The Goodness of Coffee

I grew up in a family of coffee drinkers.  If you were not drinking coffee, you pretty much were not allowed at the adult table at holiday meals.  I didn't get my first invite to the adult table until I was in college.  That's when I discovered the local coffee house - Sweet Eugene's.  I also discovered that black was not the only way to drink coffee.  "It puts hair on your chest," my Dad would say.  Maybe that's why I put off the coffee conversion for so long.  I could not imagine how that would be a good thing for me.  


Being introduced to Foo-Foo coffee is what keeps me coming back for more.  I have sought out the best way to make coffee, the best tasting coffee, and have a daily ritual surrounding these things.  I almost won't drink my Mom's coffee flavored water anymore - unless I sneak in to the kitchen after she has prepared the coffee pot for the morning and dump in a few more scoops of grounds.  I'm really glad my brother works in a country that produces good coffee, and that I get to partake of that abundance. 


I am a coffee snob.  I prepare coffee every day in my French Press - one cup of delicious goodness while I eat breakfast and blow dry my hair.  I have been committed to the French Press for years now...until my friend Kate bested me with decaf. 


Now decaf generally tastes like drinking aluminum foil to me, but Friday night - it was the best coffee ever to have crossed my amateur foodie palate.  She made this coffee in what looked like something you'd see in a mad scientist's lab - using filter paper and all.  I felt like I was back in Chemistry with Mr. Ramsey, just as clueless now as I was then.  I was doubtful, because the French Press is superior in every way to any other method.  Well, she explained how this method was actually better, and in the end - that few sips of decaf superseded any other past cup of coffee - smooth, no aluminum foil taste...it made me wonder what goodness it would bring out of my Guatemalan beans.  I might have to give in and get me one of those chemistry sets - if it's going to be that good every time.  It might be time to break up with my French Press.