Complicated feelings about espresso

Here you see what faces me each morning as I try to restore the kitchen and get on about my day. Every two years or so my husband buys a new espresso machine in vain hope that he will finally achieve Latte of the same quality as his favorite cafe (which at the moment is Joe’s in Sebastopol). He’s also trying to avoid the $4(USD) cup of coffee which Kev talked about so eloquently. This particular model arrived at our home a couple weeks ago. The little metallic capsules on the right contain the coffee, which one loads very neatly into the top, fills it with water and VOILA! The silver pitcher on the left is for steaming the milk. I was ecstatic at first, thinking this operation would be so much neater than the previous one, and granted there are now no coffee grounds finding their way into neighboring drawers and down the sides of the trash and staining white counters, and so on.

There was one little step that was forgotten in the installation of the new equipment. No one thought to mention to 17 year old Ben, who does breakfast dishes on weekends, that the milk steamer could not be put in the dishwasher because of electrical wiring inside. And Ben, who got an A+ in Physics, never learned that practical lesson at school. So we are now on our second $100 milk steamer and those $4 Lattes are no longer looking so expensive. Personally I go for the $1 “Mini” at Joe’s whenever I get my coffee out, and have studiously avoiding learning the whole home latte scenario. Coffee should be as simple as tea I think.

SUSAN CORNELIS