By Nellie Curtiss …
Like you, I enjoy a medium roast breakfast coffee brewed in my trusty but aging Keurig.
As an early whippersnapper, I tasted my mother’s dark coffee and immediately spit it out. “Yuk!” Preferring Nestle’s Quick chocolate milk, I liked tea all right. That is, loaded with ice and sugar. Southerners made their sun tea ready for battle with lemonade in the shade. But this grown-up morning drink didn’t win me. Even in high school, I preferred hot tea with a dash of cream and honey to any BUNN-O-MATIC brewed for the coffee breakroom. Tea and Coca Cola were popular then, not coffee.
Somewhere after high school, I began to explore sugar and cream with some Maxwell House Coffee in a brown bell-shaped ceramic cup. Later it was the instant coffee of Taster’s Choice. In the 90s, I began loving all the forms of coffee like Espresso, Coffee Mocha, or Caramel Latte with all that foam and whipped topping. Coffee became more meaningful with the added treat of long conversations with family, friends and fellow professors.
Since the 1773 Boston Tea Party and the protest against the tax on tea, American connoisseurs have held a long love for coffee. And the world, as well, has had a long affair with coffee.
The History Kitchen on PBS.ORG details a legend about a ninth century Ethiopian goat herder named Kaldi. He noticed his goats jumping and running without ceasing after nibbling the dark coffee fruit–even as night fell, they were still wired. After Kaldi imbibed and sported the same reaction, a monk shared some fruit with other monks at the monastery. Needless to say, the friars reacted to caffeine and were ready all night for early mass.
Like Facebook (and Twitter, Snapchat, and TikTok), coffee drinking started a social revolution when coffee houses sprung up from the East to Arabia and from Europe to the new world. These were places, like they still are today, for talking and sharing big proposals and viewpoints. Today, some telecommuters make their offices at coffee houses like The Roast or Milagros in Alamosa—a direct connection to coffee houses of old.
Anytime there is an educational or political seminar, the first element in the community room is the coffee maker, coffee and all the “fixin’s.” A lot of churches have coffee in the kitchen and office. At Arby’s, chocolate ice cream with coffee is called Jamocha. “It’s a frosty, chocolate-y, coffee-y treat,” they write on Arbys.com. Likewise, McD’s has coffee on the menu and via the drive-through morning, noon, and night. Even so, Blessed Brews has offered a coffee tailored to the walk-up customer, too. Oh, and don’t forget Starbuck’s either.
Coffee’s fame in the first millennium also included doctoring and foretelling uses. It was even outlawed by the Catholic church until Pope Clement VIII (1536-1605) intervened when he tasted the brew and liked it. He decreed that the drink was a Muslim and Christian drink. “This devil’s drink is so delicious… we should cheat the devil by baptising it!” (historyextra.com)
According to Paul Chrystal, author of Coffee: a Drink for the Devil, some rulers and churches have outlawed the stimulating drink over the centuries. The beverage can be controversial and communal. At first, men only were allowed in the coffee houses. The male sex claimed that the drink was an ale or a muddy wine not for women. As BBC World Histories Magazine reveals, the drink was the “first Viagra.” Women petitioned, protested, and finally won the right to drink coffee as well. I can attest to being a woman who has ordered fresh brew at coffee houses across the country including Houston, Dallas, Anchorage, Billings, Portland, Denver, and the San Luis Valley.
Life is short but made longer with a tall Starbucks coffee shared at the office or over Zoom with friends! Brew some coffee and build another connection today!
Nelda Curtiss is a retired college educator and long-time local columnist. Reach her at http://www.columnsbynellie.com or email her at columnsbynellie@gmail.com
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