Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: GUEST,Patsy Date: 16 Mar 11 - 08:54 AM I know it seems ridiculous to actually spend money on vending machine coffee LH my excuse is that it was instant warmth in an ungodly hour of the morning in freezing cold weather, even the moon was still out. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: Deckman Date: 16 Mar 11 - 12:17 AM JUDY ... I just talked with you sister and got your e-mail. I'll be sending you a catch-up (ketchup?) note overnight! bob nelson |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: Little Hawk Date: 15 Mar 11 - 01:05 PM I'll make a note to avoid Roy Rogers franchises. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: Micca Date: 15 Mar 11 - 12:44 PM It was on the way from the Getaway(my first in 2001) to New York on the New Jersey Parkway, we stopped, (we were both Very tired and hungry), at a Roy Rogers franchise place, They had the WORST doughnuts I had EVER tasted before or since! and the WORST Coffee also!! it was worse than Mellow Birds instant, Vile, |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: Deckman Date: 15 Mar 11 - 12:40 PM YIPPEEEEE! You're still ALIVE! I'll send yout note off to Don NOW and I'll contact yout sister. Thanks for getting in touch, MUDCAT STRIKES AGAIN! bob(deckman)nelson ... still hiding out in Everett, Washington |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: Little Hawk Date: 15 Mar 11 - 12:37 PM Vending machine coffee is so bad that it's simply incredible that anyone would pay for it. Try water instead. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: GUEST,JUDY FOLKSINGER Date: 15 Mar 11 - 12:32 PM Hi Bob - This is the only way I know how to respond to you and Don F. from your query looking for me in 2002. My sister somehow came across your post from that time and just forwarded it to me this morning. Yes I am still in the Florida Keys and singing occasionally but not regularly. Blown away that you would remember and go looking!! We did spend about 10 years diving on Spanish galleons near Ft. Pierce, FL (not the Atocha but those guys are friends of ours and we worked the wreck they found and left to go look for the Atocha off Key West.) Please call my sister Shary who is still in Seattle - you will find her in the phone book under our last name (which you spelled correctly)- our Navy father's listing. She will be glad to give you my contact info and fill you in some on what we have been doing. Sorry to be so vague but I don't want to post personal stuff without making contact. Regards, Judy F. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: GUEST,Patsy Date: 15 Mar 11 - 12:04 PM And then there is vending machine coffee. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: Deckman Date: 15 Mar 11 - 10:52 AM I well remember when my cousin Aria visited us some years ago from Rovaniemi, Suomi. She brought her own coffee with her. I think she was warned about american coffee. Her coffee came in a red foil "brick." When she stuck a knife in it,it pooshed and inflated it self. The coffee she brewed with it was something to behold: a spoon would stand upright in it. For several weeks after she left, all I had to do to have a "cuppa kavi" (that's Finnspeak) was add water to the cup! bob |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: Little Hawk Date: 14 Mar 11 - 03:04 PM Try water. It works wonders. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: GUEST,Patsy Date: 14 Mar 11 - 09:31 AM The 3 in 1 or 2 in 1 individual coffee sachets Kenco or Necafe both are as bad. It has this horrible synthetic aftertaste which I assume must be the creamer and sweetners mixed in but it is not nice. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: JohnInKansas Date: 13 Mar 11 - 10:12 PM Grishka - The forecast of rising prices, and even more so the threat of shortages, impelled me to buy another 18 pounds of coffee on our shopping trip today. (Of course I do that about once a month anyway. I'm sure glad "she" only drinks about a cup per day, cause I'd be buyin' twice that if I warn't the only one in the house that likes it.) John |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: GUEST,Grishka Date: 13 Mar 11 - 05:18 PM John, this means that eventually we may all become Scots(wo)men drinking Camp Coffee! At least we won't have to wear anything underneath ... |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: JohnInKansas Date: 13 Mar 11 - 01:30 PM If it was bad aback then, just wait: Cost of coffee soars as climate warms The New York Times 3/10/2011 Production in Colombia has plunged amid higher temperatures, more rain and the arrival of new diseases. ... ... In 2006, Colombia produced more than 12 million 132-pound bags of coffee, and set a goal of 17 million for 2014. Last year the yield was nine million bags. Brands like Maxwell, Yuban and Folgers have increased the retail prices of many grinds by 25 percent or more since the middle of last year in light of tight supply and higher wholesale prices. Profits of high-end coffee chains like Starbucks and Green Mountain have been eroded. Coffee futures of Arabica, the high-end bean that comes predominantly from Latin America, have risen more than 85 percent since last June, to $2.95 a pound, partly over concerns about supply, extreme weather and future quality, said George Kopp, an analyst at the International Futures Group in Chicago. ... ... The Colombian Coffee Growers Federation says high fertilizer prices have also dented yields. But it agrees with a 2009 report from the International Coffee Organization that concluded, "Climatic variability is the main factor responsible for changes in coffee yields all over the world." Average temperatures in Colombia's coffee regions have risen nearly one degree in 30 years, and in some mountain areas the increase has been double that, says Cenicafé, the national coffee research center. Rain in this area was more than 25 percent above average in the last few years. At the new, higher temperatures, the plants' buds abort or their fruit ripens too quickly for optimum quality. Heat also brings pests like coffee rust, a devastating fungus that could not survive the previously cool mountain weather. The heavy rains damage the fragile Arabica blossoms, and the two-week dry spells that prompt the plant to flower and produce beans occur less often, farmers say. Arabica beans take about seven months to mature. "Half a degree can make a big difference for coffee — it is adapted to a very specific zone," said Néstor Riaño, a specialist in agroclimatology for Cenicafé. "If temperature rises even a bit, the growth is affected, and the plagues and diseases rise." ... ... Starbucks has already bought enough coffee to last until 2012 ... John |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: GUEST,Eliza Date: 12 Mar 11 - 10:00 AM Yes, Guest mayomick it's still sold here, but about four years ago they changed the picture on the front as it was too Imperialist and racist (An Indian servant standing with a tray offering his 'master' a cuppa) Now the Indian gentleman is sitting beside a kilted Scotsman enjoying (?) a cuppa with him. The chicory stuff is just as ghastly as ever. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: artbrooks Date: 12 Mar 11 - 09:54 AM Starbucks has decent coffee - but I like strong and slightly bitter coffee. I normally drink it at Barnes and Noble, since I like to sit and read and the atmosphere at the Starbucks store is a bit frenetic (too many 16-year-old girls with their $5 lattes). At $1.35 (US) for a fill of my 16oz cup, it is reasonably priced. BTW, Starbucks never "got the Border's franchise" - at least not in the US. Borders started selling 'Seattle's Best' coffee, a different brand that was bought up at the corporate level by Starbucks, Inc. a few years ago. Not at all the same stuff...some prefer it - I don't. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: GUEST,mayomick Date: 12 Mar 11 - 08:49 AM It depends on the standard you've been used to drinking . For the last three weeks I have been spoiled from drinking good quality stuff in Switzerland . I normally drink the Aldi house brand that somebody mentioned as being particularly bad and am having to get used to it again now. At least it is real coffee . Camp Coffee - sweetened , liquified and containing as much chicrey as coffee - used to be the very worse . Do they still have it in the UK ? |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: GUEST,Grishka Date: 12 Mar 11 - 07:22 AM The following urban legend is told about an Indian scientist named Kulkarni (maybe this one): he used to start his coffee machine but, immersed in his science, forget to switch it off or drink the coffee; next morning he would find it evaporated, so he would pour hot water on the brown crust, stir, and drink it. His students, including a friend of a friend of a friend of mine, named this process "kulkarnization". |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: Dave MacKenzie Date: 12 Mar 11 - 06:22 AM If I made a big flask of coffee, it wouldn't be around for reheating the next morning. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: Joe_F Date: 11 Mar 11 - 09:27 PM I used to be proud of the badness of the coffee I drank. I would make a big flask of coffee in the coffeemaker & then reheat it every morning till it was gone. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: Dave MacKenzie Date: 11 Mar 11 - 07:37 PM "If you like your coffee strong and you don't mind it to taking the enamel off your teeth" Definitely not the stuff I've had here. And I'm not sure if Borders in the UK was the same company as in the US. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: Don Firth Date: 11 Mar 11 - 07:16 PM Starbucks? Not bad, actually. I've drunk a lot of the stuff. Dark roast, brewed strong. If you like your coffee strong and you don't mind it to taking the enamel off your teeth, it's good stuff. Maybe that's why lots of people go for lattés. Cut it a bit. I prefer my coffee straight. I learned about good coffee as a student at the University of Washington. No, not that slop at the Student Union Building cafeteria. From a Turkish exchange student I knew. He brewed it strong and flavorful. He said that most Americans don't know what good coffee is and opt for dishwater instead. If you want a cup of coffee, drink drink a cup of coffee. I live in Seattle. Not to say that there are quite a few Starbucks' in this city, but I went into a Starbucks a few weeks ago and before I placed my order, I decided to go the men's room. Damned if there wasn't a Starbucks in there, too! I posted this on some thread here maybe three years ago, but for your amusement and amazement, I thought I'd post it again, here. For the memoir/autobio I'm writing (folk music scene in Seattle in the 1950s and 60s, and up until now if I don't run out of steam), I did a bit of research on coffeehouses (big venue for singers of folk songs during that time) and came up with what I thought was some interesting stuff. Pour yourself a cup of coffee and prop up your feet. As early as Homer, there were stories of a black and bitter brew that had the power to endow increased alertness on those who drank it, but it was not until much later that the details of the discovery of coffee comes into sharper focus.Fun times! I spent a lot of time singing in coffeehouses back then. No, not the 1600 and 1700s!! In the 1950s and 60s. I the late 1950s and on into the 1960s, some coffeehouses were almost like non-alcoholic night clubs, and actually paid fairly decent money! AND, there is a lot of folk music going on in Seattle's coffeehouses these days. "Come all ye bold fellers. . . ." Don Firth |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: RangerSteve Date: 11 Mar 11 - 06:43 PM The 7-11 in Lakehurst NJ. (7-11 is a convenience store chain in the U.S.) - their coffee is usually good, but this one store had what was possibly the worst coffee in the world. I was on my way to a job installing thermal windows at a housing development construction site, and I figured there'd be another place to get something to wash the taste out of my mouth, but there wasn't. I tasted bad coffee all day. 25 years later, I still remember that stuff when I drive by that particular store. It was that bad. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: PoppaGator Date: 11 Mar 11 - 05:38 PM Starbucks has the in-store cafe franchise for Barnes and Noble bookstores, which are not going out of business, as well as Borders, which is downsizing many of their sites. I am pretty well persuaded by the theory that Starbucks' coffee is "designed" to be mixed and sweetened to death for all those prissy sissified concoctions, not primarily for the (much less profitable) basic cup of coffee. Makes a lot of sense. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: Little Hawk Date: 11 Mar 11 - 04:50 PM I would blame Henry the VIIIth for it. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: MartinRyan Date: 11 Mar 11 - 04:44 PM Heard Paulo Tullio, an Italian food critic living in Ireland for many years, talking about the problem of getting decent espresso in Ireland, this evening. "Imagine if you (an Irishman) went into a pub, asked for a pint of Guinness - and it arrived with no head on it! What would you do?" Regards |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: Little Hawk Date: 11 Mar 11 - 04:38 PM Did they? Christ! I thought it was just a partnership or something. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: Dave MacKenzie Date: 11 Mar 11 - 04:36 PM I haven't been in a Starbuck's since the day I discovered they'd taken over the Borders' franchise. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: Little Hawk Date: 11 Mar 11 - 04:14 PM I agree that Starbucks is pretty awful...too high-priced...and downright pretentious as well. But I never drink their coffee anyway. I have tea if I go there (and I hardly ever do). |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: Dave MacKenzie Date: 11 Mar 11 - 04:11 PM You find that you can get used to the smell of cat piss..... |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: VirginiaTam Date: 11 Mar 11 - 01:45 PM best coffee Whittards St Augustin Columbian.... it is wonderful. worst... out of those cafevend dispensers. you select your little sachet and plug it into the maker and it is squirted or extruded through hot water into a plastic cup. Ugh! Tastes like what the contents of an ashtray and cat piss would smell of, if you mixed them together. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: Dave MacKenzie Date: 11 Mar 11 - 01:28 PM Can the demise of Borders Book Shops be attributed to their awarding the coffee shop franchise to Starbucks? That's when I stopped going for a coffee and a browse. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: Bee-dubya-ell Date: 11 Mar 11 - 09:45 AM Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: lefthanded guitar - PM Date: 10 Mar 11 - 02:47 PM Starbucks I don't know WHY that vile stuff is so popular I have a theory that Starbucks brews their coffee to a strength that works well as a base for the various coffee-flavored concoctions they sell. It's not meant to be drunk straight-up. It's meant to be adulterated until all resemblance to its original fresh-from-the-pot state has vanished. Drinking a large (or whatever Starbuckese for "large" is) "black coffee" will result in a four-hour bout of intolerable indigestion. And olddude, all Folgers coffees are not the same. My wife and I have become addicted to their "Black Silk" blend. Compared to it, their "Classic Roast" and similar blends taste like weak dishwater. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: Noreen Date: 11 Mar 11 - 08:16 AM Narrowly escaped one last summer in Iraklion, Crete where I asked for a coffee at a nice little sidestreet café. The waitress, deducing I was a tourist and English too, with a bright smile said "Nescafé?" The real stuff was much nicer :) |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: GUEST,Patsy Date: 11 Mar 11 - 07:43 AM The coffee that used to be served in MacDonalds was so atrocious that it looked and tasted just like hot dish water. It's bad enough eating the unhealthy stuff and then to add a bad coffee, yuck. I could have had a cold drink with the meal menu but it was in the middle of winter and this particular MacDonalds was a bit remote and quite a long chilly walk home. The coffee I've been told is getting better....apparently. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: Allan C. Date: 11 Mar 11 - 06:40 AM I have discovered that, after I have deciphered the shop's lingo with regard to size and style of coffee and place my order, my hackles rise when they ask: What flavor, vanilla, hazelnut or mocha? I have to keep myself from shouting, "What flavor? COFFEE flavor, you idiot!" |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: GUEST,Grishka Date: 11 Mar 11 - 06:36 AM Allen, you have won so far: Bushell's coffee brewed with water containing rust and traces of machine oil. Easily tops all first-australian grub of grubs - as a tall tale to be told while enjoying a billy brewed with fresh source water. Grishka (spent a couple of years down under, learned to appreciate McDonald's coffee there) |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: artbrooks Date: 10 Mar 11 - 09:01 PM My parents had a neighbor who served with the British army in North Africa. He refused to drink coffee, and insisted that the mark of a good cuppa tea was whether or not a spoon would stand up straight in it...from all of the sugar. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: Allen in Oz Date: 10 Mar 11 - 08:39 PM Bert It is hard to know which is worst really ...albumen or rust ! Best wishes AD |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: Bert Date: 10 Mar 11 - 07:12 PM Eliza, I thought the same way the first time I tasted Turkish coffee, But after having to drink a lot of it in the Middle East (Just to be polite) I got to like it. Allen in Oz. That reminds me of one time in a Youth Hostel when one of our gang made tea with the water that the eggs had been boiled in. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: Allen in Oz Date: 10 Mar 11 - 06:22 PM This is a story about a cup of tea but it could equally have applied to coffee. In the very early 1960s I worked with on old chap who had been in the Australian Army in Palestine during the First World War. At one point a steam train pulled in where the soldiers were stationed and the Aussie diggers were dying for a cup of tea. So they used the boiling water fron the steam train and proceeded to drink their tea. My old mate said that he had had some bad cups of tea in his time but this was a bad as it could get ! Allen in Oz |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: PoppaGator Date: 10 Mar 11 - 06:04 PM My experience as a world traveler has been severely limited: one week each in England and Ireland in August of '04. Most of our stay in the UK was at my brother's home in East Anglia, but our one overnight in London, plus the week traveling across Ireland, involved overnight stays in B&B-type establishments where every proprietor was anxious to demonstrate to us "Yanks" that they knew how to make good coffee. And, indeed, every morning's brew proved to be more than passable (and some were downright excellent). I would have been glad to "do as the Romans" and stick with tea as a morning wakeup, but took the coffee to be polite. Never regretted it; had to wait til afternoon to experience nice cups of tea at, well, teatime... I can't name a single specific "worst" cup of coffee. I generally dislike instant, but my real pet peeve is non-dairy creamer. I'll use it anyway when unavoidable, finding it just barely preferable to black, but will go to lengths (including paying extra for a glass of milk) to include a shot of real dairy product. My normal preference is cream-no-sugar, but when faced with the prospect of imbibing nasty chalky powder-cream, I will sometimes resort to sugar to kill the aftertaste. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: GUEST,Eliza Date: 10 Mar 11 - 05:48 PM Honestly, I swear I don't know what espresso, capuccino, latte, skinny, etc etc mean. These Costa, Starbucks and other modern coffee places are alien to me. I've been in one with a friend and even the sizes of cups were strange words, like a foreign country. I asked for a cup of tea, which they had, but it cost a fortune. And dreadfully loud jazzy music was playing, I couldn't hear my friend speak. I remember fondly the old Lyons Corner shops, at least you got a lovely cup of tea, even if the cakes were like sawdust.Oh dear, I'm too old for the twenty first century! |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: GUEST,PeterC Date: 10 Mar 11 - 05:25 PM <>but I find it increasingly irritating when ordering an espresso in the UK to be asked if I want a "single or double" or the assistants in motorway services who ask if you want your americano black or white! It is subjective of course, going on a package holiday to Mallorca with my parents in the 60s I remember people complaining because the hotel didn't serve instant. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: GUEST,Grishka Date: 10 Mar 11 - 04:57 PM British coffee is bad for ideological reasons, mirroring US tea. However, you ain't tasted nothing yet if you don't know Australian Bushell's coffee, my candidate. Serves the Yanks bloody right, mate! Nescafé - pure luxury, as the Four Yorkshiremen would say. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: Deckman Date: 10 Mar 11 - 03:08 PM My American Army days. When we were in the field, the cooks boiled coffee in 55 gallon garbage cans. Beyond morning coffee, it was also the ONLY hot water we had to shave with. We'd drink half a canteen cup (one quart)and then use the rest to make shaving lather. After we shaved, we drank the remaining lather/coffee. It always tasted better AFTER we shaved! bob (deckman)Nelson |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: GUEST,Eliza Date: 10 Mar 11 - 03:07 PM Yes, Bert, I realised it was Turkish coffee, as I was sitting outside at a cafe in Turkey. But I don't think I could ever acquire a taste for it. In the Royal Infirmary in Edinburgh during the sixties, I got a student job on the wards (relief auxiliary nurse). We nurses had ghastly NHS coffee, a horrid greyish brew with a sour taste (some cheapo instant with powdered milk) But my job was to make The Doctors' Coffee. (curtsey) Real coffee grounds, roasted in a pan then percolated. It smelled absolutely delicious, the beasts. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: gnu Date: 10 Mar 11 - 02:49 PM In every job I have had I was always the first arrival in the morn. Always made the coffee. One morn, a full pot had been on the heat pad all night and it just reeked. I poured out the sludged and thought "This crap goes in black and comes out clear.... never again." I've had three cups in over 20 years... only because I couldn't stay awake on a technical course about hydraulic hose and fittings. Oh, I'd have still been a certified hoser without the coffee but the snoring might have offended the instructors. |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: lefthanded guitar Date: 10 Mar 11 - 02:47 PM Starbucks I don't know WHY that vile stuff is so popular but then again so was/is Justin Beiber The Carpenters Avrile Lavigne Sarah Palin |
Subject: RE: BS: Worst cup of coffee ever!!! From: GUEST,999 Date: 10 Mar 11 - 02:32 PM " unless you steal a filter, stick some coffee in it and dip it in your cup like a tea bag. Done that. It's tricky not to scald one's fingers." Get someone else to do that part, Jeri. |