Tuesday, April 25, 2017

Bad coffee

Maxwell House Instant FTW? Keith Pandolfi makes a case for bad coffee. Found via Matt Thomas’s Submitted for Your Perusal.

A related post
Whiter instant? (A 1972 Instant Maxwell House ad)

[It used to be Instant Maxwell House; now it’s Maxwell House Instant.]

comments: 6

Matt Thomas said...

Maxwell House Instant might be a bridge too far for me, but I've been known to enjoy Chock full o’Nuts and last weekend had two delicious cups of coffee at a Jiffy Lube. Thanks for the plug.

Michael Leddy said...

The instants in our non-Maxwell house are Nescafé Clásico and Ferrara Espresso — both cheap and not bad at all. The trick with the Nescafé is to use enough coffee — as Pandolfi does, two teaspoons for a large cup.

Geo-B said...

Not a fan of bad coffee. I grind my own beans and use a French press (I must love doing things the hard way, since I write with a fountain pen and drive a stick shift). If I'm at someone else's house, I will gladly drink instant coffee, without any sense of snobbery, but I do take umbrage if they ask, "Instant coffee, just as good as the brewed stuff, don't you think?"

Michael Leddy said...

No, it’s not the same. We have a French press too, and a grinder, and a Melitta cone, and both whole beans and ground coffee in the house. We don’t drink a lot of coffee, but what we do drink, we’re serous about.

Berit said...

For my two cents on instant coffee, I recommend Giraldo Farms to both instant-lovers and those with more elaborate-process tastes (if nothing else, to taste what Fairway Market, and so many of our friends and coworkers, touted as "absolutely THE best instant coffee money can buy.".)

Also, I recently came to experience plain old 12-cup pot drip coffee using Melitta's pre-ground decaf as "good, QUITE GOOD!" at some recent dinners with friends. I'd say I drink coffee more for the taste than the effect, though most decaf just tastes bad to me.

Finally, we've taken up a new diner recently. I recommend New Heritage Diner in Hackensack for both their regular and decaf coffee! However, I can only recommend the after-10p. crew as worthy of a visit. And don't get too fancy with your order either. (Yes, the stuffed chicken dishes are "too fancy".)

Michael Leddy said...

Thanks for sharing the recommendations, Berit. I bought a jar of Giraldo Farms at a Shop-Rite in New Jersey a couple of years ago. Very good, though not, for me, as good as Nescafé Clásico. (But I may not have been using enough coffee.) I’ve seen Mount Hagen recommended as best, tried it, and was underwhelmed.

The New Heritage Diner: I’ve been! At least five or six times. I recommend the moussaka, though I’m not sure that’d work well late at night. :)