As a kid, I always liked my coffee with lots of milk and sugar. My
step-dad
sometimes put honey in his coffee, and I thought he was nuts.
I didn't become a serious coffee-drinker until I was in my mid to late
twenties. By "serious" I don't mean that I bought an espresso machine or
started roasting my own beans, but only that I started drinking coffee
every
day. I still used lots of milk and sugar in my coffee.
While traveling from Indiana down into Texas in 1980 or so, I noticed
honey
on the table in a restaurant, and tried some in my coffee. I was trying
to
get rid of that bitter taste coffee often seemed to have -- especially
restaurant coffee. I liked the coffee with honey in it.
I didn't use honey in my coffee at home because it was too expensive. But
I
did eventually graduate from milk and sugar in coffee to just sugar. I
noticed that if the coffee was good, the sugar allowed me to get more of
the
flavor, while still adding sweetness.
Really good coffee, of course, needs nothing added. But I had not found
really good coffee very often. I kept trying to use Folgers and Maxwell
House, etc. And I was slow to discover the things that make even a good
coffee taste bitter -- like leaving the heat on after it is brewed in a
drip
coffee-maker, or filling the basket all the way up when making coffee.
We finally happened on a good commercial coffee brand that is found in
most
stores. For us that is Yuban, the dark roast. The dark roast of a good
coffee adds a deeper flavor without adding bitterness. With Yuban we use
less coffee and still get lots of flavor.
Once in a while, I would use honey in my coffee. I like the flavor, but
not
with milk, oddly enough. But I just could not see paying for the use of
honey all the time.
In recent years, I've been able to find a good clover honey (very sweet
and
light) at a good price. So I started using honey in my coffee more often.
But I use two teaspoons per cup (16oz) and so the honey goes pretty fast.
Then one day, to try and stretch the honey until I could get to the store
again, I used half sugar and half honey. I was still able to get much of
the honey flavor, without using so much.
I noticed that cane sugar works better than beet sugar, when mixing with
honey. Cane sugar has a sweeter taste.
At some point I started pre-mixing the sugar and honey in a small
container.
That way, I can simply get the half and half mix at once, without doing
tricks with the spoon, to avoid getting honey in the sugar, and so on.
And
this works well for me. About once every two weeks, I mix up my sugar and
honey in a plastic container and then use out of that batch each day.
Now I seem to have the best of what I like in coffee. Plenty of flavor,
no
bitterness to try and cover up, and the sweetness I enjoy to help
kick-start
the day.
Pazzo
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