Coffee

[Wesley]

Okay, all this talk of getting coffee grounds in the mouth means I have to talk about another way of making coffee: Turkish.

It is rumored that the Turks were the first to roast and brew the coffee into something that looks like the coffee we drink today. But they had no filters. At all. They grind the roasted beans really really fine and boil them with water for a few minutes, then pour it into your cup. Gravity keeps a bunch of the grinds in the pot, then as you sip your strong and fragrant brew, gravity keeps some of the grounds in the bottom of your cup. If you don't like nibbling your coffee, this is a good reason to drink it slowly! Anyway, this method is actually closer to the awesome (?) method U.S. described in his post on the previous page.

I may be too much of a little girl to make my coffee this way.

[Eff]

Mannn i like the coffee thread but how the hell will i get to read it alll damm!

[Wesley]

I am a prolific prognosticator. You will have to make yourself a Nescafe and read the whole thread. Which brings me to today's variety: Freeze Dried coffee.

Step One: Quick physics/chemistry lesson... when a solid goes directly to a gas it is called Sublimation. Okay, now take a bunch of coffee, freeze it, put it in a vacuum and bring the temperature up just to the transition phase. Before the ice gets a chance to turn into water, it turns into gas and is whooshed away. Now you have coffee that weighs much less, will not spoil, is easy to ship around the world, and is easy and quick to prepare. Just add hot water and you have a cup of coffee! (so they say...)

Effie uses milk when she makes hers. This is perfect for her because I think she is too lazy .. um, I mean, she is in too much of a hurry.. Yeah! She does not have time to brew coffee the regular way, so she will have a Nescafe and post a few quick responses in here, then get on with her busy day.

One advantage of the freeze dried coffee is that it is easy to control how strong your "brew" is by using a little more or a little less water. A down side to this is that if you make it too strong, it ends up tasting like burnt celery. Sprinkle some instant coffee on your vanilla ice cream for a taste treat!

[Wesley]

Wow! Has it really been 3 weeks since the last coffee post?

As I sit having a terrible cup of re-brew, I am thinking of using my Aeropress to make a cup. This method relies more on technology to provide a unique way to deliver a good cup of coffee. It looks like a big syringe, with a flat bottom. There is a filter in there, and you pour your hot water on the ground coffee and put the plunger in, let it sit for a minute, then press it down! Ta Daaaa! Very fast brewed coffee! NOT instant, NOT freeze dried, actually brewed right into your cup! It looks like this:

And here is a video!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_pHqYVWqg6k&NR=1

[Wesley]

I guess nobody has had any coffee since October... HA!
Anyway, today I am having a New Orleans/Vietnamese style cup of coffee. What do New Orleans and Vietnam have in common? They were both under the influence of the French at some point in their history! The New Orleans coffee is roasted fairly dark, and they add a bit of Chicory. When coffee was scarce, roasted chicory root was used as a substitute. To make what coffee they had last longer, they would mix the chicory with it and brew the mix. Chicory has more of a smoky, "roasted" flavor than regular coffee, and it is a nice flavor enhancer. Anyway, back to the coffee.....

In Vietnam, it is rather hot and humid, so nobody really wants a hot cup of coffee. But having adopted so many things from the French, coffee became an integral part of their daily routine. What to do? Hmmm, those smart guys came up with a brewing technique that is like an upside-down French press.


You put the coffee in, pour the hot water, place it on your cup and let it drip. What you get is a very strong cup of coffee. Want a little milk? Well, it is hot and often there was no refrigeration, so milk is out of the question.... or is it? Canned milk does not spoil, so they will put a spoon of sweet condensed milk in the strong coffee. Great! Since it is January and quite cold out, that is as far as I went, and I am drinking my strong, hot, sweet coffee.

But what if I was in Vietnam, and it was 98 degrees and 98 percent humidity? I would not want a hot cup of coffee... As it turns out, the coffee is strong enough when you brew it this way that when you pour it over a glass of ice it dilutes just enough to make a perfect iced coffee! Here's to France, to Vietnam, to Chicory, and to Condensed Milk! * Sip *

[Wesley]

I like coffee, and I may get a French Press for a friend of mine.

The next thing I get for myself will probably be a little milk frother. Much quicker and easier than using the leftover steam from your espresso machine. It is a little battery powered wand with a whisk disc on the end. It spins so fast that it will whip even fat free milk into a nice froth, perfect for your morning cup of coffee.

[LaLou]

Pay a little more to get a good one. The cheap ones are really crappy and give up after a few times. And not because the battery ran out.

[chex]

I've been using little packets of instant iced coffee, and adding caramel creamer.

[Wesley]

Keurig claims to make a cup of coffee with the little plastic cup in the instant brewing machine. It upsets me. First, it is basically a heater for instant coffee. Second, the little plastic cups are not recyclable. So not really a good brew AND bad for the environment? Boo. Hiss. Nuts to that.

[Mouse]

I like coffee, and I may get a French Press for a friend of mine.

The next thing I get for myself will probably be a little milk frother. Much quicker and easier than using the leftover steam from your espresso machine. It is a little battery powered wand with a whisk disc on the end. It spins so fast that it will whip even fat free milk into a nice froth, perfect for your morning cup of coffee.

I have a frother, they're awesome for mixing up hot chocolate. Just make sure you get one with a thick stem. The thin ones get bent easily & then don't work effectively.

[Wesley]

Keurig claims to make a cup of coffee with the little plastic cup in the instant brewing machine. It upsets me. First, it is basically a heater for instant coffee. Second, the little plastic cups are not recyclable. So not really a good brew AND bad for the environment? Boo. Hiss. Nuts to that.

Yes, I still agree with this a year later. Keurig machines cost 20 times more than anything you need if you actually want good coffee. They use non-recyclable cups that add to our landfills. Their marketing is genius: Good brewed coffee in an instant. However, it is febreeze. You know who likes Keurig? People who don't really like coffee or don't know what good coffee really tastes like.

I'd like to share a story: A close friend of my little sister did not drink coffee at all until she was an adult. At this point someone introduced her to Keurig, and she fell in love. So much so that when she was going to Costa Rica to do some church work, she was inquiring about electricity so she could bring her damnable Keurig with her. To Costa Rica. Where they grow coffee. Yeah. Well, it only took a couple of days until she was done with Keurig forever. Once she tasted a fresh ground, full-bodied brew from a tin pot, she got rid of her Keurig and never looked back.

Consumers are partly to blame, because they think that more money is synonymous with more quality. With the key-rag, the exact opposite is true. Here is something to think about: with the key-rag, one little pod can make a small, medium, or large cup of coffee. What? How do you expect to get the same quality of brew with different amounts of water, but the same little plastic cup of freeze dried coffee? Oh, yeah, you don't.

So let's get this straight. For about 200 bucks, you get a fancy machine that heats water. For another 20 bucks, you get a cluster of little enviro-bombs filled with a mix of instant coffee and some coffee grounds. It heats water to about 180F - not hot enough to really extract the flavor from coffee beans - and squirts it through the plastic thingie and into your cup. Hooray. Sign me up.

At least Nestle, with their NesCafe brand, have made a machine that straight up tells you they are making the perfect cup of instant coffee. They have been doing instant coffee for decades, and don't mind admitting it. Unlike Key-Rag which tries to tell you that you are getting something you are not actually getting.

To sum up : Key-rag gives you a dishonest, overpriced, less-than-good quality cup of semi-instant coffee and then ruins the environment as an encore...

No.

[chex]

Oh, that was beautiful. Well worth the wait, and totally cheered me up after taking three kids to the grocery store.

[sizz]

I don't know really what Keurig is but it sounds crap, so amen to that.

I'm really an instant coffee person because it's easy and cheap.

[sizz]

Revisiting this to say I think I'm developing some sort of weird reaction to coffee, it's started making me feel really nauseous and shaky.

I also work in a coffee shop. Free coffee all the time. Coffee is my favourite beverage. I would drink decaf, but I need something to wake me up too.

WHY IS THIS HAPPENING? Has this happened to anyone else? I've literally been drinking coffee since I was about ten

[Wesley]

There are a few factors here: Quality, quantity, frequency, what else is in your diet, etc. There is such a thing as too much caffeine. Also, coffee is a stimulant, and a diuretic. I know you are putting all that liquid in you, but the caffeine makes you pee it all out. If you still drink like you are in college, then the alcohol and the caffeine may be conspiring to make you dehydrated. Make sure you have some good food and some water in addition to the coffee and it should help.

Oh, and there are trace minerals in coffee as well as various oils, etc. My Taiji teacher gets a headache from normal coffee, but not from espresso. Funny how that works. Maybe because espresso takes less time and has less acid? Not sure, but everyone is different.

[Wesley]

Oh damn, I miss Scooters....

Starbucks in known to use a blend of over-roasted and under-roasted beans. The burnt ones give their coffee that signature bitterness, the green ones have loads of caffeine. So in youe example, Shay, it may be that you are right at the edge of your caffeine threshold and Scooters -- which is damned good coffee -- is just right, but Starschmucks is over the top.

[sizz]

I think quality might be the issue here. I was talking to a friend today about this and she said that the coffee from this particular shop I'd been going to was particularly strong. Have actually managed to stay off the coffee for a few days and just had some really nice fruit/herbal teas in the last few days.

Ah, I try to avoid Starbucks, don't think I've been in almost a year. I adore their coffee, but there are so many independent coffee shops here that are cheaper and more cozy!

[sizz]

Had coffee out again this afternoon and the same thing happened! I had a three hour rehearsal this evening so I couldn't eat dinner until around 10.30pm, and I felt so faint all evening. I think I'm going to take a break from coffee in cafes. Or maybe start getting decaf.

[bella]

I tried Monmouth coffee recently in London. It's highly recommendable. A bit expensive but full of flavour, fruity and no bitterness. One of the best coffees I had yet.

[LaLou]

The supermarket discontinued my favorite coffee. It's a simple decaf instant, but has a mild, almost creamy taste.
Now I can:
> not have my after dinner coffee (not really an option) or
> have a regular coffee and stay awake half of the night (not an option either) or
> get a decaf instant coffee at another supermarket for twice the price.
I'll just start with being frugal with the last jar that I have and decide later.