Hey! Wild, bizarre notion! So good, I'm going to patent it!

1. Do NOT take a big gulp of a fresh cup of coffee.
2. Raise cup to lips, but don't drink yet. You can feel the heat radiating from the coffee and that will give you a notion of how hot it is.
3. Be patient. Let it sit for a few minutes and check it again.

(Patent pending)

As people above have said. For a decent cup of coffee, the water has to be VERY hot when it hits the coffee.

And--an old Swedish fellow I knew taught me how to make a cup of instant coffee that is indistiguishable from fresh-brewed:

Coffee powder (teaspoon, heaping, rounded, or level, depending on size of cup and to taste) in cup, ready to go. Wait for the water to come to a boil. Take kettle off stove and pour boiling water into cup immediately. Stir until thoroughly mixed. Let stand long enough to cool to a drinkable temperature.

Don Firth

P. S. Coffee that the kid in the paper hat throws out the drive-by window at passing cars is almost invariably piping hot--because people will kvetch at them if it's NOT hot.

(And then, of course, they'll manage to dump it in their laps, then sue the drive-in!)