I like coffee. Until recently, I drank coffee every day. I averaged around 5 cups. I couldn't function very well without it. In the morning, I couldn`t talk to anybody before I`d had my third cup. Then I`d leave the house and go to a neighborhood coffee shop and drink two or three more. Because my sense of taste and smell is very sensitive, I can only drink premium coffees. The bitter flavor of supermarket coffee like Maxwell House or Sanka makes me nauseous.
Paris has the best food in the world but shockingly has some of the worst coffee. I looked for a place to buy coffee for months since coming to Paris. Ive tried dozens of shops throughout Paris and the rest of France with little luck. Without access to good coffee, I had to switch to tea. Even I can brew it myself - I microwave a mug of water for a few minutes then put in a tea bag for a few more.
There are two main kinds of coffee beans used for making coffee, the arabica bean and the robusta bean. Robusta beans are large, grow anywhere, grow at low elevation and in poor soil, and grow quickly. They are easy to harvest and very cheap. Robusta has long shelf life and is more suited to be brewed as instant coffee. But perhaps because of their larger size, they are difficult to roast correctly. As a result, any subtle flavors they might have had raw are always burnt away. Coffee brewed from robusta beans tastes very bitter and has an aftertaste like burnt grains. Advertisers often describes the flavor as `rich,` 'full-bodied,' or `dark.`
Arabica beans, on the other hand, are hard to grow. They require very specific conditions including higher elevation and better soil. They are often grown on steep mountainsides and are difficult to harvest. They take longer to mature and the yield is less per tree. They are more expensive. Generally, arabica has the best flavor. Like wine, it tends to have overtones of sugar, fruit, flowers, berries.
Until World War II, the civilized world drank coffee brewed from arabica beans or just tea. When the war broke out, trade was disrupted, rationing was imposed, and arabica became expensive. Nobody had any money to afford it. Soldiers were issued beans made from robusta coffee. It traveled well and could be brewed instantly. The world world switched to robusta. No idea why they didn`t give up coffee altogether and switch to tea, but I suspect that since around 80 percent of the population smoked tobacco cigarettes, their sense of taste was dead. Everyone else had been exposed to so much second hand smoke that they couldn't taste anything either. Nobody could tell the difference. After the war, the economies of Europe were devastated and nobody could afford arabica. France encouraged the production of robusta beans in its former colonies and imposed a tax on arabica beans to give robusta an advantage so robusta drinking became deeply entrenched in France. Everybody in France smoked cigarettes as well.
It took years, but as robusta drinkers died off and a new generation came of age, arabica began to make it back to the markets in the 1960s and 1970s adn finally became widespread in the 1990s. In 1966, Alfred Peet founded Peets Coffee and Tea in Berkely, California. Promisingly, he decided to use arabica beans. But he ruined the beans because he used the robusta dark roasting technique he learnt in the army during WWII. This dark roasting method burns the beans. Dark roasting basically scorches the beans and burns away all flavor. It was the only way to deal with (get them to cook all the way through) inferior robusta beans during war time. No matter how good the bean is to start with, dark roasting removes all of the flavors. It ruins the subtle berry, floral, fruit, or sugary flavors and makes all coffee beans taste the same: very bitter. Like most men in the 1960s, Peet was a heavy smoker and wouldn't have been able to taste the difference between roasting techniques even if he'd experimented.
Starbucks came along in the 1970s and the founders learned Peets roasting style. I suspect the Starbucks founders were chainsmokers too and therefore lacked sensitive palates. They didnt have the taste buds to know how bitter and undrinkable their coffee was. As far as I know, Starbucks and the others only use arabica beans, but for whatever reason, they and all the other big coffee shop chains like Peets, pikes place, seattles best, caribou, dunn brothers, and joe muggs overwhelmingly use the same dark roast method. I suspect that even though they use arabica beans, they use the cheapest arabica beans of the lowest quality bred to grow at low elevations and in bad soil in wastelands in places like sub-Saharan Africa. The worst arabica beans are worse than the best robusta beans, after all. They stick with the dark roast method because it covers up the fact that their beans are cheap.
You can`t tell if all you drink are the sweet, flavored drinks like mochas or cappuccinos because the other ingredients cover the bitter flavor. But it's obvious that their drip and espresso shots use cheap beans.
I asked natives for help but they didn't know what was talking about. They grew up on bad coffee, and the harsh brews have killed their sense of taste I imagine. It doesn't help that people here smoke cigarettes like it`s 1970.
Cigarette tobacco and robusta beans have a lot in common. Just like robusta is the lowest quality of coffee, cigarette tobacco is the lowest quality of tobacco. It is made from the cheap part of the leaf cut from the cheapest plants and is mixed with the scraps left over from making cigars and pipe tobacco. That's why cigarettes smell like burnt cat shit while pipe, cigar and sheesha tobacco have rich, savory smells with hints of exotic things like fruit, wood, leather, or wines. Cigarettes, like bad coffee, are not smoked for their flavor.
As I mentioned, I looked for drinkable coffee for months. I tried the ubiquitous cafes and brasseries Paris is famous for. But they all use the same a blend of arabica mixed with robusta. After a year, I've found only four or five coffee shops that serve coffee brewed from high quality arabica beans in a city of ten million. Unfortunately, they are not close to my flat. You might wonder why I don't have some beans shipped to me, but I don't like to make my own coffee. My xgf used to do it for me when I bought beans, but it's not the same when I try.
Paris has the best food in the world but shockingly has some of the worst coffee. I looked for a place to buy coffee for months since coming to Paris. Ive tried dozens of shops throughout Paris and the rest of France with little luck. Without access to good coffee, I had to switch to tea. Even I can brew it myself - I microwave a mug of water for a few minutes then put in a tea bag for a few more.
There are two main kinds of coffee beans used for making coffee, the arabica bean and the robusta bean. Robusta beans are large, grow anywhere, grow at low elevation and in poor soil, and grow quickly. They are easy to harvest and very cheap. Robusta has long shelf life and is more suited to be brewed as instant coffee. But perhaps because of their larger size, they are difficult to roast correctly. As a result, any subtle flavors they might have had raw are always burnt away. Coffee brewed from robusta beans tastes very bitter and has an aftertaste like burnt grains. Advertisers often describes the flavor as `rich,` 'full-bodied,' or `dark.`
Arabica beans, on the other hand, are hard to grow. They require very specific conditions including higher elevation and better soil. They are often grown on steep mountainsides and are difficult to harvest. They take longer to mature and the yield is less per tree. They are more expensive. Generally, arabica has the best flavor. Like wine, it tends to have overtones of sugar, fruit, flowers, berries.
Until World War II, the civilized world drank coffee brewed from arabica beans or just tea. When the war broke out, trade was disrupted, rationing was imposed, and arabica became expensive. Nobody had any money to afford it. Soldiers were issued beans made from robusta coffee. It traveled well and could be brewed instantly. The world world switched to robusta. No idea why they didn`t give up coffee altogether and switch to tea, but I suspect that since around 80 percent of the population smoked tobacco cigarettes, their sense of taste was dead. Everyone else had been exposed to so much second hand smoke that they couldn't taste anything either. Nobody could tell the difference. After the war, the economies of Europe were devastated and nobody could afford arabica. France encouraged the production of robusta beans in its former colonies and imposed a tax on arabica beans to give robusta an advantage so robusta drinking became deeply entrenched in France. Everybody in France smoked cigarettes as well.
It took years, but as robusta drinkers died off and a new generation came of age, arabica began to make it back to the markets in the 1960s and 1970s adn finally became widespread in the 1990s. In 1966, Alfred Peet founded Peets Coffee and Tea in Berkely, California. Promisingly, he decided to use arabica beans. But he ruined the beans because he used the robusta dark roasting technique he learnt in the army during WWII. This dark roasting method burns the beans. Dark roasting basically scorches the beans and burns away all flavor. It was the only way to deal with (get them to cook all the way through) inferior robusta beans during war time. No matter how good the bean is to start with, dark roasting removes all of the flavors. It ruins the subtle berry, floral, fruit, or sugary flavors and makes all coffee beans taste the same: very bitter. Like most men in the 1960s, Peet was a heavy smoker and wouldn't have been able to taste the difference between roasting techniques even if he'd experimented.
Starbucks came along in the 1970s and the founders learned Peets roasting style. I suspect the Starbucks founders were chainsmokers too and therefore lacked sensitive palates. They didnt have the taste buds to know how bitter and undrinkable their coffee was. As far as I know, Starbucks and the others only use arabica beans, but for whatever reason, they and all the other big coffee shop chains like Peets, pikes place, seattles best, caribou, dunn brothers, and joe muggs overwhelmingly use the same dark roast method. I suspect that even though they use arabica beans, they use the cheapest arabica beans of the lowest quality bred to grow at low elevations and in bad soil in wastelands in places like sub-Saharan Africa. The worst arabica beans are worse than the best robusta beans, after all. They stick with the dark roast method because it covers up the fact that their beans are cheap.
You can`t tell if all you drink are the sweet, flavored drinks like mochas or cappuccinos because the other ingredients cover the bitter flavor. But it's obvious that their drip and espresso shots use cheap beans.
I asked natives for help but they didn't know what was talking about. They grew up on bad coffee, and the harsh brews have killed their sense of taste I imagine. It doesn't help that people here smoke cigarettes like it`s 1970.
Cigarette tobacco and robusta beans have a lot in common. Just like robusta is the lowest quality of coffee, cigarette tobacco is the lowest quality of tobacco. It is made from the cheap part of the leaf cut from the cheapest plants and is mixed with the scraps left over from making cigars and pipe tobacco. That's why cigarettes smell like burnt cat shit while pipe, cigar and sheesha tobacco have rich, savory smells with hints of exotic things like fruit, wood, leather, or wines. Cigarettes, like bad coffee, are not smoked for their flavor.
As I mentioned, I looked for drinkable coffee for months. I tried the ubiquitous cafes and brasseries Paris is famous for. But they all use the same a blend of arabica mixed with robusta. After a year, I've found only four or five coffee shops that serve coffee brewed from high quality arabica beans in a city of ten million. Unfortunately, they are not close to my flat. You might wonder why I don't have some beans shipped to me, but I don't like to make my own coffee. My xgf used to do it for me when I bought beans, but it's not the same when I try.
