Freeze dried coffee was better than most coffee in 1979.
Today, I like Medaglia d’Oro's instant espresso coffee.
Give me that over a k-cup any day.
YMMV...note I didn't say I only drink instant coffee.
Good Coffee Is Now Bad
101–110 of 128 posts
Re: Good Coffee Is Now Bad
#102If specialty coffee stops being "different", then it's no longer specialty - it's a commodity. I'm reading the "Best of Jimseven 2004-2015" [1] book, where then-blogger, now-Youtuber [2] James Hoffman explores his own journey starting a cafe. And, in it he talks about the original marketing challenges of positioning a specialty cafe: > What those of us in specialty coffee offer isn’t necessarily unilaterally better c…
Heh, I read that very same chapter from that very same book last night. What a coincidence!
It sounds like the author of this article isn't interested in specialty coffee. If they're regularly going to Dunkin or Starbucks -- and particularly if they prefer the donut shop blend that Dunkin serves -- then the highbrow "tasting note" styled coffee probably isn't to their taste.
Folks have to figure out a price:performance ratio they're comfortable with, and the author just isn't interested in shelling out for high quality coffee. They're satisfied with something simpler. But just because that style of coffee isn't the author's favorite is no reason to hate on the coffee industry as a whole. Best of Jimseven really opened my eyes to just how much the specialty coffee industry has evolved and improved over the past decade. It would probably be a good read for the author of this article!
Re: Good Coffee Is Now Bad
#103In visiting NYC, I decided to stop by one of my old coffee haunts, Gorilla in Brooklyn. An AMERICANO was $7.50 before tip. And it was that burnt tasting roast ala Starbucks that I don't believe is good at all. The proprietor/barista also asked me MULTIPLE times to review them on Google Maps. I'm not sure the argument holds as much sway in other places (I live in a coffee mecca normally, and I think it's far less like…
As a coffee lover and former NYC resident, I really struggled to find a decent local coffee shop in NYC. There are lots of decent options, but I honestly feel like the average shop is worse than your average smaller, artsy city in the US.
If you've spent much time in Portland or Austin or Seattle or even Boston, most coffee shops in NYC aren't that great. The best ones are equally good and maybe even better, but you really have to sort through a million lookalike wannabe shops to find the good stuff.
Re: Good Coffee Is Now Bad
#104It’s even stranger than the author makes out. When I got into coffee in the 80’s, being a coffee snob meant buying beans, grinding them in a $30 Braun chopper, and brewing them in a $50 Braun automatic drip machine. The beans were often from the grocery store, and normally roasted very dark. When a Peet’s opened in the town where I went to grad school, I thought I had died and gone to heaven.
A Blue Bottle coffee opened up in that same town, and I had a cup last time I visited. It was almost unrecognizable as coffee. Light roasted, fruity, what is now called “specialty coffee”. I got that cup pour over, but coffee is very often made today on expensive espresso machines. I have a $500 machine. I have friends with $1000 machines and $600 burr grinders. People debate the merits of flat vs conical burrs in machines.
I was still buying dark roasted coffee, now from a coffee roaster subscription, but it hasn’t been tasting as good to me. I miss the taste of the dark roasted drip coffee I made in the 80’s, and I don’t seem to be able to recreate it with my manual burr grinder or my v60 pour over set. I think my taste as probably changed. I changed my coffee subscription to explore some of the lighter “specialty” roasts. Still doesn’t taste like coffee to me, but I’m starting to appreciate it more. There’s no Peet’s in my current state, and I find Starbuck’s drip coffee so strong as to be hard to appreciate.
Around 10 years ago I was in a diner and had a fantastic cup of coffee. It was full bodied and nearly perfect. I asked what kind of coffee it was and they said Maxwell House. I haven’t started buying Maxwell House (yet), but it made me realize how much of current coffee culture is fetishism around our addiction, and how little is about the ultimate taste.
A good cup of drip coffee can be amazing. I haven’t had one in a while, but am trying to find the beans and the grind that will bring me back to the excitement I had about coffee in the 80’s.
Re: Good Coffee Is Now Bad
#105Earlier quoted context omitted.
Shops are opening left and right with specialty beans, great atmosphere, pastries, and the $30k La Marzocco espresso machine, yet the baristas have no training, can't steam milk, and pull shots that taste like battery acid. The reason the coffee costs $6 a cup is to pay the pilot
> the $30k La Marzocco espresso machine I think it's interesting how a coffee shops are starting to hide their machines beneath the counter and just the group head is above (much like a beer tap). They don't get to show off their super expensive machine, but it does open up the counter for more human interactions (the barista isn't hidden behind a giant machine. I personally think it's a big improvement.
I think most people who come for coffe don't care about espresso machines. My wife was shocked when I told her how much a good grinder and espresso machine costs. Forget about knowing particular brands and product lines.
And people who care tend to care in an unhealthy way. I would put them in same category as people focusing what kind of photographic equipment you use to make a photo.
From purely practical point of view the espresso machine is one of the least significant ingredients. An espresso machine is essentially a heater and a pump that is supposed to push water through coffee puck at a given pressure. Some bells and whistles can help make a touch better coffee more consistently.
A good grinder and well dialled is on the other hand essential and any misstep here will basically preclude you from getting good coffee.
And if you don't get quality, freshly roasted coffee no of the above will save you.
Re: Good Coffee Is Now Bad
#106Theres this Orwell piece that just absolutely resonates with me. https://www.orwellfoundation.com/the-orwell-foundation/orwel... My favourite bit in there is: > All the organs of his body were working –bowels digesting food, skin renewing itself, nails growing, tissues forming–all toiling away in solemn foolery. His nails would still be growing when he stood on the drop, when he was falling through the air with a ten…
Thanks for the link to that essay. I feel changed after reading it.
Re: Good Coffee Is Now Bad
#107It’s even stranger than the author makes out. When I got into coffee in the 80’s, being a coffee snob meant buying beans, grinding them in a $30 Braun chopper, and brewing them in a $50 Braun automatic drip machine. The beans were often from the grocery store, and normally roasted very dark. When a Peet’s opened in the town where I went to grad school, I thought I had died and gone to heaven. A Blue Bottle coffee ope…
> Around 10 years ago I was in a diner and had a fantastic cup of coffee. It was full bodied and nearly perfect. I asked what kind of coffee it was and they said Maxwell House.
I find that I can get used to a type or method of coffee, and just drinking something different to change it up leads to it tasing delicious. After a couple weeks of dark roasted illy in a french press, a cup of Folger's in a drip maker will taste great, after a couple weeks of that, I switch types/methods and it's like rediscovering coffee.
Re: Good Coffee Is Now Bad
#108Starbucks makes delicious cappuccinos and mocha espressos probably by dumping a month's worth of recommended daily allowances of sugar in them. But they are yummie. Their house blend drip coffee of various roasts, however, is burnt. Starbuck's signature flavor for their drip coffee is burned coffee. I don't know how Starbucks thought that burning their coffee was a novel idea, and I don't know how anyone can drink it…
They burn their coffee (make it bitter) because it then works better with sugar. Too much sugar and we don't like something, too much bitter notes and the same thing, but when you combine bitterness and sugar, our body really likes it for some reason. Hence Starbucks. (Have to add fat in there, too ;)
Your explanation makes perfect sense. One of my reasons for drinking coffee black is that it isn't water (which is mostly what I drink), and there's no sugar. Now I understand: Starbucks drip coffee is not for black coffee drinkers.
Re: Good Coffee Is Now Bad
#109Earlier quoted context omitted.
Blue Tokai (and the other specialty roasters - must be at least 5-10 now) is certainly an improvement in the diversity of coffee we get, though pricing is quite high. However, there has been a good option for coffee beans (and ground if you prefer) for many, many years and that’s Devans in Delhi. Used to be mostly available at INA market but they also started online a few years ago. They are much cheaper than Blue To…
I have used Devans before and yes, they were my goto at one point! To my point earlier though: it took a while to find it. There's a few others I know of. Lately I found shop in Bangalore that gets beans from Coorg. Reasonably priced and decent beans. Ainmane https://www.ainmane.com/ . Shop is good. A little more expensive than Devans though I think. Devan's is a good option though. Malakodu Estate has some decently…
>There's a website that aggregates all the coffee vendors, but the name is slipping my mind for some reason.
Sixteen grams, Somethings Brewing...there are a few of those now.
> every once in a while I find myself picking up a cup of "sugar milk with coffee" on the street.Maybe there's something to it....
I ask for strong (filter) coffee without sugar, and that works reasonably well in Bangalore and Chennai.
Re: Good Coffee Is Now Bad
#110Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've never tried it, but a friend of mine says he uses a hot-air popcorn popper to roast coffee beans.
Yep! You need the right kind for it to work, but they're not particularly expensive. Granted, it's not a whole lot cheaper to buy good beans and roast them at home, but it's kinda nice to experiment and get your own personalized blend if you're interested. Guess that goes for cooking your own food, mixing your own drinks, and lots of other things too, though.
Indeed, my friend prefers to roast his beans in very small batches, to minimize the storage time before brewing.
And home cooking is definitely a personal / cultural thing. In my own case, I don't like restaurants: The crowding, noise, huge portions, and challenge of finding decent selections for the variety of people I hang out with, including vegetarians of all stripes. Having kids put a damper on my enjoyment of restaurants as well.