Are You A Coffee Snob? The 5 Stages of Coffee Snobbery

Coffee snobbery is a fairly recent phenomenon. Starbucks has enabled a culture of coffee douchebags to populate the world and spread words like "fair trade" and "organic". Even so it surprised me to hear a statistic recently from the USDA that coffee consumption peaked in 1946. In those day people had the time to savour a cup of joe at breakfast, after dinner or with friends at home, diner or at a restaurant. Soldiers returning home from Italy had been fooled into thinking an Americano was an actual coffee and not a joke played on them. In today’s drive thru world we cart around our java in environmentally friendly paper cups to keep us awake and have the time to care if the coffee is fair trade. We may drink coffee but do we even enjoy it?

Like Maslow and self actualization, HDTT has created a hierarchy of coffee snobbery The progression on the hierarchy is gradual and at every step of the way you think you are better then everybody else on either side.

Stage 1 – Coffee is an afterthought. You will drink anything from instant to whatever brand is on sale at Walmart or a discount supermarket. Your coffeemaker was a gift, on sale or was left over by the previous tenant.

Stage 2 – You are a Tim Hortons loyalist. The thought of getting a double double anywhere else makes you cringe. You would never vote for a politician who would buy coffee from anywhere else because it would make an elitist. Try not to laugh when a former Harvard professor from London, England proves his down to earthiness by ordering a double double. Your coffeemaker brews Tim at home or another mid range national brand.

Stage 3 – You enjoy buying your coffee from a premium national or international chain of coffee shops. You prove your individuality by knowing the difference between sizes (a venti is a large) and being able to order espresso based drinks with inflated prices due to the addition of 5 cent flavour shots or 10 cent chocolate flakes. You think the average donut store coffee drinker has no taste or teeth. You did some research before buying a coffee maker, use a grinder sometimes and have a number of premium blends you purchase.

Stage 4 – As a hipster douchebag you only drink coffee from a local independent coffee shop. This shows you’re a free thinking liberal even though every shop of this type is exactly the same.

• It’s located in a gentrifying neighbourhood because the rents are still cheap but the really scary minorities have moved out.
• The table and chairs are from a used furniture store. It adds a touch of retro coolness while making loiterers uncomfortable after 20 minutes
• A white barista with a liberal arts degree who wont serve you an espresso in a paper cup as it ruins the taste. Meanwhile the Italian café in business for 50 years serves it up in a Styrofoam cup
• Inconvenient hours since the owner knows that leaving the barista alone is his shop will lead to financial ruin as he will steal or give his unemployed friends free coffee. Plus the neighbourhoods scary minorities come out at night
  
• Wi Fi for free loaders even though theres only one table
• Horrible baked goods from the local gluten free bakery
• A soundtrack powered by an Ipod filled with local indie bands, ironic pop, 30 year old new wave and a Tribe Called Quest. Every white hipster likes Tribe.
• Terrible Art on the walls from local residents
• The menu is written on a chalkboard. There are five items and the only thing that changes is the feature coffee. This week it's from Costa Freakin' Rica. Starbucks stole this to inform us that Barista Kelly loves a soy latte.
  
• A flyer for yoga
• Wardrobe by American Apparel
  

Stage 5 – The mysterious snob is rarely seen. He (and it is always a he as only a man could get this obsessed) is well to do and surrounds himself with the finest thing including a coffee maker which is not a machine but a work of art. A great bean that has been sacrificed to lesser brands makes him cry.

The coffee may be a lot better then it was in 1946, but something tell me that they enjoyed it a helluva lot more then we do now. Plus that hipster who wouldn't make me an espresso in a paper cup would have been killed at the hands of his own men.

The Coffee Chronicles

A story in the Toronto Star reports that a Muslim cleric has an issue with the Starbucks logo. While most people see a Mermaid, Egyptian cleric Safwat Higazi sees a plot against Islam. He believes that the logo represents Esther, the Jewish Queen of the Persians. As recounted by the Star, "Esther, a beautiful virgin who is manipulated by her cousin Mordecai to win the heart and hand of the Persian king Ahasuerus (believed to be Xerxes I) without revealing to him that she is a Jew." This is all tied together by the fact the the CEO of Starbucks is Jewish.

The cleric, who should be more worried about teaching his flock tolerance, doesn't care that the coffee giant failed in Israel, or that the company was founded over 20 years before its first foray into the Middle East. It's even more ridiculous when you consider that the CEO came to the company 11 years after it was founded, but then again when did the facts get in the way of a Muslim Cleric?

I have a bigger concern when it comes to coffee logos, mainly a snooty French guy that represents Van Houtte? The Montreal based company has been sending this logo all across America. For years a good cup of joe was represented by Juan Valdez. The Colombian coffee icon represented the hard workers who made sure the beans were the very best. Without warning the snooty AL Van Houtte started sprouting across North America. His face is in 60000 workplaces, gas stations and carried by reality TV starlets. What does it say when Audrina, the TV star carrying your cup is known for her sleepy eyes?

I don't want the guy who is exploiting the workers to be represented on my cup of coffee. He doesn't even look like he knows a thing about coffee. And there looks to be a big wad of toilet paper sticking out of his cup. The Van Houtte people must be paying a lot to have their brand displayed at the supermarket. The display is always the biggest and always looks like it has never been touched. Meanwhile coffee packages with mountains, trees and coffee are scooped up. Maybe it's because no one likes the French, especially if they are snooty.

One final story regards Tim Hortons. While McDonalds is offering free coffee, the iconic Canadian brand is fighting back. Not with a return of the "Roll Up the Rim" promotion but with hepatitis A. Two employees at a store north of Toronto were found to have been infected with the disease. The authorities only notified the public after the second case was confirmed. The first employee who was infected did not work in food handling. This seems strange as I have been in many Tim Horton's and each and every employee is involved in food handling. There's not a lot of astronomy or accountants working in a donut store. The store was closed and disinfected and the regional authorities are holding a vaccine clinic. Symptoms of Hep A include loss of appetite, diarrhea, nausea and abdominal discomfort, or what I experience after a breakfast sandwich and medium double double.

Starbucks Hates Children

A recent Toronto Star article shines the light of truth on yet another big, bad corporation. American coffee giant Starbucks might want to rethink their pledge to contribute positively to our communities and environment after a recent Star investigation.

On a recent lovely Sunday Morning a couple of Girl Scouts escorted by their mother were selling cookies outside of a Starbucks outlet. Everyone loved the cookies and they were doing brisk business in a tony neighbourhood in Toronto. An ornery manager, displeased on the effect the girls fundraising efforts were having on baked good sales came to the girls in a huff. The manager demanded they leave the property and sell their cookies near a nearby garbage can by the street. Their mother was closeby and was outraged that the greedy corporation would be so mean to the girls. The Star saves the day!

Get out of my way!
At least that's the story the Star is giving. Frankly I'm a frequent Starbucks customer. If I'm on my way to get an Americano at 10 am on a Sunday the last thing I want is a couple of girls trying to guilt me into buying their delicious but fattening cookies. There's enough parents trying to push their kids chocolate covered peanuts at work. The "manager" of the outlet is probably a poor liberal arts grad working on her poetry and making 9 bucks an hour. A high powered exec isn't doing a barista shift on Sunday Morning. The kids undoubtedly annoyed a couple of customers and the poor sap had to deal with it instead of talking about the poetry slam she went to the night before. Instead of being called a hero, she is probably out of a job, playing her guitar and singing her shitty songs outside the same Starbucks. The "poor" mother is probably a member of the same tennis club as an editor at the Star and got this idiotic story in the paper.

Sell your cookies at work momma, I just want my coffee in peace damnit!