Somewhere in my late 30's or 40's, I started drinking coffee. I also like hot tea, preferably English or Irish breakfast or Earl Grey. Over time, I have gotten more and more enthusiastic about coffee. Now, I drink about 10 oz. of strong bold Starbucks in the morning, the same amount with 25% de-caf at lunch, and 100% decaf after dinner. Once, when driving alone from Wisconsin to Baltimore, I drove until well after I was hungry for lunch and then drank a cup of coffee, waiting another hour for lunch. I thought the hunger would help me be awake and alert. So, I got in the habit of having coffee well before eating for both breakfast and lunch.
I liked the taste of coffee with cream and sugar and still do. I can only drink tea without those additions if I work up to doing so slowly. If I don't work up, I will have an upset stomach. But coffee was different. I was watching a black and white Peter Sellers film, probably The World of Henry Orient, when a character carrying a tray asked, "Black coffee?" Until that moment, I had only tasted black coffee when I forgot to add sugar. This was during my 40's and it was about 11 PM. As soon as I heard the words, I immediately knew I wanted some black coffee. I made some immediately and drank it. From then on, I liked my coffee black, without sugar or cream or other adultery.
To me, the aroma of coffee is almost nourishing in itself. I remembered reading in The New Yorker in 1963 about Miss Effie who taught her kindergarteners to learn to drink their coffee black! I kid you not. (The New Yorker, p. 115, May 11, 1963. Go on - look it up and check me out.) I do feel that good coffee is a nourishing drink. 'Good' means the right strength and the right flavor. I have heard that some natives at one time, boiled the beans, tossed the liquid and ate the beans. I use two heaping 1/8 cups of ground coffee to 6 'cups' of water. Most of the time, other coffee, home or restaurant is a little weak tasting to us.
Garrison Keillor first introduced me to the idea of eating the beans in a skit about a man forbidden by his doctor to drink coffee. He missed it seriously and snuck a single bean and ate it. Now, chocloate-covered coffee beans are common.
I read in an Scientific American article that espresso actually a little less caffeine per equal volume than regular and that robustica beans have more than arabica. I have read twice now that a dark "bold" roast such as French or Italian results in a little less caffeine than lighter roasts. I read that oil is the world's most traded substance, followed by coffee and then sugar. Dr. Andrew Weil introduced me to the fact that coffee was thought by some Arab countries to be chemically similar to alcoholic drinks and was banned for a while. Similarly, there a time when it was banned in Germany. In England, coffee houses had a poor reputation as dens of trouble and low life.
Weil also introduced me to the fact that J.S. Bach wrote the Coffee Canata, a dramatic tale of a woman who hates and longs to leave her husband in the 1600's because he doesn't supply her with coffee, her real love. The Coffee Trader by David Liss is a well-written and fairly interested story set in the 1600's in Amsterdam during the time of coffee emergence in Europe.
Time for my morning coffee!
