The Coffee / Fast Dilemma

And so it begins…

Yesterday Zahava reminded me that the time has come to once again begin tapering off my caffeine intake in anticipation of the full-day fast on Tisha B'Av. So… since I am going to be fixated with coffee (or lack thereof) over the next week or so, guess what? You get to fixate on it right along with me.

Some people get hungry or thirsty when they fast… I usually don’t. Maybe it’s the, ahem, significant stores of reserve fuel I so prudently put aside during the rest of the year. Or maybe I just have a higher threshold for discomfort.

However, coffee - or more importantly the potent drug it delivers: caffeine - is what holds me in its evil grip. I don’t drink gallons of coffee throughout the day the way some people do. I usually have one… perhaps two cups in the morning, and don’t even think about coffee for the rest of the day. However, I’m a bit of a fanatic about the coffee that I do drink… making it oh-so-hard to wean myself down to mornings of decaffeinated tastelessness.

First, and foremost is the quality issue. I am a bit of a coffee snob when it comes to my beans. I don’t require brand-name coffee (although many of the well-known brands tend to be more consistent in their quality), but outside of the big roasters, I find it hard to find good, consistently fresh, medium-dark roasted beans. To that end, some of the beans I like best:

The Beans:
Peet’s (Berkeley, CA) – Major Dickason's Blend

Community Coffee (New Orleans, LA) – Breakfast Blend

Starbucks (Seattle, WA) – Gold Coast Blend

Green Mountain Coffee (Waterbury, VT) – Wild Mountain Blueberry (the only flavored coffee I have ever really enjoyed…and it is available only during the summer ...great for making iced coffee!)

[Request: I would appreciate a recommendation from anyone in Europe (hint, Mlle A.) who knows a good, consistent, continental coffee purveyor who won’t mistake me for his banker]

The Form:
Whole bean…preferably vacuum packed. Since I live so far from the source, I like to buy the beans whole so they can be ground immediately before brewing. A few years ago I restored a 1930’s era wall-mounted, hand-cranked coffee grinder. It holds exactly a pound of coffee, and can be adjusted to exactly the grind I want. Also, since it only grinds as fast as you can turn the crank... it doesn’t inadvertently heat the beans the way most electric grinders do. [more on that here]

The Preparation:
While I enjoy the occasional espresso, cappuccino, or even ‘Turkish coffee’ (which I’m told is actually not Turkish, but Arab in origin), I almost always use a press pot. Some people complain that the few minutes the coffee steeps in a glass press pot means it won’t be hot enough when served. I’ll share a trick I learned in the navy: When boiling the water, add a very small pinch of salt. The salt raises the boiling point of the water by a few important degrees, but is not nearly concentrated enough to be noticed when you drink the coffee.

©Bodum

The Additives:
I like fresh cream in my coffee. I don’t understand people who put milk (especially skim milk) in coffee. Why not just get some white food coloring, mix it with water and use THAT to hopelessly dilute your coffee??? I’m not talking about using heavy whipping cream (although if there is an open container in the fridge I have been known to treat myself), but rather light cream… the kind you use for cooking.

Since I try to stay away from sugar, I usually use Splenda® (which is made from sugar that has been bonded to an inert substance that your body won’t digest). It tastes like sugar, and it doesn’t add carbs to my day. Best of all, no sugar-substitute aftertaste!

The Cups:
If I’m drinking coffee at home, I like to drink from what my wife affectionately calls my ‘soup bowl’. OK, it might be a tad bigger than your typical coffee mug… but I like it because when I’m sitting outside on the mirpesset (balcony), it rarely requires refills!

If I’m in the car, I have my trusty Starbucks travel mug. I hated to pay the exorbitant prices that they demand for their products… but this happens to be the absolutely best travel mug ever. I challenge anyone to show me something that even comes close! It keeps the coffee hot for over an hour… it has a rubber gasket in the screw top to prevent leaks… and most important, the drinking hole has a hinged stopper that clicks securely into place to keep every drop inside the cup (even if you hold it upside down!) until you want it to come out. I have forgotten this cup on the top of my car (only to see it bouncing on the pavement in my rear view mirror), and it has survived countless winter mountain climbing trips. It has dents and scratches and stickers to attest to its beloved status, and it is absolutely perfect in every way.

The withdrawal:
Well after all that, here I am… facing a couple of weeks of less and less caffeine (read: less and less flavor). To accomplish this self-deprivation I will have to start mixing in more and more decaf to the morning grind. Hopefully Tisha B’Av, won’t find me in the fetal position wishing for the world to end.

Feel free to share your coffee-related hopes, dreams and stories. I’m assuming that anyone still here at this point is either an extremely close friend or a dedicated coffee aficionado.