Our Coffee Culture

granjura I too hate all the cloned shops - and coffee shops like Starbuck, cups far too big that isn't how coffee should be taken - Costa, Nero etc. We have a tiny coffee bar chain here three shops spread over the area. The decor is wonderful and quirky, a talking point whilst one drinks their really good coffee and read their copies of the Indie,

Here Here granjura I won't use chain coffee shops..we are lucky to have 2 or 3 independent cafes in town which I prefer to use.
Just heard a Tesco Express may be coming to our town right next to a small independent general corner shop which won't last. So sad..they are a lovely family and it will be sad if they lose their livelihood... we have Sainsbury and Waitrose within walking distance of the proposed site so we are not short of a supermarket.

At home we use a Senseo coffee machine, with Carte d'Or coffee bags. The great thing about those is that they can go straight onto the compost heap, and taste good too.

Such a shame that most coffee shops these days are from 2 big chains. BTW I really don't like bitter Starbucks coffee, and the fact that a regular is about the size of a swimming-pool. Wherever I go, I try to find a small independent coffee shop - much better service and nicer home-made cakes, etc.

I just hate the way all the towns in UK are just becoming clones - same fashion shops, same coffee places, same restaurants even (yes I like Carluccios, but I really do not want all towns to become the same). Support your local independent cafés, restaurants and shops.

I use Illy coffee and one of those little Italian pots on the stove top. I then dilute the resultant brew with hot water and hot milk. I'm not much of a tea drinker, except if I'm feeling unwell.

My local pub makes great coffee at a very reasonable price and they also stock an interesting selection of soft drinks. I wish more pubs would do this so that when it's your turn to be designated driver you don't have to settle for watery coffee or diet coke.

Look what I found.

www.coffeejudge.co.uk

It is good.

As someone who is always surfing the net I never thought to try online . Thanks, I will.

I've had several nice Chatsford ceramic teapots with filters from Whittards over the years. I'm surprised that they couldn't oblige. Have you looked at their web site? They have quite a few designs and very few of them spotty!

Talking of filters, where's a good place a nice tea pot - not a glass one - with a filter? John Lewis couldn't oblige much to my surprise and Whittards had a very limited choice mostly spotty which I didn't fancy.

M&S Lazy Weekend ground coffee is good - made in a cafetiere. All those expensive coffee machines that take up half your kitchen space are a complete waste of money. But instant coffee doesn't get a look-in in our house. Ditto tea bags. We like loose tea (Earl Grey, Assam and Darjeeling) and tea pots with filters so the tea is brewed but never stewed.

veronica was the Cona Coffee maker the one with a glass jug and a glass bowl fitted on top with a funnel leading into the water. You would put the coffee in the bowl - boil up the water which would rise with the heat from the jug into the bowl. Then slightly cooler, the water would ease down into the jug leaving the coffee dregs in the bowl. One or two would escape though. I bought mine from Habitat in 1968 with some wedding vouchers.

For most of our married life (nearly sixty years) my husband would grind the roasted coffee beans for our breakfast coffee and the coffeewould be made in a Cona Coffee machine. Do any of youj remember them? They made excellent coffee.

OK, johanna . I did notice that but was puzzled by the question because I don't have any difficulty buying a real coffee when I want one.

bags,
I asked where one could buy A real coffee, as a choice of drink in a public place.

I do buy on line as its easier for me!

And they'll give you a refund if it's not up to scratch. Can't do better than that.

Whittards have plenty of choice. You can even buy from them online.

Whittards Italian this am for me!

I think I said before on another coffee thread that in the UK, Monmouth is the one for me. Here in France I buy an organic Mexican Arabica. Johanna, if you can't find a good place in the UK to go for a coffee, then you must go to Tunbridge Wells and you will be spoilt for choice.

......drinking Malongo Arabica (AB) coffee this morning..... La Tierra (savoureux et harmonieux) - made with filter and jug. I cup per morning. I keep the tin in the fridge. I drink it straight away - doesn't taste so good if it's kept hanging around.

So, if filter coffee made from ground coffee beans is real coffee (and I always thought my coffee made in a jug, and DH's coffee made in a cafetière were real coffee too), I don't understand why you asked where one could buy real coffee, johanna (see your post 16 Jun 22:40) . I'm drinking a brew of fairtrade Colombian at the moment which tastes like real coffee to me. In fact, the coffee I make for myself is the nicest coffee I have. Sometimes we buy it already ground; sometimes we buy beans; it partly depends on what the shop has in stock.

Maybe it's just like tea and people have different 'tastes' for coffee.

I agree about instant. It's not the same species of animal (like most 'instant' things).

Hi dorset
Do the same myself. I put a holder with a filter paper - Melitta -on a cup. Then I fill that with coffee. Press the coffee down, and then moisten it for a second. Then add your boiled water .Pretty pathetic really but that is what works for us.
Although it is very difficult to know what one would like, the 100% Arabica is a good bet, in any brand of coffee.

Johanna I use filter coffee - have taken a leaf from my son and his wife and have started to grind my own. I tend to try various types - I do like Columbian and or Kenyan at the moment. I am not human in the morning until my first cup of coffee

Instant coffee is taboo has to be the freshly brewed kind. Didn't drink tea for years but now love Rooibos tea but the family laugh at me because I can never pronounce it properly!

Sorry to be pedantic but think coffee with cardamom is Palestinian rather than Israeli. Was my (Palestinain) father's fave drink.