| | RE: Happy (Inter)National Coffee Day, everyone. I am at... | Write Reply |
| Actually, Starbucks makes crappy coffee. You have to add a lot of stuff. I only get special drinks when they are free. Otherwise, it is regular coffee, screw off the top of the vanilla shaker and dump it in, a bunch of brown sugar, and half & half. Back in the Midwest, we had mainly independent coffee shops. Coffee was so good there that you didn't have to add anything. You just had plain coffee. Good plain coffee is nice because then you can enjoy different types. Colombian coffee is the center of the scale. You can also have a light Rwandan or a deep, earthy Ethiopian. My favorite is a Pan-African mixture.
I actually think the fancy coffees, espresso, lattes, etc. are a step down from good plain coffee. Good coffee is like a fine wine, you just sip it plain. That is why microwaves were invented - to keep coffee at that perfect temperature. That is also why Styrofoam is better - it keeps coffee hot longer.
The secret to good coffee is fresh roasted coffee beans. Until the bean is roasted, it is in a waxy, oxygen-free, suspended animation. Once roasted, the inside of the bean is exposed to oxygen and the chemicals break down fast and the bean becomes bitter. These chemical reactions are accelerated by light, heat, and oxygen. It is best to grind/use coffee within 1 week of roasting. I find it also helps to grind to a powder, like espresso grind. You then need to use 2 filters to catch all the powder when brewing. |
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