Phil Brewer's Blog

Well, this is not really a diary, but in some ways it is a walk through time. As I sit here along the banks of the river next to the Castle and Cathedral Durham, England. I marvel at the lack of change. The Cathedral is close to 1000 years old, and the same building tools used then are used now. There are some more tricks to the scaffolding, but by in large, the trade of masons has little changed, I suspect.

Inside, however, is a modern kitchen serving coffees. Think about the exotic flavor of coffee and the cream, the sugar in the little bags, the sweeteners. When did sweeteners come into existence? Not that we should debate here the practicality of using them. How about bottles of flavoring? The machines are so large and grand. The steam is built up from the piped in water, filtered for special flavor, and then forced through the high pressure line to throw out the thick syrup of espresso.

How many coffee machines over the years did I watch my Dad buy? I got caught up in the acquisition of the perfect home brewer. We didn’t have Mr. Coffee early on. That was a much later invention.

We had a percolator. You had to wait for the water to boil, and then be sure to turn it down just before it erupted out the top and created a great mess.  Later, we got an electric percolator that seemed to solve this messy problem.

Mr Coffee was a neat invention, not because it really produced a very good cup of Joe, but because it made it so convenient.  But still, dealing with the paper filters, and the special type of grounds etc, what a bunch of fuss.

But, now, we have the everywhere phenomenon of Starbucks.  What a genius idea that is.  You can debate the merits of the coffee brewed there, but no question about it, it is a long overdue phenomenon.  Who could have ever predicted that the 5 cent cup of coffee could now cost you as much as $5!  Wow.  What a country!