Mad Cook
Master Chef
I don't think we have the pay-for-the-first-cup-and-get-free-refills thing over here. At least I've never come across it. The waiter may ask if the customer would like another cup but it's not usually free.
Coffee Pet Peeve
- Thread starter larry_stewart
- Start date
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If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.
roadfix
Chef Extraordinaire
I've only been to few places where they pour without asking. Most coffee shops I frequent, even raunchy, hole-in-a-wall coffee shops ask if I want more coffee. It basically boils down to common sense.
Zagut
Head Chef
It's good to see someone has good manners.
I'd have spewed whatever I was eating all over the place.
Mad Cook, On this side of the ocean (I can't call it a pond) we have what is known as a bottomless cup of coffee.
If you like Java it's a good thing.
Yep, Common sense is the key but how much of that exists in this day and age?
Addie
Chef Extraordinaire
We don't get it here in New England either. It is found more through the south and out west.
Andy M.
Certified Pretend Chef
We don't get it here in New England either. It is found more through the south and out west.
You'll find diners and similar restaurants give free refills. Tablecloth restaurants don't.
erehweslefox
Sous Chef
Isn't it nice to have good mugs? I have a collection of mugs, and ceramic cups which I have gotten all over the place. It is fun to have a bit of ritual about it, and I have mugs for different things, my wife when we first met used to just grab one from my cabinet, and I'd have to bite my tongue as she was using a tea mug for coffee, or my sunday morning mug on a Tuesday evening... I know I am weird.
Larry, my relationship to coffee is complicated, started drinking it in prep school, where it was just a Caffeine Delivery System, and we had either instant in the microwave, or a secret coffee maker hidden somewhere, no refrigerator access also, so it was black with sugar or nothing. I quickly eschewed sugar, and got used to drinking it black for convenience sake. I can say it is an acquired taste. For the longest time I thought it was bitter horrible stuff. It grows on you.
I got into tea when I was over in Russia, where that is pretty much what you drink to exclusion of water. We, when I got back, didn't really have much options for GOOD tea in the states, loose leaf, so until people like Upton Tea Imports etc... started getting available on the internet back in the early 90's I stuck to coffee.
Nowadays I mostly drink tea, and have a series of thermoses, tumblers, devices, and cheats so I don't have to rely on the restaurant I'm at for a cup, they generally have one of those horrible boxes of stale bags of Twinnings and Celestial Seasoning that has been there for a year.
I am partial to a good cup of black coffee on occasion, and I have trained myself to drink it black, I will do that in a restaurant. At home I have a mocha pot, and will make myself two shots of espresso, dilute it with a similar quantity of hot water, and add devonshire cream and a little bit of vanilla sugar.
So I agree with your point on service, I'd say in practice most people I know that are coffee drinkers take it in stride though. One reason for it, is that one of the key things about coffee is that it be hot, and it cools quick in those shallow six oz cups you get, it is generally not difficult to get it back to the sugar and cream you like by taste.
Still prefer tea most of the time for drinking, but coffee is a nice change of pace.
Cheers,
TBS
Cooking Goddess
Chef Extraordinaire
Kayelle, those mugs are a very pleasant way to start your morning. How much coffee do they hold? One year I bought a huge (22-oz) mug for Himself as a Christmas gift. ordered from the Christmas catalog. It was hand-made in Ecuador and had pretty graphics and a nice glaze. He says it's too big. I tell him he can fill it only half-way.
We treat ourselves to brunch at a cute little cafe in Putnam. Not only do they keep your coffee hot and the cup full, when you are ready to leave they ask if you would like a fresh to-go cup.
I thought Connecticut was part of New England.We don't get it here in New England either. It is found more through the south and out west.
We treat ourselves to brunch at a cute little cafe in Putnam. Not only do they keep your coffee hot and the cup full, when you are ready to leave they ask if you would like a fresh to-go cup.
Cooking Goddess
Chef Extraordinaire
You are not alone in your weirdness when it comes to which-cup-what-liquid. I'm the same way. As far as "Day of the Week Cup"? You're on you own with that one.
Are you familiar with Harney & Sons tea? They offer a product called a "Tagalong", a round tin with five sachets of tea. They also sell their same quality loose tea in boxes of 20 sachets, so you could always slip one or two wrapped sachets into your pocket and ask your server for "a cup of hot water, please?"
I did that in the past and never got an argument. Now, I just drink water when we go out.
GotGarlic
Chef Extraordinaire
We don't get it here in New England either. It is found more through the south and out west.
Your neighborhood /= New England.
erehweslefox
Sous Chef
Are you familiar with Harney & Sons tea? They offer a product called a "Tagalong", a round tin with five sachets of tea. They also sell their same quality loose tea in boxes of 20 sachets, so you could always slip one or two wrapped sachets into your pocket and ask your server for "a cup of hot water, please?"
H&S are good, I keep a couple of their bags with some Twinning at work in the break room, mainly the darjeeling Twinnings and the Russian Caravan H&S blend.
I also have a friend from India that got me as a gift six silk teabags. They are looser than I'd expect silk to be, so I'm not convinced if they are made of silk, or that is the name, but they are reusable as heck, don't hold flavor, you just have to rinse them off and dry them and they are ready to go, and they are the most awesome thing ever. I keep them in an altoids tin, and when I go out for serious dinners at nice place, and I want a very good cup of tea appropriate to a good meal, I fill them with my favorites.
Generally I will at a fancy place tell the waiter I brought my own tea, and just charge me for a cup of tea and bring hot water. Everyone is cool with it, except once, at a very fancy Indian restaurant, chef sent me out a pot of his own private tea, and came out, it was if you know teas a SFGFOP1-CL from Margareta's Hope Estate, 1st flush, he had gotten it sent over from India, and came out to talk with me about teas.
I gave him the content of one of my little bags (they are awesome I won't give a one of them up), which was a Temi Estate Sikkim FTGFLOP1-CL, also first flush which he hadn't seen. Damn, to explain all this I should find or make a tea thread?
If you don't know what I'm talking about, you might have thought I had a minor stroke, and am only capable of stringing nonsense letters together. TL;DR is TEA GOOD.
CG, yeah I have a couple of mugs only for certain days, it sounds weird, but I only have about 20 mugs, right? I also have a sad mug, a happy mug, and one I keep in my darkest cabinet, that is only used on Friday the thirteenth and Halloween.
Cheers,
TBS
Cooking Goddess
Chef Extraordinaire
Ah, tea grading. I've had several multi-lettered teas from Harney's, but not by design. Instead, I've been to their tasting room in Millerton, NY, where you gaze in wonder at their walls full of canisters of every tea they offer (as long as it's in stock). I acquired the teas by pointing and asking "what does that one taste like?". If I liked it, I bought it.
I was blessed with meeting Mr. John Harney at his original shop in Salisbury, CT. I spent a number of years traveling between MA and suburban Cleveland after we moved to MA, fixing up my parents' house in OH after Mom died. Himself encouraged me to get off the interstate and take state routes if time and weather allowed. While driving US 44 into CT, I passed a small shop with a sign out front that said "Tea Shop Open". There was John behind his counter, giving a talk to a group of prospective tea shop owners who were attending as part of a seminar being conducted by Pearl Dexter, a tea aficionado. He invited me to join them, as they were leaving shortly for his new, state-of-the-art plant in Millerton. I followed like someone on Mr. Toad's Wild Ride and learned much about tea and Harney's. Still, the letters mean nothing to me without a scorecard.
Methinks Himself and I need to take a (long) day-trip out there this autumn...
Addie
Chef Extraordinaire
I have two large DD mugs that I only use to grab for a cup of water. And two smaller plain white mugs just the right size for a cup of coffee. When not in use, they are inside a cabinet behind a closed door. So no one sees them.
I am not out to impress anyone anymore. And I don't want a bunch of stuff collecting dust. As long as I have what I need, I am happy. Less dishes and cups to wash.
I am not out to impress anyone anymore. And I don't want a bunch of stuff collecting dust. As long as I have what I need, I am happy. Less dishes and cups to wash.
GotGarlic
Chef Extraordinaire
I have two large DD mugs that I only use to grab for a cup of water. And two smaller plain white mugs just the right size for a cup of coffee. When not in use, they are inside a cabinet behind a closed door. So no one sees them.
I am not out to impress anyone anymore. And I don't want a bunch of stuff collecting dust. As long as I have what I need, I am happy. Less dishes and cups to wash.
Those of us who like functional items to also be pretty are not out to impress anyone. It's part of enjoying life. Too bad you don't get that.
Souschef
Sous Chef
I agree-We have a beautiful hand painted olive oil dispenser that we bought in Ravenna Italy. It sure looks nicer than an ordinary olive oil bottle.
Mad Cook
Master Chef
I counted my mugs when I unpacked after moving house. 32 ....and I live alone. How did I get there?
Still one never knows when one will need them. I'm thinking of trying to persuade my next door neighbour that we should get involved in the MacMillan Cancer Support Charity's "World's Biggest Coffee Morning" in September.(What's the World's Biggest Coffee Morning about? | World's Biggest Coffee Morning | Macmillan Cancer Support)
Mad Cook
Master Chef
A rather spiteful repost, I thought, GG.
GotGarlic
Chef Extraordinaire
No, I'm sad when people can't appreciate beauty and think other people only have beautiful things in order to try to impress still other people.
di reston
Sous Chef
I agree with Mad Cook: I learned that a good coffee should be 'black as night, pure as an angel, hot as hell and sweet as love' the very first time I went to Italy over forty years ago. Here it really is a culture, and the first thing a good local barman has to learn is how to follow the rules as above. Quantities are much smaller than elswhere, and an espresso usually only comes halfway up the little cup, but the kick it gives you is staggering! You can get a 'high' with one of those! Cappuccino's and other styles of coffee also come in smaller quantities, and aren't consumed with meals, with a snack at the most. The coffee bars are meeting places and usually a hive of activity. There's nothing quite like them!
di reston
Enough is never as good as a feast Oscar Wilde
di reston
Enough is never as good as a feast Oscar Wilde
roadfix
Chef Extraordinaire
I like cowboy coffee. Only three components: mug, ground coffee, and hot water.
I'm having one right now... I let ground coffee sink to the bottom of my mug, then drink....
I'm having one right now... I let ground coffee sink to the bottom of my mug, then drink....
Sounds like you need some Turkish coffee.
