I Happened to Be Thinking About Coffee ...

... because of this story at the National Post:

U.S. researchers found that people who regularly drank two to three cups of coffee or one to two cups of tea per day had a lower chance of developing dementia than those who drank little or abstained altogether. Though caffeinated coffee intake was “significantly associated” with lower risk of dementia, the same wasn’t true of decaf, according to the study.

Challenge accepted. OK, not really. I already drink two to three cups of coffee per day. I'm on my third at this very moment.

So why not blog about coffee because reasons?

Tamara and I do not drink the same coffee. In fact, I don't recognize the stuff she drinks as coffee.

The most important difference between what she drinks and coffee is that she drinks "decaf," so what's the point?

She also drinks, at strongest, a "medium" roast, regular grind, and sometimes even goes off into "breakfast blend" and "blonde roast" territory.

And, finally, she prepares her coffee using a Keurig machine, which is really just a pretty fast drip method. I'll do the k-cup thing when it's all that's available, but I barely consider it coffee under the best of circumstances.

Since I like to both taste my coffee and get an energy boost out of it, I go with a dark/bold roast in an espresso grind (usually Cuban, such as Cafe Bustelo), and if I use the Keurig at all, it's just to heat some water.

Because cheap espresso machines just aren't very well-made and don't last very long in my experience, I use one of three methods:

1. French press. I use that if I want cold brew. Throw in the coffee, add hot water, let it steep a little, throw it in the fridge. The next morning, press and pour it. It's not a pressure-brewed espresso, but the time factor does give it a nice, strong flavor.
   
   
2. Moka pot. It's technically a percolator, but a pretty pressurized one and makes a nice cup of coffee. Not really espresso, but pretty nice.
   
   
3. Aeropress. I got a good deal on an Aeropress Go, their travel model, a few years back (current price is twice what I paid), and bought an after-market "flow control cap" so that it takes pressure to get the water through the grounds instead of just being a compact drip unit. I'm still not sure I'd call the result real espresso, but it's pretty close.

I've mostly been using the Aeropress lately. It's quicker than the moka pot, I don't have to remember to prepare things the day before for cold brew as with the French press, and overall it produces the best quality brew IMO. But as the weather warms up, I'll probably switch to cold brew.

One thing I finally got to decide against is the "Nespresso" line. I'd been wanting to try one, and finally got the opportunity during a recent hotel stay where that was what they had for in-room coffee. The damn thing sounded like a Mack Truck coming down the road and produce, IMO, an inferior cup of ... well, something. I'm not even sure what brew they were going for with the particular pods included, but it just wasn't very good. I ended up going downstairs each morning for a cup of Colombian dark roast from those thermosy things.

One of these days I may buy a "real" espresso machine, but they tend to run several hundred dollars minimum and that seems like a mal-investment to me, at least for now.