The elixir of life

I am that most common of creatures; the coffee addict.

Like millions of others in the world, I am one of those morning zombies who struggles to deal with t).he world without a caffeine injection to get me operating at normal speed. While I am quite happy to drink instant in a pinch (preferably Nescafé), I favour freshly ground coffee and the french press at home and, like all addicts, I have my favourite haunts picked out for that perfect cup on the go, and I’m generally faithful to the love of my life - the cappuccino (except at uni where, for some reason, it's twice the price of a latté).

My favourite haunt in Perth is a few minutes away, conveniently located in the same complex as my chiropractor.  The small café is perhaps overly hipster in ambience, with an industrial front room with bell jars displaying red velvet cupcakes (I confess I love this feature), a back room of vintage, mis-matched furniture primarily of the seventies persuasion, and a unisex bathroom which reminds me of 90s bizarity Ally McBeal. Every time I go in there I expect to be confronted by a baby dancing to “Hooked on a Feeling”. 

The Horror.

However, the quirky decor holds a certain appeal, and pales into insignificance next to their phenomenal coffee.  I’m pretty sure that the coffee beens are hand picked by fairies, polished by Nubian princesses and gently reduced to grounds by the crystal-plated hooves of unicorns.  It’s that good.

The owners seem to be a bunch of coffee obsessives in search of the holy grail of coffee.  In the summer they offer a cold filter coffee which, rumour has it, takes a full 24 hours to filter and is one of the few coffees I’m happy to drink cold, black and unsweetened.

While we’re on the subject, coffee should Never have sugar added to it.  Ever.  Is that coffee too bitter, or are you just too weak? If it’s the former, it’s just bad coffee.  Either man up and down it with a grimace to get your fix, or Throw. It. Out.  Sugar in coffee in an Abomination.

The owners are a curious mixture of bogan and bikie in appearance, and are possessed of some of the most ocker Australian accents I’ve ever encountered (in Perth anyway). I have never been addressed as anything other than ‘love’, and their laid-back attitude means they never alter their work pace, whether the place has one customer or twenty - nothing fazes them. They refuse to buy into the whole nametag thing, so I have no idea of ANYONE’s name. I love it.

While they offer all your regular coffee options - long black, latté, cappucino, machiato, espresso... they also offer select house blends in a cold filter (in summer) and a pourover (in winter).  Though twice the price of a Normal Coffee, I am, more often than not, seduced by the strange, and tend to cave to temptation and opt for one of these 9 out of 10 visits.  When meeting a friend for coffee, this tends to be something of an antisocial choice, as the pourover tends to come out a good ten minutes after a Normal Coffee, by which point the other person has pretty much finished with their coffee. Yet still I am seduced by the pretentious, but oh-so-living-up-to-its-pretension, cup of fresh-brewed black coffee.

When it finally arrives, the pourover (I usually opt for the V60) comes cradled gently in the arms of one of the staff, served in a large stemless wineglass on a black saucer.  It’s generally accompanied by a verbal chemical analysis worthy of a wine afficionado; “now, love, this is yer V60; it’s a blend of yer Rwandan and Costa Rican coffee beans with a hint of blackberry, gently ground by the loving hands of a Franciscan monk while riding a zebra.” Or something to that effect.

I tend to get a bit uncomfortable during this part, as it makes me very conscious of the fact that I have unwittingly joined the ranks of the hipsters by paying $7 for what is, effectively, a black coffee.  But, like a desperate crack addict looking for “one more fix”, I keep coming back because the act of drinking one of those nectar of the gods coffees is something of a religious experience for me.  

You give thanks for the wonder that is life in your way, and I’ll do it in mine.

I tend to nurse the coffee like a broke drunk, dreading the moment when the last drop is drunk and the joyful experience is over. Because then begins the internal bargaining - do I get another, or acknowledge that:

a) it’s indulgent enough to buy One of these coffees, let alone Two, and

b) I should really limit my caffeine intake to no more than five a day, and preferable less than three. (I try, honest I do.)

Hey, we all have our drugs.  Mine’s at least legal, and is only hurting me.  Unless I can’t get my fix.  Then Stuff Gets Tense.