Thread: 'The higher up the candle, the stronger the coffee, and contrariwise.'' Board: Oblivion / Ship of Fools.


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Posted by Eirenist (# 13343) on :
 
Have Shipmates found this to be true?
 

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Posted by leo (# 1458) on :
 
No
 

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Posted by Chorister (# 473) on :
 
What a weird idea! Ours changes week by week, according to who is on the coffee rota!
 

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Posted by Spike (# 36) on :
 

 

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Posted by Og, King of Bashan (# 9562) on :
 
I think that might be one of those lines that is more amusing than true. At the very least, I don't see a correlation. We are pretty high up the candle and have pretty mediocre coffee, which I chalk up to the bulk purchased, pre-ground, extra oxidized coffee that the budget allows.
 

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Posted by ken (# 2460) on :
 
We're low and mostly African and West Indian.

So the coffee is milky weak instant. Drink the tea, at least its strong.

When I lived in Kenya my neighbours grew coffee - it was the main source of income by a long way in our district - but they drank tea. Made the Anglo-Indian way, tea, water, milk, and sugar all boiled in the same pot.

If you bought your chai from a stall or cafe run by Somalis, which lots were, it often came with other herbs and spices in it too. Like black pepper, coriander, cardamom, cumin, sometimes even chili. Not so much spiced as curried. And it's wonderful. If you are hot, dry, tired, and dusty waiting for a bus in the middle of nowhere at the edge of the desert, a cup of boiling hot sweet spicy tea full of milk and sugar can be amazing.
 

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Posted by Ariel (# 58) on :
 
I make my own coffee and it has to be rough, rich, intense, and dark. No milk, no sugar, no prisoners.

I also love a good old-fashioned Catholic Latin Mass.

Having said that, I've never been to the after-service coffee at my local church, basically because there isn't any as far as I know, but in places where I have had this it wasn't particularly inspiring coffee.
 

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Posted by Zappa (# 8433) on :
 
I don't get to the coffee in my new pad, as I tend to be "working the crowd". We're kinda just above middle at the moment, and the coffee is I suspect just below drinkable if it's the same as that which I avoid in the office (lots of nearby cafes instead).

But it is fair trade.
 

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Posted by TurquoiseTastic (# 8978) on :
 
I suspect it may once have been true but no longer; and furthermore I suspect that this is because the true correlation is between quality of coffee and total (rather than average) parish income.
 

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Posted by georgiaboy (# 11294) on :
 
If you're REALLY high up the candle you will find something like, and I quote from the service paper:

'The licenced establishment in the undercroft opens 20 minutes after the conclusion of the High Mass,'

This is from All Sts, Margaret St., I may not have quoted quite correctly, but the brews were superb.

(I have not comparison-shopped other AC shrines in London.)
 

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Posted by Jade Constable (# 17175) on :
 
We're reasonably high and still get sad instant church coffee, and too-weak tea served with stale and soft biscuits. We are very much not a shrine church, and one can only dream of the wonders* served there.

*If said wonders do not include a G&T then I am deeply disappointed.
 

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Posted by Jade Constable (# 17175) on :
 
Also, I think char-evo places with actual coffee bars rather disprove this! Never found one with a Rev-style smoothie bar yet though
 

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Posted by Sir Kevin (# 3492) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by Ariel:
I make my own coffee and it has to be rough, rich, intense, and dark. No milk, no sugar, no prisoners.

I also love a good old-fashioned Catholic Latin Mass.

Having said that, I've never been to the after-service coffee at my local church, basically because there isn't any as far as I know, but in places where I have had this it wasn't particularly inspiring coffee.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Augustine the Aleut:
I have never found any relation between churchmanship and the quality of coffee.

Unless I know otherwise, I go for the tea. Sometimes I ask for the server's recommendation, also a good way to break the ice and actually get someone to talk to me at the coffee hour (this is especially necessary when the church advertises itself as inclusive and welcoming)-- assured by a young man in Kingston that it was not wimpy coffee and he had barista training, I tried it and found that the coffee had a redemptive aspect.

In one of my MW reports, I noticed how the Anglican Cathedral in Buenos Aires after the service provided me with a cortado (macchiato) as requested, and cafe solo (espresso) or cafe con leche (cappucino/café au lait) was also available. However, the Argentines are serious about their coffee. Having tasted the coffee of Florida Episcopalians, I was driven to attend a Mass in Castilian at the local RC outlet, and got an excellent cubano coffee after the service.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Emendator Liturgia:



seems like the tea-drinkers prefer a tea-bag.

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What? Separate individual tea-bags, in a cup?

They are not tea-drinkers. By definition.
 

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Posted by Twilight (# 2832) on :
 
That's exactly how most Americans feel about instant coffee. I've never been to a church that would dream of serving instant, we use huge automatic coffee machines. Instant coffee is for camping trips.

Chai tea? Just the smell of it gives me a headache.
 

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Posted by Adeodatus (# 4992) on :
 
It's simply not true that Anglo-Catholics have refined or exotic tastes. I simply haven't the energy for anything fussy after a High Mass which I've spent inhaling purest Arabian incense, spiced with the oil of black roses whose petals were picked at dawn. So exhausted am I from elevating the chalice - heavy with cabuchon rubies given from the dowry of a 17th century contessa - that I retire to my boudoir as soon as the organist has finished his weekly tribute to the excesses of Lefébure-Wély. There, it's true, I sip a little coffee, an espresso made from heady, sweet Java beans. I may even nibble on a small bitter chocolate, fashioned by strict Calvinist virgins in a Swiss valley accessible only by pack-mule. But then I barely have time to practise my hobby of trying to identify the precise origin of a range of Thai silks by touch alone, before I have to slave over a hot stove to prepare a luncheon snack of larks' tongues and asparagus tips. My one indulgence is that I eat this with a two-pronged golden fork reputed to have belonged to King Chosroes II, and smuggled into England in a hatbox belonging to Heinrich Schliemann. But one has to have one's little luxuries.

*Sigh*. Anglo-Catholicism is such hard work.
 

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Posted by roybart (# 17357) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by Twilight:
I've never been to a church that would dream of serving instant, we use huge automatic coffee machines. Instant coffee is for camping trips.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Twilight:
I've never been to a church that would dream of serving instant, we use huge automatic coffee machines. Instant coffee is for camping trips.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Adeodatus:

My one indulgence is that I eat this with a two-pronged golden fork reputed to have belonged to King Chosroes II, and smuggled into England in a hatbox belonging to Heinrich Schliemann.

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quote:

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Originally posted by OddJob:
Connoisseurs of good ale also tend to be concentrated at opposite ends of the theological spectrum, I find. Maybe the latter trend results from relatively few men being in the middle of the theological road.

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They are also concentrated in the members of cathedral, collegiate and better church choirs. Lurk outside the cathedral at the end of Evensong and follow the choirmen and they will unerringly lead you to the best local hostelry.

The thing that surprises me about this thread is that there are, apparently, churches with decent coffee. My experience points to good coffee being one of the consumables explicitly not shown to St Peter.
 

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Posted by betjemaniac (# 17618) on :
 
I think that "coffee" may well become a euphemism the higher up the candle you go.

My last regular place was not the one l'organist has in mind, but was also a fan of sherry most of the year, with champagne (from the fridge naturally) May-August.

We, however, had a dishwasher.

If it had been any higher, then nosebleeds would have been the least of the congregation's worries, what with the general lack of oxygen, and danger of heads imploding.
 

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Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on :
 
Right at the bottom of the candle here and no sherry (Methodist).

But excellent coffee and food all round. Several of our members have been on gourmet foody courses.


 

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Posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider (# 76) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by Twilight:
That's exactly how most Americans feel about instant coffee. I've never been to a church that would dream of serving instant, we use huge automatic coffee machines. Instant coffee is for camping trips.

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It's a British thing I'm afraid. For many Brits, Instant Coffee is coffee. It comes from drinking it with lots of milk and usually sugar. You have to specify black over here or milk goes in automatically.
 

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Posted by Jengie Jon (# 273) on :
 
Common conversation with cafe staff

Jengie: May I have a black Americano/coffee?
Staff: Do you want milk in that?



It really is deeply ingrained.

Jengie
 

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Posted by Og, King of Bashan (# 9562) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by betjemaniac:
I think that "coffee" may well become a euphemism the higher up the candle you go.

My last regular place was not the one l'organist has in mind, but was also a fan of sherry most of the year, with champagne (from the fridge naturally) May-August.

We, however, had a dishwasher.

If it had been any higher, then nosebleeds would have been the least of the congregation's worries, what with the general lack of oxygen, and danger of heads imploding.

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quote:

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Originally posted by roybart:

quote:

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Originally posted by Twilight:
I've never been to a church that would dream of serving instant, we use huge automatic coffee machines. Instant coffee is for camping trips.

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This is my experience too -- big chrome percolators with spigots at the bottom. Coffee is purchased in huge tins from a warehouse store like Costco. The same urns are an almost universal feature of AA meetings, as well.

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AA rents our church hall for its meetings. They are the same urns, in our case.
 

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Posted by Augustine the Aleut (# 1472) on :
 
Having recently attended the local Coptic outlet to pacify a friend, I was pleased to see that, along with the legendary coffee urns which are clearly a proof of assimilation and integration, several kanakas (ibriks, or little pots for making turkish coffee) were on the stove, tended to by an intense young woman from the youth group. It was for the old people, I was told, so I pleaded to be counted among them and was given a small glass of the stuff and directed to the loukoum.

I might go back. I cannot think of a better subject for my five thousandth post.
 

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Posted by piglet (# 11803) on :
 
I can't say I've ever observed the coffee conundrum, but a committee for which I do the minutes met the other night at a fairly evangelical shack and the tea (it was tea-bags in a bowl, with a kettle to make one's own) was so horrid I nearly asked what sort it was so that I could avoid it. D. said that knowing the church's new rector, it was probably free-trade, right-on politically-correct tea ...
 

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Posted by Mama Thomas (# 10170) on :
 
I remember a conversation the topic of which was "Which is worse: hospital coffee or church coffee?" I think the consensus was they are tied for horribleness.

In the US, one cannot find good tea. In churches, it likely to be warmish water from a 90s drip coffee maker, which someone flicked on before the service. The tea bag generic, and the cup Styrofoam. Even in somewhat nice restaurants, the tea ordered will be made from flat, insipid water sitting in an urn from time immemorial, poured into an ice-cold individual metal pot, and perhaps a choice of pretentious sounding teas in tea bags for the patron to drop into an ice cold cup, which s/he will then pour the flat luke-warm water in the metal pot.

Don't order tea in the US, (though I hear there is a place in Manhattan where it is quaffable.)
 

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Posted by ken (# 2460) on :
 
I spent some time in hospital last month. Both tea and coffee were better than church. Though the coffee wasn't very good.
 

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Posted by Chorister (# 473) on :
 
If you go too high up the candle, of course, a miracle occurs and the coffee turns into GIN.
 

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Posted by Barefoot Friar (# 13100) on :
 
Depends on your tea, Mama Thomas. Don't try asking for this from Yankees, who will look at you as though you've sprouted horns in your head, but here in the American South tea is drunk sweetened, over ice. And it is the best drink in the whole world.
 

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Posted by Gwalchmai (# 17802) on :
 
Our church recently acquired a commercial filter coffee machine, so we now have proper coffee after the service - better than most Anglican churches I have worshiped in.It does mean that people new to the coffee rota have to be trained in how to use it.

However, I like the idea of champagne for festivals.
 

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Posted by Stercus Tauri (# 16668) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by Jengie Jon:
Common conversation with cafe staff

Jengie: May I have a black Americano/coffee?
Staff: Do you want milk in that?



It really is deeply ingrained.

Jengie

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quote:

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Originally posted by Stercus Tauri:

quote:

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Originally posted by Jengie Jon:
Common conversation with cafe staff

Jengie: May I have a black Americano/coffee?
Staff: Do you want milk in that?



It really is deeply ingrained.

Jengie

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When did 'Americano' enter the language? I am sure I never encountered it before my last couple of trips home. I tried it, and diagnosed it as 'coffee'.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Barefoot Friar:
Depends on your tea, Mama Thomas. Don't try asking for this from Yankees, who will look at you as though you've sprouted horns in your head, but here in the American South tea is drunk sweetened, over ice. And it is the best drink in the whole world.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Mama Thomas:
Don't order tea in the US, (though I hear there is a place in Manhattan where it is quaffable.)

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quote:

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Originally posted by Barefoot Friar:
Depends on your tea, Mama Thomas. Don't try asking for this from Yankees, who will look at you as though you've sprouted horns in your head, but here in the American South tea is drunk sweetened, over ice. And it is the best drink in the whole world.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Jengie Jon:
Agreed.

I am wondering that if Starbucks do a short cappuccino then maybe they can do a short Americano.

Or do you order a small with an extra shot?

Jengie

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quote:

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Originally posted by Chorister:
If you go too high up the candle, of course, a miracle occurs and the coffee turns into GIN.

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Quotes file!
 

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Posted by Zappa (# 8433) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by Twilight:
That's exactly how most Americans feel about instant coffee. I've never been to a church that would dream of serving instant, we use huge automatic coffee machines. Instant coffee is for camping trips.

Chai tea? Just the smell of it gives me a headache.

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quote:

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Ghastly. Sort of wet and brown and watery coffee-like substance. I am sure that no coffee bean, fair trade or otherwise, sacrificed its life for it.

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(at least I didn't bold quote myself )
 

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Posted by ExclamationMark (# 14715) on :
 
Not sure how we'd fare on the low to high scale - probably off the (bottom) end - but we have filter coffee ordered from a bespoke supplier. Cream also provided.
 

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Posted by Sir Kevin (# 3492) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by Jade Constable:

quote:

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Originally posted by Jengie Jon:
Agreed.

I am wondering that if Starbucks do a short cappuccino then maybe they can do a short Americano.

Or do you order a small with an extra shot?

Jengie

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You should certainly be able to get a short Americano. Do they do flat whites in the US?

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