A few weeks back I visited Asheville for a family vacation. During vacations I’m always keen to try a variety of coffee shops and roasters in the area. Unfortunately for as many breweries as Asheville has, there were not a ton of coffee roasters. (The COVID-19 pandemic also made the experience of checking out a coffee shop a bit different and not nearly as fun.) That said, I was able to stop by two locations of Hive Five Coffee, a local coffee shop who roasts Counter Culture coffee (a roaster based out of Durham, North Carolina). Fresh cold brew is always something hard to get from roasters around the country because the need to refrigerate it during shipping, so I thought that would be the perfect thing to pick up and bring back for a review. I’m glad I did too because Scout’s Honor is one of the best cold brews I’ve tried in a long time.
Contained in a fun, cheeky brand, Scout’s Honor is Hive Five Coffee’s signature cold brew. From my first sip, I was incredibly impressed with what it delivered in the beautifully packaged bottle. It was incredibly smooth, but with a nice, strong brightness. It was sweet and fruit-forward with a lemon citrus that dominated throughout. I also tasted notes of chocolate and raspberry. For a cold brew, I was quite impressed with the complexity. It had a wonderful mix of the smooth chocolate notes, but also some really nice bright and fruity notes. It reminded me a lot of what I’d expect to find in a flash brew.
At $4.75 a bottle, it definitely isn’t the cheapest cold brew option. That said, that price point aligns closely with other canned or bottled cold brew options I’ve found from specialty coffee roasters here locally and around the country. The coffee used in the cold brew is a rotating selection from Counter Culture’s catalog. It usually features a single origin or high-quality blend of a Central or South American coffee. Unfortunately my specific bottle didn’t have the specific coffee specified on it, but after writing with them on Instagram and trying it myself, I’m fairly certain it was La Golondrina from Colombia.
The Bottom Line
Scout’s Honor was one of the best cold brews I’ve had this summer. It surprised me with its brightness and complexity. It was a delicious coffee and I can’t wait to get back to Asheville (in non-COVID times!) to try more of what High Five and Counter Culture have to offer.
