a mandate on taste

consumer reports reports to consumers that mcdonald's premium coffees (newman's own organic, in the green mountain family) beat starbucks regular coffee in their in-house testing. this is interesting on a couple of levels, none of them having anything to do with the relative quality of either coffee.

first though, to disclaim, i've never tried mcdonald's new coffee, despite the fact that they offer it for free with any of their delicious sammiches every morning. i do, however, have a cup of starbucks' ethiopia sidamo in front of me as i'm typing this. and it's pretty damn good. ooh, also in the interests of full disclosure, i kinda sorta work for starbucks. and have for years. in fact, starbucks not only pays my rent and my bills, but they bought me a bike when mine got stolen. nevertheless, i like to think i'm vociferous in my criticism of my corporate overlords, both on and off the job. plus, like the evaluators in the survey, i'm trained in the intricacies of coffee-tasting. my palate be hella educated, yo.

there, now that that's out of the way, on to the coffee survey itself, and more importantly, my problems with it.

ok, back to the taste thing. the appeal of coffee is very, very subjective, and i'm not just talking about what kind of milk or how much sugar you add to it. (don't even get me started on calling your fucking latte "coffee" because it's just not right) whether or not a random person enjoys a cup of coffee depends very much on characteristics that your average joe probably wouldn't even know how to characterize, like acidity, body, and mouthfeel. these traits interact with the three levels of flavor (top, middle, and bottom) to create the overall taste of a cup of coffee. if this sounds nerdy, well, that's because it is. and i go here not to prove how uncool i am (duh) but to make the point that every cup is different. there are starbucks coffees i hate (verona) and starbucks coffees i love (shade-grown mexico), but my opinion of the company's offerings as a whole are relatively constant. unlike mcdonald's, i should point out.

so am i defending starbucks? maybe. a little. more like condemning the conditions under which this test was conducted. for instance, were all the coffees they tasted organic? or just mcdonald's? were they latin american? african? asian? blends? light roasts? dark roasts? were they freshly ground? freshly brewed? how long ago were they brewed? were they all 100% arabica? was the coffee brewing equipment clean?

god knows i can't vouch for my own store on some of these factors, let alone five different stores with five different sets of corporate standards. and maybe these variables will cancel each other out across the field of candidate coffees, but coming fresh from a course on research methods, the whole thing seems a little sloppy to me.


notice how i don't dispute the value thing though. newman's own organic coffee is fair trade certified, and thus about as guilt-free as coffee can be. unlike starbucks (cafe estima aside). and the mcdonald's is still cheaper! if there's anything about this that should embarrass the suits in seattle, it's that.

who knew tv journalists could actually do their jobs?

i don't really like tv news. i've watched the local broadcasts a few times and they're pretty pathetic. the national stuff's even worse most of the time. at least the local news is still relevant to the people who watch it--the cable news channels are completely ridiculous. cnn's preaching the coming armageddon, fox news is winning the market share for old white people (news viewers) and polemicizing as if most of its audience didn't just get kicked out of washington. but out of nowhere comes msnbc. despite having chris matthews and tucker carlson on their own shows, the peacock became the first network to have the balls to call iraq a civil war on the air. i don't even mind joe scarborough some of the time, since he actually uses his brain and not just his mouth.

but man oh man, do i love me some keith olbermann.

i liked him on espn (i think that was the last time i watched espn on purpose, actually) and i really, really like countdown. olbermann is everything you could want of a media personality cum journalist: avowedly nonpartisan, viciously protective of social, civil, and human rights, striking without being strident, clever without being smug, pointed without being shrill, and possessing the kind of gravitas (and eyebrows) that peter jennings would be proud of. he has real experts from both sides come on every night and even provides political, historical, and philosophical context for the issues he's covering. context! issues! not empty blather and shouted character assassinations. can they even do that on television? i swear, it's like an incredible one-hour dream every weeknight.

i've been studying political media personalities all semester, and if they were all a little more like olbermann, maybe tv news wouldn't be the spite-filled, useless wasteland it's become. on the show tonight, in one of his 'special comment' segments, olbermann tore into newt gingrich's proposed dismantling of the first amendment. it's a good read, but it was absolutely stunning television. i don't even mind that he borrowed edward murrow's closing line. i've never seen politics on tv that impressed me as much (not counting the west wing. and 24).

forefathers be proud

happy birthday america!

the 4th of july is an odd duck of a holiday.  not so much in the reasons for its existence, but more in the way it’s celebrated.  is bbq-ing american?  sure it is, unless you count all of the other cultures—africans, arabs, asians—who beat us to it.  there’s also the pesky fact that holding raw meat over open fire may very well be the oldest form of cooking there is.  it’s so easy, a caveman could do it.  sure, they didn’t have frozen burger patties and individually wrapped cheese slices back then (it took america to individually wrap its cheese, by gum!), so i guess we can lay our claim to the experience if not the method.  but is grilling really any more american than frying things?  kfc and paula deen probably don’t think so.  we can probably call the fish-fry an authentic american experience, and it’s even appropriately summery, but i don’t think it’ll ever catch on as a 4th staple.

also, when the temperature rises, there’s a certain segment of the population (myself included) that will always reach for one specific beer—la corona!  That’s just an inviolable fact of summer.  and despite the overall (and also inviolable) blandness of the corona, i have yet to find an american lager that a) combines as well with limes and b) refreshes quite so perfectly.  sure if push came to shove, i would sell my cervezas down the river for a pint of harpoon summer, but sadly, that miracle beer hasn’t made to my little corner of the swamp that is dc.  anyway, the point is that our nation’s birthday is doomed by its own summer date to be celebrated with mexican beer. (don’t worry, america, my coronas were in celebration of their election, not your birthday!)

lastly, fireworks.  we all know blowing things up is as american as apple pie.  but the chinese invented fireworks!  and yes, i suppose if there’s one thing america does better than any other country, it’s appropriate culture and assimilate people.  all things considered though, there’s not one thing about this holiday that’s actually american (not counting mike’s supersnack)!  we even had tortilla chips (mexico again) and pretzels (dutch or german, i don’t know).

i guess what I’m trying to say is, good job america!  this holiday has actually shown me that we can thank the various immigrants we’ve had over the centuries, because i’m pretty sure that without them we’d be eating deep-fried cheetos and setting off real bombs every year.