What to Eat With Coffee: Pairing Ideas

Key Takeaways

• Coffee roast and acidity both influence the perfect pastry pairing. 
• Breakfast and Kona blends are among the most versatile brews to pair with fruit pastries, such as scones or muffins.
• Espresso blends cut through rich desserts, like decadent chocolate cake.
• Bold French or Italian roast coffee needs a dessert that can stand up to it, such as chocolate chip cookies, to balance its flavors.

Your coffee and pastries are both divine alone, but we all know that they work even better together. Complementary flavors can actually enhance the overall experience, bringing out delicious and unexpected notes in both items. 

Want to taste for yourself? Learn more about creating your perfect coffee and dessert pairings with The Bold Bakery!

How to Pair Coffee and Pastries

Coffee doesn’t work with just any desserts, of course. Certain desserts and flavors help balance coffee’s acidity and bitterness and bring out its tasting notes. The reverse is also true! Specific roasts and blends can balance the sweetness of your artisan baked goods. 

Taste and Flavors suggests focusing on complementing or contrasting flavors when choosing what to eat with coffee. Here are examples:

Contrasting: Eat a sweeter dessert, like chocolate chip cookies, with a darker and bolder brew.

Complementary: Sip a bold coffee with a bold baked good, such as rich chocolate cake.

Think About Your Dessert’s Complexity

The complexity of your dessert and coffee must also be considered when choosing your pairings. In general, it’s best to pair a simple item with a complex one to avoid overpowering flavors.

For example, a spiced cake with a sweet sauce or frosting would go best with a simple black coffee. 

When in Doubt, Experiment!

While coffee flavor and acidity are important, so are your tastes. Experiment with your favorites to determine what to eat with your coffee blend. As coffee shop manager Bryan Allen said, “If it’s not the right match, you’ll get a bitter taste when you go back to the coffee. If it doesn’t work, try something else.”

Need Ideas? Here’s What to Eat With Your Coffee

Pair Your Espresso Blend With Nutty or Chocolate Treats

Espresso blends are dark roasts that offer a balance of sweetness and acidity. But they’re most known for their bold flavors (like our artisan bakery!). Its boldness makes espresso blends perfect for decadent chocolate desserts, cutting through the dessert’s rich flavors. 

Espresso chocolate cakes also make a wonderful pairing. The espresso’s acidity and earthy notes deepen the chocolate flavors in our cake, creating a more complex and less one-dimensional experience. It also cuts through its sweetness for a more harmonious taste! 

Wondering what else to eat with this espresso? We also love nutty desserts with espresso blends! Espresso’s nutty undertones complement our gourmet scones topped with almonds beautifully.

Sip Your Breakfast Blend With Berry Muffins and Pastries

It’s easy to choose what to eat with a breakfast coffee blend, because it goes well with almost any dessert on our menu at The Bold Bakery!

Pastries with fruit and berries go especially well with a breakfast blend. This is because breakfast blends often feature citrus notes, which complement sweet and tangy berries!

A blueberry muffin with streusel topping will harmonize beautifully. But if you’re looking for an alternative coffee and dessert pairing, we highly recommend citrus-blueberry scones, a slice of citrus cake, or even a slice of vanilla cake topped with berries from The Bold Bakery. 

Breakfast blends complement the local berries in our treats and highlight their sweet vanilla undertones.

Balance Your French Roast With Chocolate Chip Cookies

Don’t know what to eat with French roast coffee? This blend can be tricky because it has a smoky and bittersweet flavor profile that overpowers most desserts it’s paired with.

The bold and intense flavors of French roast coffee pair best with rich and sweet desserts that can stand up to them. This makes the fresh baked cookies from The Bold Bakery its natural partner. 

From chocolate chip cookies to pistachio chocolate cookies, our sweet and buttery baked goods provide the perfect counterpoint to the smoky notes of French roast. This coffee’s boldness, combined with its caramel notes, also enhances the depth of flavor in our cookies!

Note: You can also pair our chocolate cookies with Italian roast coffee, because it has a smoky and bittersweet flavor profile like French roast to bring out the same flavors in these treats.

Complement Your Kona Coffee With Buttery Scones

Kona coffee has a smooth body and a balanced flavor profile that often includes floral, fruity, chocolate, and nutty notes. This well-rounded profile makes this premium coffee incredibly versatile when it comes to coffee and dessert pairings! 

Hint: The natural sweetness of Kona pairs beautifully with desserts that are rich but not overly sweet. Here are ideas for what to eat with this coffee:

• Buttery or Fruity Scones: Kona’s natural caramel and nutty notes echo well with the fine ingredients in our gourmet scones, such as cherry chocolate and lemon blueberry.
• Chocolate Scones and Cake: The Bold Bakery’s chocolate cake and scones are classic matches with Kona coffee. This is because Kona’s notes of caramel, nuts, and fruit naturally elevate the chocolate’s richness.
• Fruit Scones or Muffins: Desserts with cherries and berries are also great Kona coffee pairings. Their bright, tart flavors bring out the flavor of the coffee, while the smooth coffee profile provides balance to their tartness and accents their sweetness.

Find Your Perfect Sweet Treats at The Bold Bakery

These are just some of the many ideas of what to eat with your coffee! Play around with flavors to find your perfect baked goods, whether it’s a slice of cake and French roast or sweet cookies with a cup of Kona.

Shop our unique selection of treats at The Bold Bakery to get your favorites delivered. You can also come pick them up at our Chantilly, VA bakery!

FAQs

Do you have ideas for what to eat with coffee?

While it depends on the coffee you’re drinking, cakes, muffins, and scones will still be a match with almost all coffee blends.

What are some good coffee pairings?

Coffee pairings depend on the type of coffee bean and roast. Typically, lighter coffee roasts with fruit and citrus notes will match better with lighter desserts, like a sponge cake or fruit-forward scone. On the other hand, richer, chocolatier desserts will match better with dark roasts and espresso.

Why do baked goods and coffee go together?

Coffee and desserts make for a great pairing, because they offer a complementary experience. The deep, bold, and acidic taste of your brew will balance the sweetness associated with most pastries. It also cleanses your palate between every bite of your dessert.