August 2018

About 3 months ago, having just packed up our whole house and driven for 15 days across the country in the middle of winter with a 2 year old and 4 year old in tow, I decided to “go big” on my Valentine’s Day gift for my wife. She deserved it.

We had gone through a rather intense couple of months, and if anyone deserved a quality gift, it was my lovely wife. Only a few weeks earlier she showed me this meme and we laughed out loud. Having been to the local Starbucks a couple of times, I saw a product that caught my eye.

That is, an Ember coffee mug. The price tag was the first thing I noticed. $79 or $150 for a coffee mug??? That seemed ridiculous. But I have to admit I was also intrigued. The design is beautiful, and its claim that it would keep your coffee at the perfect temperature drew me in. I purchased one for my wife and then she returned the favor on my recent birthday.

As a smallish coffee snob, I had already learned the value of the perfect temperature for your coffee. We had purchased a Bonavita Coffee Maker about 5 years ago (alas, that wonderful machine gave up the ghost after our most recent move.) I noticed a significant difference in the quality of the coffee simply by brewing the coffee at the right temperature.

Which is where the Ember coffee mug comes in. Most of us have become accustomed to microwaving our coffee multiple times in the morning, especially when we get distracted or immersed in our work. We also are used to throwing out that last quarter-to-half-inch of coffee at the bottom, the dregs that taste bitter.

Both of these issues are resolved with the Ember coffee mug. One of the strange things I began to notice was my completely empty coffee mug. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen that before! I don’t know if you will ever make up the money in that last couple sips of coffee, but you will be surprised and satisfied that none of it goes to waste.

Now as with any product, there are some weaknesses, but in the case of the Ember mug, I only really have two: