There is a great dividing year in the history of coffee in America, and it is 1972. Before it, the percolator. After, automatic drip.
via Here’s to Mr. Coffee, Known to Some as Sam – NYTimes.com.
One of the co-inventors of the home drip coffeemaker died this month at the age of 89. Samuel Glazer and Vincent Marotta Sr. were partners in Cleveland, Ohio who had the Mr. Coffee coffeemaker engineered and built. The machine they made changed the way America woke up each morning. Mr Sam passed away on March 11. Thanks to both of them for making my life better…I remember how bad coffee used to be.
I can recall my father, sprinting across the livingroom in his underwear and undershirt, dashing to the kitchen to catch the first (he hoped) bubbling of the percolater. He drank his coffee black and could not understand the seemingly minute amount of sugar my mother put into hers.
“You don’t even taste that.”
“Well…”
How many times did they have that exchange?
And since summer’s coming, here’s the best – BEST! – iced coffee recipe ever.
Mix 1/2 cup coarsely ground coffee and 2 cups water in a Mason jar, or whatever’s handy. Let it sit at room temperature for at least 12 hours. Strain and chill. (I use a metal strainer and a paper coffee filter). It’s concentrated, so add water, ice, milk and sugar as you wish. Makes about four cups.
There’s no bitterness at all, hardly an effort at all, and it’s got a nice mocha-y taste, depending on your bean. As soon as I get some cinnamon sticks, I’m going to throw on in the jar and see what happens.
It’s kinda funny…Almost all of my life I’ve been a big coffee drinker.
One of my first jobs out of high school was as a donut maker at the local Dunkin. The beans were ground just before brewing and the water was filtered through a system that looked like it belonged on the space shuttle…and that was at the same time these guys were rolling out their Mr. Coffee. The pot was dumped and a fresh one started every 16 minutes no matter how full it was…
Here lately though I’ve started drinking Pu-erh tea every morning…And I like it with the cinnamon stick and some cloves in it…