Einstein bros vanilla hazelnut medium roast ground coffee

Starbucks is the superior coffeehouse  

Brielle Aguayo 

Starbucks, to many coffee lovers, is the holy grail of macchiatos, frappuccino’s and, most famous of all, pumpkin spice lattes. These drinks are not only the most popular among younger generations, but as a society we collectively all have had an obsession at least once with Starbucks’s drinks and yummy treats. My love for Starbucks was even more enforced when I began to live on campus, where its convenient location has me hooked.  

As a coffee connoisseur, I enjoy vanilla iced lattes and toasted white iced mochas. They are both sweet and have just the right amount of coffee I prefer as a consumer. When it comes to non-coffee items, I am a refreshers enthusiast. Such as, the dragon drink, the strawberry açai lemonade, the kiwi starfruit and the pink drink. These drinks provide a fresh taste of caffeinated bases and a take on different fruit flavors.  

The world-renowned company not only has some of the best drink combinations I have ever tried, but the food items are delicious. The food menu is also something I gravitate towards when going to Starbucks for my daily breakfast-run. In particular, I am a huge fan of their breakfast sandwiches; the bacon-gouda and egg sandwich, and the double-smoked bacon and cheddar-egg sandwich.  

Starbucks does a phenomenal job at providing unique drinks and food items that taste delicious and are creatively brewed well.  

Give Einstein Bros. Bagels a chance  

Sophia Cortes 

With Starbucks’ iron clad grip on breakfast foods and coffee, it’s sometimes hard to remember that there are genuinely better, and cheaper, options available. Einstein Bros. Bagels is such a place that you can easily find on campus. Unlike Starbucks’ stoic rotation of often unfulfilling breakfast sandwiches and paninis, Einstein Bros. has a large selection of genuinely delectable sandwiches at affordable prices which you can customize at will. My favorite of the bunch being the “Tasty Turkey,” which is what a cucumber asiago bagel sandwich would taste like in Heaven.  

But coffee is where the most important differences lie. While Einstein’s iced coffees and lattes can sometimes be too sweet, something Starbucks doesn’t seem to mind when promoting their “signature lattes,” their freshly brewed coffee is where the greatest of their strengths lie. Einstein offers wonderful blends of dark and medium roasts, my favorite being their French vanilla flavored roast, which offers a wonderful, sweet aroma and incredibly flavorful notes of vanilla and hazelnut, all from a single black coffee. If you’re not one for black coffee and relish in the sugar brought by most Starbucks products, Einstein offers cold brew shakes in a variety of flavors that go miles above any Frappuccino.  

Starbucks is too expensive, and their food can at times be lackluster. Their Pike Place roast? It tastes like office coffee. It’s surprising that as much as their blonde and dark roasts change, nothing replaces the bitter dirt water that is Pike’s Place. Not to mention how their regular espresso is incredibly subpar. If you want good tasting espresso that does the job, you have to pay extra for the blonde. Where Starbucks lacks, Einstein Bros. comes to pick up the pace as an underrated classic.