I’ve become pretty good at making coffee over the years (I’ve even written about all my various methods of preparation). While it took me a long time to get to drinking coffee, I have to admit my mother’s influence on me in this regard. She often spoke of how she loved coffee all the way back into her childhood, and coffee was one of her essentials, all the way up to the end.
I recall, with some embarrassment, by first attempt at making coffee, when I was in kindergarten and we were living in La Crosse, WI. One Saturday morning I wanted to make coffee for Mom, so I set out to do just that. The problem was that I didn’t understand how coffee worked. I thought it was just like making hot cocoa: spoon the powder stuff into a mug, add hot water, stir, and drink. So that’s what I did. Mom was very nice about it, even as she explained to me that no, that’s not how coffee works, and that I should leave the coffee-making to her and to the machine on the counter that made all the weird noises. (“Hisss…hissssss…WHEEZE…drip drip drip! WHEEZE, drip drip drip! WHEEZE, drip drip drip!”)
Here’s to jitter liquid and to things we learned from our mothers.
My parents drank instant coffee, so spooning in the Maxwell House was precisely how you made it.
As a non-coffee drinker, I was working in an office where it was mandated that there should be a rotation for making the beverage. I protested, “But since I don’t drink coffee, I have no way to judge if it’s any good.” I think I made it once, and it was apparently terrible, and I was releived of that duty.