Why we say this so plainly

People tell us they are afraid of ordering the wrong thing, and we understand it. Coffee has a vocabulary problem: every bag says something is special, and none of it means much.

So here is the rule we use ourselves. Order one bag. Drink it for two weeks. Write down whether you wanted more or less of it. That one note is worth more than any tasting note we can print, and it is how you find your answer faster than reading another guide.

If you want the full picture before you decide, why tea measured in spoons does not work is worth a read before you buy loose leaf, and why we do not carry K-Cups explains the one option we deliberately do not offer and why.

P.S. We roast on Wednesday and ship on Thursday, and the coffee lands within a week of the roast. If you order on a Thursday, you are looking at the following Thursday, not tomorrow. It is the one piece of timing you need to know before you order, and everything else you can work out in the cup.

Sip slow.

— Seraphina