I don’t own a coffee machine. I’ve owned two over the years — a pod machine that produced decent coffee but generated a significant amount of plastic waste, and a bean-to-cup machine that produced excellent coffee but required cleaning that I consistently failed to do properly, leading to a machine that eventually stopped working and a lesson about the gap between the coffee drinker I aspired to be and the one I actually am.
Since the bean-to-cup machine’s demise I’ve been using instant coffee and feeling vaguely apologetic about it — to guests, to myself, to the general idea of coffee as something worth taking seriously. The illy Intenso Dark Roast Instant Coffee ended that apology. It’s the first instant coffee I’ve had that I’m genuinely happy to serve to people who care about coffee.
The Problem With Most Instant Coffee
The issue with most instant coffee isn’t the convenience — it’s the flavour. Standard instant coffee is typically made from Robusta beans, which are cheaper and higher in caffeine but have a harsher, more bitter flavour profile than Arabica. The processing also strips out much of the complexity that makes good coffee interesting — the result is something that tastes like coffee in the way that a photograph of a landscape looks like a landscape: recognisable but flat.
What I wanted was instant coffee that tasted like coffee I’d actually chosen to drink rather than coffee I was drinking because it was the easiest option. That’s a higher bar than it sounds for instant.
Why I Chose illy Intenso
The illy Intenso Dark Roast Instant Coffee is made from 100% Arabica beans, which is the starting point for any instant coffee worth taking seriously. illy is an Italian coffee company with a reputation for quality that extends across their whole range — they’re not a brand that makes good espresso and then produces mediocre instant as an afterthought. The Intenso roast is their darkest, which suited me — I drink my coffee black and I want it to taste like something rather than like hot water with a coffee suggestion.
The six-pack was the practical choice. At 95g per jar, a single jar lasts a few weeks with daily use. Buying six at once is more economical than buying single jars and means I’m not running out and substituting something inferior while I wait for a reorder.
The First Cup — A Genuine Surprise
I made the first cup with the same scepticism I bring to any new instant coffee — a teaspoon in a mug, boiling water, no milk. The colour was right: a deep, dark brown rather than the pale tan of cheaper instants. The aroma was right: genuinely coffee-like, with the slightly smoky quality of a dark roast. And the flavour was right: full-bodied, with a bitterness that was present but not harsh, and an aftertaste that lingered in the way that good coffee does rather than disappearing immediately.
It tasted like an Americano. Not like a pod machine Americano or a bean-to-cup Americano, but like a decent Americano from a coffee shop — the kind you’d drink without thinking about it because it was simply good coffee. That’s a significant achievement for an instant.
Daily Use — Three Months In
I’ve been drinking illy Intenso as my daily coffee for three months. I have one cup in the morning before work and often a second in the early afternoon. The consistency is one of the things I’ve appreciated most — every cup tastes the same, which sounds like a low bar but is actually something that pod machines and bean-to-cup machines don’t always achieve. There’s no variation in grind, no variation in extraction, no variation in water temperature affecting the result. You put the granules in, add water, and it’s good coffee.
I’ve also served it to guests who care about coffee — including one friend who owns a proper espresso machine and is fairly vocal about coffee quality. He asked what I was using. When I told him it was instant he was sceptical until he tasted it, at which point he asked where to buy it. That’s the endorsement I’d been waiting for.
The Americano Preparation
The packaging suggests it’s ideal for Americano, which is how I drink it — one heaped teaspoon in a large mug, filled with freshly boiled water that’s been allowed to sit for thirty seconds off the boil. That thirty-second wait matters: water at a full rolling boil is slightly too hot for coffee and can make it taste more bitter than it should. At around 90-95°C the flavour is noticeably better.
I’ve also tried it as a shorter, stronger drink — two teaspoons in a small amount of water — which gives something closer to a long espresso. That works well too, though the Americano preparation is where it really shines.
Where to Find It
The illy Intenso Dark Roast Instant Coffee 6 Pack is available in the Coffee collection, within the broader Beverages and Food, Beverages & Tobacco ranges.
If you’ve been using instant coffee and feeling apologetic about it, I’d suggest trying illy Intenso before concluding that instant can’t be good. It can. This is the evidence. I no longer apologise for not having a machine, and I no longer miss the machine I used to have. That’s a better outcome than I expected from a jar of instant coffee.
— Marcus Webb, former bean-to-cup machine owner, three-month illy Intenso convert, and now the person who serves instant coffee to guests without any apology whatsoever
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