RIP, Alfred Peet and Michael Jackson

I'm afraid I like Maxwell House, Folgers, et al. I think coffee snobbery is as ridiculous as bottled-water snobbery.

David J., there's no sin in preferring Folgers to the more boutique roasts, but there really is a marked qualitative difference between supermarket canned coffee and the better stuff. I drink Folgers at my office because that's on offer, but it tastes inferior. Similarly, there is a qualitative difference between mass-produced supermarket beer, and the stuff your local microbrewery makes. It's not a matter of baseless class prejudice to make that observation, even as one asserts one's right to enjoy the proletarian stuff.

On water, though, I think you have a point. I've never been able to discern any significant taste difference between the bottled stuff and tap water, at least in most places I've lived.

Rod,

When I was in high school I was drinking ten cups a day on some days, and I decided to try to cut down. I figured that at least part of my coffee addiction was simply the pacifier addiction -- holding a cup in my hand and taking sips from it. So I replaced part of my coffee consumption with cups of hot water -- and it worked. Nowadays I don't drink quite so much coffee (or any hot water), but I really do prefer the cheap stuff. What I'm after, esp. in the morning, is a cup of hot brown stuff with caffeine in it, and that's pretty much it.

For someone who really likes to eat, as I do, I'm afraid I have no real appreciation of so-called "good" food, wine, coffee, etc. I attribute part of it to the fact that I simply don't seem to have a very sensitive sense of smell, so all too often I'm afraid I really can't taste the difference. And, to be honest, I'm sure a good deal of it is just reverse snobbery on my part. I like seeing the look of shock on people's faces when I tell them that I would sell my mother to the Arabs for a sack of White Castle hamburgers. ;-) (But I really like the burgers, too.)

When my parents were first married, my mother (so she tells me) tried to be somewhat adventurous in the kitchen and make interesting things. After a while, she says, my father told her that, while he appreciated the fact that she was willing to make the effort, she might as well not bother, because he's a meatloaf-and-mashed-potatoes kind of guy. So my mother became the queen of opening cans and defrosting, and that's what I grew up with. And, well, what can I say, I am my father's son. ;-)

One of the big adjustments I have had to make since moving to Texas three years ago is that fact that just about everything is, to my tastebuds, extremely overspiced. I grew up with bland food, and that's what I like. I tell people that when I was growing up, "spicy" meant that my mother looked at the pepper shaker when she was cooking. ;-) Ordinary black pepper was a rare and exotic spice my mother's kitchen. In fact, to this day, my favorite chili is my mother's. It contains *no* chili powder -- it's essentially ground-beef-and-bean soup.

Did you try Peet's coffee resently?
Coffee served in Peet's coffee shops tastes like pee with lots of acid.

10 years ago Peet's coffee was quite different.
In general Starbucks and Peet's coffee is vastly inferiour to coffee in a decent French or Itallian backery/coffee shop (shops in US of course).
Even McDonalds/Burger King coffee is better than Peet's.

Coffee served in most of Europe is much better than Starbcks/Peet's pee.

It could be worse Rod. What if you also had a gastro-intestinal disorder that resulted in wafters that could knock a buzzard off a shit-wagon at 100 paces. Be thankful, be very thankful.

I drank my first good coffee at Peets in North Berkeley. It began a life-long addiction and love affair. Peets is now a public company but mostly follows in the tradition of Alfred Peet. I now buy my beans from a gal who roasts them in her shop in my neighborhood. I like the shop but the beans are are good but not great. Every so often one of my wife's students gift her with a Peets card and we indulge. Major Dick's blend is one of life's small pleasures.

Hmm, I think the only think that smells better to me than a freshly-opened can of Folgers is a freshly-opened jar of Skippy peanut butter! ;-)