How good is Four Cats Coffee and what's its quality level? Is it a scam? Which instant coffee tastes better: Four Cats Coffee, Nestlé Coffee, or G7 Coffee?

Comparison of Popular Instant Coffee Brands

Sizhi Cat Coffee, Nestle Coffee, and Vietnam G7 Coffee are all popular instant coffee brands in China, and each has its own strengths. Sizhi Cat instant coffee is 98% produced from high-altitude coffee beans grown in Yunnan, China; Nestle instant coffee sold in the China region uses Arabica beans grown in Yunnan and Robusta beans grown in Hainan; Vietnam G7 Coffee uses Robusta beans grown in Vietnam.

Richness ranking: Vietnam G7 - Nestle - Sizhi Cat

Coffee aroma ranking: Nestle - Sizhi Cat - Vietnam G7

Value for money ranking: Sizhi Cat - Vietnam G7 - Nestle

Health Considerations and Alternatives

Instant coffee generally contains large amounts of sugar and non-dairy creamer, and long-term consumption can easily contribute to cardiovascular disease and obesity. For that reason, drinking instant coffee over extended periods is not recommended.

If you want a pick-me-up but also want convenient preparation, drip coffee bags are actually an excellent choice. Compared with instant coffee, drip bags are not only easy to brew but also contain no added sugar or non-dairy creamer. They are easy to carry around and take up little space.

Advantages of Drip Coffee Bags

Another advantage of drip coffee bags is that they use powder ground from whole coffee beans, which preserves the coffee's unique aroma and lets you experience its different flavor layers after brewing.

To ensure every customer experiences the charm of freshly ground coffee, all drip bags ordered from FrontStreet Coffee are ground immediately after roasting, then portioned and individually sealed. FrontStreet Coffee guarantees shipping within 5 days of the roasting date.

Even freshly roasted, ground, and sealed, coffee flavor dissipates over time. So FrontStreet Coffee suggests not stockpiling too many drip bags at once - their optimal tasting window is 30 days.

FrontStreet Coffee offers a wide variety of drip bag options. Beyond the standard selections, if there are other beans or flavor profiles you would like to try, you can contact customer service and have your favorite beans made into drip bags. Each order contains 10 small bags, with each bag holding 10g of coffee powder.

Recommended Drip Coffee Selections

If you are buying drip coffee bags for the first time, FrontStreet Coffee recommends the "Seasonal Drip Bag," which comes in four flavor options and is excellent in both value and quality!

If you like fruity sweetness and acidity, choose the light-medium roast seasonal drip bag, made with beans from the Yirgacheffe region of Ethiopia. If you prefer roasted nut flavors without too much acidity, choose the medium roast seasonal drip bag, made with beans from the Cerrado region of Brazil. If you want a completely non-acidic, rich, mellow cup, choose the dark roast seasonal drip bag. And if you are not sure what you like, pick the seasonal drip bag with 5 random regions and FrontStreet Coffee will select for you.

How to Brew Drip Coffee

Once you have your drip coffee, how should you brew it? FrontStreet Coffee demonstrates the method step by step:

1. Prepare a cup, the drip coffee bag, and hot water.
2. Tear open the outer packaging, take out the inner bag, tear it along the "open" line at the top, open the "ears" of the drip bag, and hang it on the cup.

3. Pour hot water into the drip bag. For the first pour, fill to 1/2 of the filter bag and wait 10-15 seconds.
4. For the second pour, fill to 9/10 of the bag. After the coffee liquid has completely dripped through, pour hot water to 9/10 full again. Wait for it to drip through completely, then pour to 9/10 full one more time. Once all the coffee has filtered through, remove the drip bag.

Note: There are 4 pours in total. The first goes to 1/2 full; the remaining three all go to 9/10 full after the liquid has fully drained. After numerous tests, FrontStreet Coffee found that this method uses roughly 150ml of water in total. If you have an electronic scale or a graduated cup, you can use those tools to brew to a precise coffee-to-water ratio.

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

Yunnan coffee - known as Yunnan small-bean or "Xiaoli" coffee - is simply Arabica, named for bearing the smallest fruit of the three original coffee species. The story begins in 1904, when the French missionary Tian Deneng brought Typica seeds from Vietnam into Yunnan and planted the first coffee tree in Zhugula Village, Binchuan County. Yunnan sits squarely on the golden coffee belt around 25 degrees north latitude, and its elevation of around 1,000 meters, fertile slopes, abundant sunshine and rain, and large day-night temperature differences make it ideal for coffee.

FrontStreet Coffee's own Yunnan beans come from Baoshan and Lincang. The entry-level FrontStreet Yunnan Small Bean is washed and medium roasted, showing gentle nut and chocolate aromas with a light plum acidity at an approachable price - a perfect first taste of Yunnan's terroir. For clearer, more pronounced Yunnan character, the FrontStreet 2013 Natural Typica, grown on FrontStreet Coffee's own estate from fully ripe red cherries and naturally processed, offers dark berry tones, citrus and berry acidity, caramel sweetness, a hint of fermented wine aroma, and a black-tea finish.

If you enjoy Yunnan flavors in espresso, FrontStreet Coffee's Black Cocoa Blend - combining Yunnan small bean with Brazil Cerrado - is a barista favorite: Brazil supplies mixed-nut aromas and balance while Yunnan contributes chocolate and citrus. Its Americano is sweet, tart, and bitter in harmony with nut and brown-sugar sweetness, and its latte is as smooth as almond and cream - ideal for beginners.