OT - Parallel Universe

[Tapsucker]

More proof people are willing to live with mediocre crap, not just beer.

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_ ... offee.html

I guess in Canada we have Tim Horton's to remind us of bad coffee we are too simple minded to not drink. Hence my suspicion of the supporters of every politician grabbing a photo opp there.

But I guess we can lump in all the lousy beer served in otherwise great pubs in the UK and gardens in northern Europe. The cultural experience must be so good, nobody notices/cares how bad the product is.

[phirleh]

The best selling beer in Belgium is Jupiler - they don't know how good they have it there!

[icemachine]

Boy doesn't this lament seem familiar

Many craft coffee aficionados blame the bad coffee syndrome on the larger coffee distributors, which hold the café scene in a tight grip. “They offer [espresso] machines in exchange for serving their coffee,” says Paturle. When the price of an espresso machine is daunting, getting one for free in exchange for serving a mediocre brand of coffee can be appealing.

[Belgian]

Those parisian terasse pictures are a flashback for me. Yeah Paris coffee was usually kind of brutal - and it was even impossible to buy a good tea anywhere except the Louvré. The scenery kind of makes up for that over there, in the way Te Aro's Caffe Americano kind of makes up for Queen & Carlaw over here.

More to the point, it's great that one good coffee house like Dark Horse can start a trend of excellence and people will really gravitate toward it. My latest and greatest are Riverdale's Rooster Coffee House and Jimmy's Coffee in Kensington Market. Both are comfy hangouts. And expensive, so please don't compete with me for seating, ever.

[Craig]

Those parisian terasse pictures are a flashback for me. Yeah Paris coffee was usually awful - and it was even impossible to buy a good tea anywhere except the Louvré. The scenery kind of makes up for that over there, while Te Aro's Caffe Americano kind of makes up for Queen & Carlaw over here.

More to the point, it's great that one good coffee house like Dark Horse can start a trend of excellence and people will really gravitate toward it. My latest and greatest are Riverdale's Rooster Coffee House and Jimmy's Coffee in Kensington Market. Both are comfy hangouts. And expensive, so please don't compete with me for seating, ever.

Have you tried Dineen yet? It has a rare combination of decent coffee and comfortable atmosphere. I mean it's not Te Aro (which is like a 5 minute walk from my house) or anything, but it's the best thing within 5 minutes of my office (Farenheit is just out of range).

[midlife crisis]

Yeah, count me in as a Dineen fan.

[Belgian]

Have you tried Dineen yet? It has a rare combination of decent coffee and comfortable atmosphere. I mean it's not Te Aro (which is like a 5 minute walk from my house) or anything, but it's the best thing within 5 minutes of my office (Farenheit is just out of range).

I will try both from my frequent haunt at Ontario St. Thanks for the tip! And I will probably run into you at your local Ceili Cottage some time, the Wednesday burger is legendary I was just thinking today.

By the way my pet peeve is coffee houses that sell drip coffee and while sometimes it's amazing, sometimes it tastes extremely oxidated. I'm sure they are not cleaning the brew baskets and machines every day, as they probably should so the old coffee oils stick on there and make the brew very sour and metallic, undrinkable. It's B----t! I know places like The Goat in Kingston never never have this problem, not once in 20+ years and The Remarkable Bean is always a 50/50 chance.

And we think beer people bitch a lot... LOL.