perelgut@utcsrgv.UUCP (Stephen Perelgut) (08/18/83)
After all the debate on freezing water, how about a short battle over when
to add cream to coffee to get it to your favourite drinking temperature. And
don't forget about when to add the sugar/cancer-causing-agent to maximize the
effect.
Seriously, does anyone out there have an explanation for the following.
Why is the quality of coffee from our automatic drip coffee maker so
variable depending on who makes it? The number of variables are small.
Only the amount of ground coffee and the amount of water. One secretary
gets in early and brews a fabulous cup of coffee and yet, even when others
(including me) follow her advice exactly, the later cups turn out "average"
usually.
--
--- Stephen Perelgut ---
{ linus, ihnp4, allegra, floyd }!utcsrgv!perelgut
{decvax!utzoo, cornell, watmath, uw-beaver, ubc-vision}!utcsrgv!perelgutstanwyck@ihuxr.UUCP (08/19/83)
Anyone who pollutes coffee with cream (or even sugar) should be hung from the gallows for desecrating our national beverage! And to further ruin it by using cream to COOL??? your coffee? Be reasonable, my friend. Coffee should only be drunk black, as hot as you can stand it, and in quantities of no less than 15 cups per day. don stanwyck : ..!ihnp4!ihuxr!stanwyck : 312-979-6667 : btl @ nap.,il
laura@utcsstat.UUCP (Laura Creighton) (08/20/83)
"Coffee should only be drunk black, as hot as you can stand it, and in quantities of no less than 15 cups a day." I like black coffee. The problem is, "as hot as I can stand it" is pretty cold. I do not think that I could fit all 15+ cups in due to the waiting time. So I put ice cubes in. Laura Creighton utzoo!utcsstat!laura
grunwald@uiuccsb.UUCP (08/22/83)
#R:utcsrgv:-198800:uiuccsb:9900009:000:200 uiuccsb!grunwald Aug 21 00:31:00 1983 Oh, this is as bad as my question of several months ago as to what makes coffe get bad when it sits on the burner (the only reply I got thought that my theory about oxidation of oils sounded good).
jab@ritcv.UUCP (John A Biles) (08/22/83)
I think your "early bird" secretary's apparent success is due to a
well documented phenomenon called the first-cup-of-the-day syndrome.
Personally, the first cup could be made from yesterday's grounds without
a filter, and I'd love it.
- Al Biles
{allegra,seismo}!rochester!ritcv!jabspaf@gatech.UUCP (08/27/83)
You said that the only variables are the amount of coffee and the amount
of water -- not so! You also have at least 3 others: the first pot
of coffee for the day is brewed in a machine that has been off for many
hours, the water for the first pot comes from the tap at a certain
time of day (it has been sitting in the pipes for a while, probably), and
it produces coffee that is probably close to your first of the day.
Let us consider each factor.
When my coffee machine is hot it evaporates more water than when it is cold.
Thus, succeeding pots of coffee are stronger because less water gets
through to the pot, and the first half of the water takes the most
flavor through the grounds. Also, the pot and burner are warmed up on
later pots and the coffee "decays" at a faster rate (you know how awful
coffee gets when it sits there on the warmer for hours...sometimes a few
minutes can do damage).
The water that comes out of the pipe early in the morning may have
been sitting in the pipe for a while since nobody has been using the
water for some period of time. Thus, all sorts of chemical/mineral
reactions could be the cause for different taste. This applies not
only to the water drawn for the first pot, but to the water arriving
later in the day which doesn't stay in the pipes very long.
Last of all, if you're anything like me, my teeth begin to get fuzzy and
the amount of coffee I drink begins to effect my judgment, and coffee
later on in the day just doesn't appeal to me the same way. As a test,
don't have any coffee all day and brush your teeth before that 4pm
cup and see what it tastes like. Which makes me think....what do you
normally have for breakfast? Do you always have a doughnut with your coffee?
Do you brush your teeth right before you come into work? The powdered
sugar or toothpaste or whatever will stay in your mouth and change the
way you taste things (like, drink some fresh squeezed orange juice
right after brushing your teeth with mint toothpaste -- wow!).
Last possible factor -- your secretary who makes the great coffee is
very, very clever and slips something into the coffee to make it
taste better. Sort of like "job security" -- "We can't fire Chris
because s/he make the best coffee around here."
--
The padded cell of Gene Spafford
CSNet: Spaf @ GATech ARPA: Spaf.GATech @ UDel-Relay
uucp: ...!{sb1,allegra,ut-ngp}!gatech!spaf ...!duke!mcnc!msdc!gatech!spaf