Full Throttle Coffee
I would have thought several forays into higher caffeine drinks for cola companies would have taught them to stick with the classic formulas – the tried and tested ones. Apparently, I do not know anything because the soft drink giant Coca-Cola is coming up with a coffee beverage.
Thomson Financial News reports:
Coca-Cola Co. said Friday it plans to launch its coffee and energy beverage, Full Throttle Coffee, in the United States in August.
The drink is made with Colombian Arabica coffee and Full Throttle’s energy and vitamin blend, Atlanta-based Coca-Cola said. It will be rolled out in the Pacific Northwest and Southeast regions of the United States.
Full Throttle Coffee is part of the Full Throttle energy drink family, which includes Full Throttle Original, Full Throttle Unleaded, Full Throttle Blue Demon and Full Throttle Fury, the company said.
At least they’re using good quality coffee beans, aren’t they? I just don’t know if I would spend hard earned money on a product like this one. I mean, as much as I like coffee, I can’t think of a reason to buy Full Throttle Coffee as an energy drink. I’ll buy regular Coke when I feel like drinking a refreshing soft drink. I’ll buy myself a cup of coffee – either hot or frappe – when I feel like drinking some coffee.
Am I alone in thinking this way or are you guys just as befuddled?
Paper Cups Or Coffee Mugs?
When you go to Starbucks or other coffee shops, what container do you use for your coffee? It’s probably a paper coffee cup, right? I suppose it is the most convenient container for everyone involved. The shop does not have to wash mugs and the customer does not have to carry around something heavy. Yet if you think about it, there are advantages to using mugs instead of paper cups in coffee shops.
One, we have the ubiquitous issue of helping the environment. Paper cups are made from trees and the more paper we use, the more trees we cut down.
Two, there is the problem of taste degradation – at least for some people. I have never really experienced this but maybe because this is due to the fact that my coffee never stays in the cup for long. Rands of Rands In Repose actually brought this up:
In fact, I’m pissed at paper. Forget about the environmental guilt, cups made of paper are a sure fire way to ruin any cup of coffee because they change the taste. Coffee mugs are the only way to go and I’ve spent a lot more time fretting about mugs than paper.
Starbucks encourages its patrons not to use paper cups, did you know that? If you use your Starbucks mug or cup, you get a certain amount off the coffee price. The discount is not big, but it’s a discount nonetheless. Coffee Bean serves dine-in coffee in mugs – for what reason, I do not know. I guess this is just a small reminder – we can help the environment in our own little way and have great tasting coffee at the same time.
Photo courtesy of StarbuckGuy
People Spending Less On Coffee
Tell me something that I do not already know! For the past month or so, I have noticed that people at my office did not go to Starbucks as often as they used to do – myself included. It used to be that we would go almost everyday, especially if we had a particularly long meeting. We definitely needed grandes during those times. Today, though, it is either we brew our own pot at the office – we’re lucky to have a drip coffee machine, we just take turns buying the beans – or we buy cheaper coffee at a local store.
It seems that the rest of the United States is doing the same thing. Based on Kelly Blue Book’s monthly survey:
The June 2008 study results reveal that 28 percent of new-car shoppers have stopped going to Starbucks or other coffee houses entirely, and 21 percent indicate they are going less often due to skyrocketing gas prices.
Though the study focused on new-car shoppers, I would not be surprised to hear the same trend happening with other groups of people. Imagine spending $2 on Starbucks a day. Do a little math – this adds up to $40 a month (5-day week) and $480 a year! What if you used that money for gas instead? You’d be able to buy 120 gallons of gas at $4 per gallon.
Not a surprising result then, huh? It’s perfectly normal when hard economic times hit, the non-essentials are first to go…
How often do you still go to Starbucks or any other coffee shop for that matter?
Cheese On Your Coffee, Anyone?
Uh, I don’t know about that. I mean, my second favorite drink in the whole wide world is coffee (first is water – yeah I am boring) and I can’t get enough of various types of cheese (check my last grocery bill and you’ll see LOTS of different cheese in there). I have not really thought of mixing the two together, have you?
This girl in Canada, Laura Perry, thinks otherwise and judges of the Eastern Regional Barista Championship in Montreal agree with her! The story featured in Ottawa Citizen narrates her victory:
Mascarpone cheese is not the first ingredient the average coffee drinker would put into an espresso. But Kanata’s Laura Perry is no ordinary coffee aficionado, using the unusual concoction to win the Eastern Regional Barista Championship this week in Montreal.
The 22-year-old’s victory will make her the only Ottawa resident to compete in October at the Canadian National Barista Championships, the Grey Cup of competitive coffee-making in Canada.
The drink, named Mascarpone Macchiato, is a shot of espresso marked with a bit of steam milk. It is blended with a variety of ingredients, including whipped mascarpone cheese, sugar cane and cinnamon bark.
For those who wince at cheese and coffee, Perry says she uses mascarpone for its light cream qualities. “It doesn’t really taste like cheese.”
For someone who likes cheese, I am pretty ignorant about a lot of types and I have not heard of mascarpone before. I found this at Wikipedia:
Mascarpone is a triple-cream cheese (though more accurately a lightly-whipped cream) made from crème fraîche, denatured with tartaric acid. Mascarpone is milky-white in color and is easily spread. When fresh, it smells like milk and cream. It is used in various dishes of the Lombardy region of Italy, where it is a specialty. It is a main ingredient of tiramisu.
I feel a bit stupid as I love tiramisu but now I understand how mascarpone can go well with coffee. I wonder if we’ll ever get to taste the likes of this coffee?
Coffee Maker Poses Security Risks
I never even knew that there is a coffee maker that can be connected to the Internet! Apparently, there is such a product and it poses certain security risks. I read this on CNET:
An Australian man has discovered security vulnerabilities in his Internet-connected coffee maker that could allow a remote attacker to not only take over his Windows XP-based PC but also make his coffee too weak.
Craig Wright, a risk advisory services manager at professional services firm BDO, found several security holes, including a buffer overflow in the Internet Connection software that links his Jura F90 coffee maker to his PC.
I don’t know about you but this is just too funny. I mean, I love coffee but why the heck would I get a coffee maker that I can connect to the Internet, especially one that goes for a hefty USD 2,000? For one, my apartment is small enough that I only need to take 5 steps to go from my bedroom to where my coffee maker is at. More so, I don’t think I have that much money lying around just to spend on something that may not be really necessary.
People say that Internet-connected devices seem to be what’s in store for the future. I love toys and gadgets, there is no doubt about that, but at this point, I cannot understand why I would want to get them. Except for the reputation points, I guess.
Load Up On Joe And Live Longer
Oh yeah? Well, if you base your beliefs on the results of a study conducted by researchers at the University of Madrid, drinking a lot of coffee can increase your lifespan. The study involved men and women who consumed large amounts of coffee and they found out that the risk of death of these people were considerably lower than those who didn’t drink coffee.
Coffee drinkers in the study had slightly lower death rates than non-coffee drinkers over time, whether their drink of choice had caffeine or not.
The findings do not prove that coffee is protective, but they strongly suggest that drinking coffee in large amounts is not harmful if you are healthy, researcher Esther Lopez-Garcia, Ph.D., of the University of Madrid, tells WebMD.
Among women, drinking two to three cups of coffee a day was associated with an 18 percent reduction in death from all causes, while drinking four to five cups was associated with a 26 percent reduction in risk.
The risk reduction in men was smaller and could have been due to chance.
“We can’t say from this one study that coffee extends your life, but it does appear that it doesn’t increase the risk for death for people who are healthy,” she says.
Oops – apparently I was a bit overexcited. There is indeed a reduction in death BUT there might be other factors in play. Again, I stick by my original belief – try to stay healthy and drink as much coffee as you think you need. If you feel ill effects because of too much coffee, then reduce intake. It’s as simple as that.
Photo courtesy of javaturtle
Guilty Of Polluting My Coffee!
“Cream, along with sugar, is one of the most basic condiments in the coffee universe. And by cream, I mean milk and all its variants: half-and-half, whole, skim, nonfat, soy, rice.”
Those are the opening lines of the article Coffee Pollutant No. 1: Cream by Oliver Schwaner-Albright of the New York Times. If he ever gets the chance to peek into my daily cups of coffee, he would probably get a heart attack! I already wrote a post on how I like my coffee a long time ago. I love it hot, sweet, and creamy. I don’t really measure - I am not one for measuring – but I probably put about a teaspoon of sugar and 3 teaspoons of cream (non-dairy) in each mug that I have.
So what’s the deal? Why is cream considered to be a “pollutant” when it comes to coffee? Schwaner-Albright explains:
If it sounds snobby, consider this: would you dab a Peter Luger porterhouse with ketchup? A slab of well-aged beef needs nothing more than salt, pepper and a good char. There’s nothing arrogant about leaving the Heinz out of it.
Uhm, now that he puts it that way, I kind of get what he is trying to say. Then again, a steak is very much different from coffee. More so, I do put A1 in my steak. It is not ketchup but it still is something more than salt and pepper.
I can appreciate a good cup of black coffee but I don’t think I can give up my sugar and cream for now. How about you?
Rachael Ray, Kaffiyeh, And Coffee
Oh my, just when I thought that people were becoming more open minded and rationale! I have never been a fan of Rachael Ray, let me say that outright. This latest uproar over her makes me kind of feel for her though. For those who may not know, she is a spokeswoman for Dunkin’ Donuts. So there she was, doing her job, being her uber perky self as usual, right? She made this Internet commercial about how good Dunkin’ Donuts coffee is (by the way, I do like Dunkin’ Donuts coffee).
Suddenly, out of the blue, she is being accused of symbolically supporting terrorism! Come on now, this irritatingly cheerful person you see on TV several times a day a supporter of violence? As much as her personality and shows grate on my nerves, I just cannot see her trying to promote terrorism by trying to get away with wearing a kaffiyeh look-a-like in a Dunkin’ Donuts commercial.
Perhaps Michelle Malkin, the blogger who put up these suggestions, is mistaken? Or maybe she has got something personal against Rachael Ray? Seriously, the drama of it all! Why can’t a person wear what she wants to when plugging good coffee without being misunderstood? More than this, who says that the kaffiyeh is only used by terrorists?
Anyhow, Dunkin’ Donuts has pulled the plug on this commercial. In the interests of peace, I suppose it was the right thing to do. Now let me go get some of that iced coffee to cool off.
Of Coffee Cuppings
Of coffee what? You may be wondering if I made a typo in my title – that is, if you have not heard of the new trend that is becoming popular in New York. The New York Times recently published an article on this activity (coffee cupping) which is supposed to be the alternative to wine tasting. Certainly, there are similarities – the tasting part. There is, however, no spitting allowed in coffee cuppings.
Joking aside, coffee cuppers take this activity seriously. The Times reports:
Time was when only coffee buyers, roasters and baristas cared to spend time sniffing grounds with patient dedication. But now cuppings at independent cafes like Joe attract connoisseurs who wouldn’t be caught dead sipping an overroasted blend and regularly travel to another borough for superior beans.
I love coffee – you know that – but isn’t this taking things a bit too seriously? Fellow blogger Emily Matchar expressed my sentiments well in her post about cuppings:
I mean, I’m willing to believe that other people have the ability to discern flavors I can’t sense. But is a bag of beans from a single farm lot discernibly different than beans from a handful of farms in the same region?
I have my favorite coffee – one that I get from this region in the south. I would really prefer to use this coffee every single time but when I do run out, I can live with other types of coffee that I get from the supermarket.
Am I being an ignorant coffee brute here or are there other people who think the same way?
The New Complete Coffee Book: A Gourmet Guide to Buying, Brewing, and Cooking
I am almost done with the book I have been reading for the past week so I thought it was time to search for some new interesting reads. I ran across this book on Google Book Search (as usual – I just love this Book Search!) and from what I have read in the preview, it looks like a good buy.
The book is quite short – a little over a hundred pages – and has 5 main chapters (introduction not included). The chapters are:
History
The Bean
The Roast
The Brew
Recipes
I think that The New Complete Coffee Book: A Gourmet Guide to Buying, Brewing, and Cooking would be perfect for your coffee table – something to browse through on a lazy Sunday morning as you sip your cup of joe while watching TV or whatever else it is that you do on lazy Sunday mornings. There is a lot of information on coffee within the pages of the book and you can get a lot of ideas for unique meals using coffee.
On the other hand, I felt that something was lacking. Sorely missing were the most basic of information, like, how to make cappuccino, latter, and the like. I know, perhaps the authors purposely left information out in order to focus on the more advanced aspects of coffee but it would have been nice to have it in the book as well.
Anyhow, I am still thinking of whether or not to buy the book – we’ll see this weekend.
