Coffee: it’s life-giving juice for so many Americans and people worldwide, but I just don’t get it.
As far as I remember, I can honestly say that “never have I ever” consumed a cup of coffee. I probably fall into the 5% of the 18 year old+ American public who can make that statement. Even without coffee, I’ve managed to live a happy, productive 24 years. Am I crazy? Nah, I don’t think so.
First of all, I have other things that can wake me up in the morning. People to see, puppies to pet, breakfast to eat, books to read, roads to drive, etc. Don’t turn the bright lights on, though; those absolutely kill my eyes, and I find myself needing sunglasses.
Secondly, caffeine doesn’t seem to boost my energy or wake me up. I tried drinking a Coke every now and then when staying up late studying in college, but I honestly never felt any more energized. The same goes for other caffeinated beverages or snacks.
Even more importantly than those first two, coffee just doesn’t taste good! It smells nice, but the flavor itself is not appealing to me.
Since I don’t drink coffee, what do I drink when others are chugging coffee? Ah ha, that is where the evolution of Steph unfolds…
For years and years, I was all about the hot chocolate. What’s better than chocolate? Not much. Okay, probably puppies, but those are for loving and beside the point. Hot chocolate was a tasty warm beverage to enjoy on the way to early morning hunting trips, while on backpacking trips, or while doing homework in the underheated cabin.
Teri tried a bit to get me on the tea wagon, but I wasn’t terribly enticed by it. Every now and then peppermint or berry tea fit the moment, but I wasn’t sold on it.
Then I went on a life-changing trip to – you guessed it – New Zealand! My supervisor (Sarah) and fellow field assistant (Rose) were not coffee drinkers, but they were tea drinkers! They drank regular black tea, not the “hippie tea” Sarah called all other tea varieties. 🙂 I still requested peppermint tea to be on hand, but when Sarah and Rose would boil water for tea at night, I slowly started drinking normal black tea with milk and a little sugar. When Rose and I went WWOOFing, our hosts always had hot tea ready to go. Before I knew it, I was drinking Dilmah black tea a lot of the time! I still had hot chocolate now and then, but I found myself buying tea rather than hot chocolate when we stopped at the store or when we used McD’s for internet. I was a changed person.
When I returned to Alaska, I was both a hot chocolate and tea drinker. Since then I’ve gotten slightly bored with having those as my options. Over the summer I discovered you can add a drop of vanilla to hot milk for a cup of hot vanilla! (If you have suggestions for other names, please do share.) While training for work with CK-9s, coffee stops were guaranteed on the way to Seattle for our crazy gear shopping trips, and I started experimenting with flavored lattes after hearing they’re milk + espresso. Full strength lattes contain too much coffee flavor, so if I ask for half strength, it’s just about right! Milk, some vanilla flavor, and mild coffee flavor = pretty darn tasty.
So what have I been drinking on the drives to survey transects in Alberta? I’ve varied between all of the above options except for the lattes… until recently. In the last few weeks I’ve made a breakthrough discovery in the world of hot beverages: the poor man’s latte, consisting of 6/10s milk, 3/10s water, 1/10 coffee, + 1 flavored vanilla creamer = vanilla latte!
Sometimes I feel slightly brilliant with my culinary finds. I’ll let you know what comes next…