Mm Mm Good

My husband's birthday was on Tuesday, but, between weeknight activities and a his last-minute trip to D.C., we rescheduled it. So, since I'm getting ready to spend several hours making a cake and, later, coq au vin, I figured I'd pick on him for a bit!

My husband is a coffee snob. Now, he comes by it honorably because his dad was the ultimate coffee snob, ordering beans by mail and grinding his own back before Starbucks made it fashionable. I, on the other hand, grew up in a household where last night's coffee becomes this morning's coffee with a simple flick of the little red button (or, in a pan on the stove back in the olden days). Have I mentioned that I left my parents' home not liking coffee?

Early in our marriage, my husband started getting coffee through the mail. Every month the little Starbucks box would show up. The rise of internet ordering meant that he could tweak his monthly order, adding more or taking away depending on our usage, and switching out blends based on his current fancy. He took great pleasure in this tweaking and in grinding his own beans and raving about how good the coffee was.

Shortly after we moved to Connecticut, he got a letter from Starbucks, informing him that they would no longer be providing mail order services, and directing him to his "local" store. At that point, the "local" store was a good hour away. (My husband is also a former retail manager and is, therefore, a retail snob. Sometime I'll have to post about his rants on the shelf-stocking policy downfalls of Target.) Enter a month that included great rants and letters written to Starbucks. Ultimately, he switched his loyalty to Peet's, and now claims that Starbucks "tastes burnt and really isn't good coffee anyway."

He's mellowed a bit over the years. He orders it pre-ground now, rather than grinding his own. He figures that he uses it fast enough, and Peet's grinds it just prior to delivery, so it's a toss-up. Last year his trusty old coffee pot at work died (yes, you read that right--he made his own coffee at work), and he decided that he would discontinue the tradition. I bought him a new stainless thermos for Christmas, and now he gets up early, brews it, and takes it with him. He could fill up a big travel mug with it and take it all (I would!), but he doesn't. So, every morning when I go downstairs, there's at least one large mug of freshly-brewed coffee left in the carafe for me to drink while I chivvy the kids out the door to school.

And that's my silver lining for today.