How Not to Order Coffee

If you are a staunch coffee drinker, like me, here is how not to order your coffee every day. 

As the waiter approaches asking what you would like to drink, do not think that the whole world of splendid possibility has just opened up. It has not. You are only having coffee. 

Do not bide your time by asking him to expound futilely on the nuances of transforming, say, a misordered frappuccino into an unredeemable affogato. You already vaguely know what you are getting, which in my case is a dry cappuccino or a long macchiato.

“Which one of the two exactly?” my garcon, staring in polite befuddlement, at this point typically presses. And would my order be a milkless cappuccino with frothed milk on top, or a frothed milk-topped double espresso, with no milk on the side? 

I don’t know, and can he please repeat the question. He can, and while he does, I seethe in silent self-righteousness: how can one ever be expected to know exactly what one wants and is ordering, especially if that someone is me, a creature all too easily bamboozled by a prospect of any option exceeding one. So, to buy myself more time, I indulge an escapist, self-destructive digression. On occasion, a real inspiration strikes me.

“Do you happen to have a doppio or a ristretto, or can you make a good cortado or an authentic aussie flat white, and does your business allow for dietary limitations to a monsooned coffee only, and also, by the way, and this will truly pique your curiosity, is your barista aware of the difference between a mochaccino con caramelized panna and a caramel glazed cafe au lait?” The question of range is always my top priority.

Yes, they do and they can, and their barista can make any and all of the above. 

Great, I say, as no one should. I’ll just go with a single shot espresso, as usual.