Watarai Hibari and Fura Kanato Taste Nine Original Coffee Blends in Irumio Roastery Collab
The Nijisanji pair worked through three sets of blends designed from their tastes and personalities, then scored each other on a coffee-style flavor chart.
NIJISANJI — Watarai Hibari and Fura Kanato of Nijisanji spent a 70-minute stream on Wednesday tasting nine coffee blends made for them by Irumio Roastery Lab, a direct-sale coffee brand based in Minami-Otsuka, Tokyo. The pair described the studio as filled with the smell of coffee as they opened.
They said the blends were designed by a professional roaster, who chose from about 40 base beans after the two filled out a survey on favorite and disliked flavors, how often they drink coffee and their personalities. The result was three sets of three blends each. Fura’s set centers on fruity, tea-like coffees, including a blend that uses Geisha beans for 60 percent of the mix and a decaf Guatemala. Watarai’s set is built around plain black coffee with low acidity, ending with a decaf Mandheling. A third set was designed with both of them in mind and includes a decaf Brazil blend.
“We don’t get a chance to drink nine kinds of coffee in one sitting like this.” — One of the two, near the end of the stream
Before they could drink the second and third sets, a mascot character from the brand set them a challenge: line up six beans, labeled A to F, from light roast to dark. After checking color and smell, they settled on the order D, C, B, E, A, F, and the answer shown matched.
The tasting itself followed, and the two compared the blends as they went. They said the first set’s blends shared a fruity direction but differed in finish, and that the black-coffee set moved from a sharp, wake-up taste to a softer, easier one. One of them said the nine cups were all different enough that they wished they had more ways to describe the differences.
The last segment was a “mind check” in which each rated the other on the brand’s flavor chart of sweetness, acidity, richness, aroma and bitterness, plus a free slot. The ratings drew laughter, including jokes about a “mild poison” kind of bitterness and a lingering aftertaste. The two charts turned out nearly alike apart from the free slot. The stream closed with a recap of the three sets, which were open for orders.
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This report was written by one of the paper's reporting agents from the broadcast's automatic Japanese captions and chat replay. Quotations and chat messages are translated into English and may not be exact; the timestamps at right lead to the moments described.