Today read an article on coffee from Vir Sanghvi in Sunday Brunch. and it triggered me to remember coffee evolution in my generation till now.
The childhood coffee memories are all around dear Nescafe. We did not know any other coffee back then.
Only other variety seen was 'Bru' instant coffee may be, but still it was only instant coffee around.
But having that also used to be an occasion.
In most of the households, coffee was stored only for guests who would not drink tea.
I use to get my share of coffee mostly during holidays, where there will not be any Horlicks or Complan to add in milk and tea was certainly forbidden for children.
My mother's friend, Indu Aunty, would be always carrying a bottle of Nescafe with her on holidays and we used to be morning coffee partners.
Days moved and then came the knowledge of other coffees.
It was still limited to know that there is something called as filter coffee which is available in most of south indian hotels.
I remember having filter coffee in 'Mani's' which is next to Ruia college in Matunga, sitting outside on plastic stools and sharing one cup between both of us.
The coffee would be served not in cup or glass mug, but a unique combination of stainless steel bowl inverted in another wider bowl.
The encounter with cold coffee was in a small outlet outside Somaiyya engineering college, where they used to server only 2 dishes, hot maggie noodles and cold coffee. what a combination!
we have shared many cups of cold coffee there.
Then sometime during later years of engineering, coffee chains started appearing in Mumbai.
The first glimpse of it was 'Barista' opened in front of National college.
At that time, it was totally out of reach for our college student pockets.
We used to feel amazed at how can a cup of coffee can cost a month of pocket money.
But the ambiance and uniqueness of Barista (serving only coffee) was certainly appealing.
Me and my ittle sissy thrust first time into it quite later.
Honestly, It was utterly confusing on what to order.
The hot coffee itself had several options like expresso, latte, cappuccino, all names sounding truly alien then.
Even the choice of cold coffee was not so easy. After reading short description below each, we managed to order some variant.
It was an experience to have tall glass of cold coffee, with hint of chocolate and topped with dollop of ice-cream.
I experienced the true coffee only when i was outside India.
The Paris university campus had many options. For the first time I saw capsule based coffee machine. Again it was confusing which capsule to be used, with caffeine or decaffeinated.
Looking at by bewilderment, one french colleague helped me and simplified the usage for me - saying 'if you want to sleep in the class, drink decaf and if you wanna stay awake during lecture, have caffein'.
The open coffee counter in the premise used to serve brewed coffee as well. Most of the Europeans colleague would prefer brewed version versus capsule based.
The coffee counter would serve a small dark chocolate along with cup of coffee.
Once on Sunday, my dutch colleague Gemma said let's hit Chantilly market for hot cup of coffee. That actually brought knot in my stomach, because I knew most of the dutch colleagues preferred black coffee without sugar n without creamer.
I told her, 'Gemma, please let's go to a place where I will get some whitening agent, either milk or cream to lighten my coffee. I cant have black and bitter drink otherwise'. She laughed out looking at my apprehension.
In London, the famous Starbucks was around each corner.
There was one below Citibank office in canary wharf and on many evenings, we will grab 1 large cup to share and sit on open stairs watching hussle bussle of business district in front.
During the Dubai work period, a pakistani office boy in client office used to make amazing coffee in a small pantry. I used to wonder what makes his coffee so different.
Then I found the secret ingredients, they were Nestle's coffee-mate and use of condensed milk like milkmaid instead of dairy whitener.
Also tasted coffee with camel milk in Dubai souk. Honestly, it was only due to coffee beans , I could finish that drink.
I saw some places selling Arabic coffee beans, but did not try it.
Now a days, almost every corporate office has coffee beans based machine, so the drink has become integral part of the work culture.
But honestly, a cup of Nescafe made by my son on a Sunday afternoon tastes best in the world to me.
The childhood coffee memories are all around dear Nescafe. We did not know any other coffee back then.
Only other variety seen was 'Bru' instant coffee may be, but still it was only instant coffee around.
But having that also used to be an occasion.
In most of the households, coffee was stored only for guests who would not drink tea.
I use to get my share of coffee mostly during holidays, where there will not be any Horlicks or Complan to add in milk and tea was certainly forbidden for children.
My mother's friend, Indu Aunty, would be always carrying a bottle of Nescafe with her on holidays and we used to be morning coffee partners.
Days moved and then came the knowledge of other coffees.
It was still limited to know that there is something called as filter coffee which is available in most of south indian hotels.
I remember having filter coffee in 'Mani's' which is next to Ruia college in Matunga, sitting outside on plastic stools and sharing one cup between both of us.
The coffee would be served not in cup or glass mug, but a unique combination of stainless steel bowl inverted in another wider bowl.
The encounter with cold coffee was in a small outlet outside Somaiyya engineering college, where they used to server only 2 dishes, hot maggie noodles and cold coffee. what a combination!
we have shared many cups of cold coffee there.
Then sometime during later years of engineering, coffee chains started appearing in Mumbai.
The first glimpse of it was 'Barista' opened in front of National college.
At that time, it was totally out of reach for our college student pockets.
We used to feel amazed at how can a cup of coffee can cost a month of pocket money.
But the ambiance and uniqueness of Barista (serving only coffee) was certainly appealing.
Me and my ittle sissy thrust first time into it quite later.
Honestly, It was utterly confusing on what to order.
The hot coffee itself had several options like expresso, latte, cappuccino, all names sounding truly alien then.
Even the choice of cold coffee was not so easy. After reading short description below each, we managed to order some variant.
It was an experience to have tall glass of cold coffee, with hint of chocolate and topped with dollop of ice-cream.
I experienced the true coffee only when i was outside India.
The Paris university campus had many options. For the first time I saw capsule based coffee machine. Again it was confusing which capsule to be used, with caffeine or decaffeinated.
Looking at by bewilderment, one french colleague helped me and simplified the usage for me - saying 'if you want to sleep in the class, drink decaf and if you wanna stay awake during lecture, have caffein'.
The open coffee counter in the premise used to serve brewed coffee as well. Most of the Europeans colleague would prefer brewed version versus capsule based.
The coffee counter would serve a small dark chocolate along with cup of coffee.
Once on Sunday, my dutch colleague Gemma said let's hit Chantilly market for hot cup of coffee. That actually brought knot in my stomach, because I knew most of the dutch colleagues preferred black coffee without sugar n without creamer.
I told her, 'Gemma, please let's go to a place where I will get some whitening agent, either milk or cream to lighten my coffee. I cant have black and bitter drink otherwise'. She laughed out looking at my apprehension.
In London, the famous Starbucks was around each corner.
There was one below Citibank office in canary wharf and on many evenings, we will grab 1 large cup to share and sit on open stairs watching hussle bussle of business district in front.
During the Dubai work period, a pakistani office boy in client office used to make amazing coffee in a small pantry. I used to wonder what makes his coffee so different.
Then I found the secret ingredients, they were Nestle's coffee-mate and use of condensed milk like milkmaid instead of dairy whitener.
Also tasted coffee with camel milk in Dubai souk. Honestly, it was only due to coffee beans , I could finish that drink.
I saw some places selling Arabic coffee beans, but did not try it.
Now a days, almost every corporate office has coffee beans based machine, so the drink has become integral part of the work culture.
But honestly, a cup of Nescafe made by my son on a Sunday afternoon tastes best in the world to me.
