Coffee has come a long way from when a few scoops of Nescafe blend 43, boiling water and a dash of milk was all it took to rise the dead from their grave... Umm I mean my mum for her slumber. In the contempoay era it seems that we like our coffee how we like our wine; expertly brewed and with an expensive price tag. I've coined this the 'Starbuckanisation' of the modern consumer. Where the phrase "A grande caramel frappuccino with extra cream and caramel" (a term which would have been meaningless twenty years ago) is now commonly understood as "I'm a teenager who really doesn't like the taste of coffee yet, so I'm ordering the sweetest drink on the menu for an artsy photo for my Instagram. Plus all the girls on Tumblr are drinking it". Coincidentally, as the popularity of coffee rises among teens, so do the number of pretentious twenty something's behind the counter. Admittedly I am one of those twenty something's (except that I'm not quiet twenty, I don't have obscure facial piercings, I've never dyed my hair an unnatural colour, read poetry, listened to 1990's scene bands on record, or been a vegan). I get it. I'm about as 'plain Jane' as baristas come.
Despite the fact that I really don't fit in with the rest of my
colleagues, I've found one thing that never fails to unite a group of people,
and that's our shared hatred for our customers! Here are just a couple of
things that make my daily grind just that little bit tougher;
1. Talking on the phone while ordering: Believe it or not, they
haven't introduced self check out machines to hospitality yet, so please
refrain from treating me like one. I know your conversation about how smashed
you got on the weekend is probably uber important, but I think I deserve your
attention. Especially since I'm about to make something you are going to be
drinking.
2. Having to deal with caffeine deprived customers: Caffeine
withdrawal is real people. I've experienced the blood shot eyes and irritable
mood of a caffeine addict before they've had their daily hit and trust me, for
some people their day really does start after coffee.
3. When you ask for your drink to be heated over 82 degrees
Celsius or a specific temperature: You do realize milk curdles at 82 degrees?
Right? And can your mouth really tell the difference between 92 degrees and 96
degrees? Doubt it.
4. When you tell me you're running late for work and if I could
speed things up: If you were running late for work and didn't have time to stop
for coffee, why did you stop for coffee?
5. When people pronounce the Italian drink names with an Italian
accent: Settle down. Just say it with the same accent as everyone else, because
the fact that you know how to say it doesn't impress me at all.
6. When you order a coffee with skim milk but add sugar: I can see
your diet is going really well.
So next time you order a coffee brighten your baristas day and
refrain from doing any of these, you might even get a smile from that pretentious twenty something. On second thought its probably still way too early for that!
xoxo
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