One thing i did, back when i did an hour long talk about Seattle each week at the hostel, was talk about the variations in the coffee culture in the northwest. I would point to Portland, Seattle & Vancouver on a map and compare and contrast.
You see, in Portland people really like coffee (espresso) but what is important is that it is GOOD coffee -- they are highly focused on quality over quantity. North of us in Vancouver people like coffee. There is a corner in downtown that at one time had three coffee shops on 3 of the 4 corners! TWO Starbucks AND a Blenz (their local chain, very Canadian – you have to smile when you say it) but they are really focused on sitting down and visiting, so the coffee shops are nice places to hang out.
In Seattle people want their coffee, they want it now (3, 6, 9 even 12 times a day) and they don't care where. T-shirt shops have to have espresso bars, just about every business of any kind serves espresso. Not only is it very profitable, but it is essential for business! Certainly every grocery store does, every restaurant does and most bars do. Some is good, most is not, but QUANTITY is what is important!
You have to understand that this is NOT just Seattle, Seattle is just the big city in Washington (and probably where it all started) but if you go out to these little mountain towns, 40 miles from a grocery store, little towns that are all rough and tumble old logging towns which voted 99% for Bush, you will find 2 or 3 drive through latte stands!
Now i grew up, partially, in New England, where ice cream is a deeply important part of life, and quality is vital. All quality ice cream comes from New England and New Englanders eat 30% of the ice cream in the country! Out here the only way to get good ice cream is to hop on I-90 and don't get off until Boston. It just doesn't exist out here and on the rare occasion that a shop opens, it doesn't last long. But milky coffee. Now THAT is a major product!
The TV stations and newspapers long ago took to calling the Seattle Metropolitan area Latteland because of this single minded focus. It's a name everyone knows and many people use in regular conversation.
And it is lucrative! I know of at least 5 different people who started a coffee cart, usually outside on the street and within 2 years had expanded into one, or several, STOREFRONTS. It's that lucrative. One of the first, just a push cart in the park downtown back 15 or 18 years ago. Now the owners don't work, pay people to run the cart and they travel the world full time and live in a huge house in a super rich suburb.
Coffee cups are allowed on busses and almost anywhere else that food & drink are forbidden. It's a must! There was a hilarious dust up back in 97 or 98 when someone with the county government noticed that the industrial regulations on boilers seemed to… um… outlaw espresso machines. This was front page headlines for a week until the county council met to write in a special "Latte exception"
Howard Shultz, the New York (in Seattle saying someone is from New York is like saying they are from Hell, and not from the good side of the tracks!) financier who executed a hostile take over of Starbucks 10 or 12 years ago recently said,
"When you are selling an addictive product, you don't have to worry much about the economy!"
The story of Shultz is an amusing one! ... you see three guys started Starbucks in the Pike Place Market. They had come from San Francisco where they started a similar shop called Peet's. They were roasting coffee, not pulling 'spro (many of the barista's in the 90's refereed to it as "pulling 'spro"). Anyway the latte thing was just getting started, they were more focused on good coffee roasting. Shultz, came to Seattle on a business trip and was impressed with the shop. So he started bugging them to bring him on as a partner... they kept saying no, but after a year or two they finally took him on. He started the company on this massive expansion, including buying Peet's in SF. As soon as he got the chance, he maneuvered the three founders out of the company, and as a consolation, gave them Peet's, which i believe they still run.
Starbucks is the only chain store allowed in the Pike Place Market, and it is only grandfathered in because it was founded there!
Of course Seattle's Best Coffee, which is a 30 or more year old roaster on Vashon Island that used to be called Stewart Brothers Coffee before they went nationwide, is now owned by Starbucks. Tully's is the other locally based international chain and unlike the other two, they started up SPECIFICALLY to become an international chain. I remember when the first store opened, i would bike past it often... still do. There are also a number of local chains... for the whole 15 years i have lived here there have been about 3 visible local chains at any one time (in addition to the big ones), but those three kind of change around, and are sometimes owned by the big ones. There are a number of local chains now, but two of note: one disguises the fact that it is a chain, and each shop is funky and comfortable and unique, but in fact two people own all 5 or so of them – they are pretty much the best places around these days. The other Cafe Ladro, started up with a major anti-Starbucks schtick -- they played it up to the max! "Stay away from the chains!" I think they have 12 stores now. Hypocrites!
Monorail Espresso is one of the originals and they moved from a cart to a storefront, but the storefront is barely larger than the cart was! Another good story is B&O Espresso, a small cart which opened up in the corner of a sandwich shop on Capitol Hill many years ago. The sandwich shop didn't do so well, so within a year or two the Espresso cart had taken over the whole shop, and within another year they had rented the storefront next door and expanded into it. They no longer focus on coffee, although it is available, but they are know as one of the premier dessert spots in town.
Many people enjoy the wild and crazy Coffee Messiah -- with the Caffeine Saves neon sign. It's another favorite of mine and almost next door to the evil Starbucks.
I should add that i do have a lot of choices -- i live 2 blocks from Broadway on Capitol hill, where there are AT LEAST 9 places within 3 blocks. And as i think about it... in 7 blocks there are AT LEAST 15 places to get a drink.
Most of Seattle is like that. Downtown, you can usually expect that on a 2 mile walk from Seattle Center to Pioneer square, you will average one per block, more if you explore closely. In many cases, a person owns an espresso cart just to service 3 floors of one 30 floor office building downtown. Really, that is their only job! So if you walk down a block in the central business district and see two latte stands, i guarantee that if you were to explore the office buildings a bit, you would find half a dozen or more on that same block! In fact, when a new building opens, the coffee cart(s) are always mentioned in the press release!
Back 10 years ago there were lots of nice coffee shops to just hang out it, but they are getting VERY rare as over 90% of people take their cup to go, and in many cases prefer to drive through -- very common. Most of the nice 'hang out' coffee shops have closed in favor of a few corporate shops or smaller, locally owned windows with no sit down area. Kids, and even recent college graduates who grew up here tell me that having coffee shops to hang out in High School was great – certainly something that was missing when i was a kid.
Cafe Paridisso at the south end of Capitol Hill was legendary. I loved it. It was the quintessential Seattle coffee shop! I think everyone was sad to see it go. I miss it terribly.
Lots of people take laptops to coffee shops these days (they ALL have free WiFi). I really enjoy chatting or reading in with a drink. I think it lends itself well to Seattle. A warm drink in a friendly comfortable space on a chilly rainy day: the windows fogged up so you can't see outside. Of course, it has hasn't rained much here in the last few years, but we can hope, right?
There are over 3,000 coffee carts or shops licensed (2,973 in 1999) in King County (about 3 million people). When i was in London in August 2000 the newspapers were discussing if 291 was "saturation" for that city of 9 million!!
To make your order properly, it has to be FAST and very personal. Baristas pride themselves on understanding each and every order, and i've almost never seen them bat an eye at the strangest orders. Many even memorize the regular customers' orders!!! Everyone walks up and spews out an order, often their standard order, but sometimes a variant, as if it were their name or phone number. I actually have my order printed on my cup – some places find this funny, occasionally annoying, but most places appreciate it. I did it because when i worked in Seattle Center in the mid 90s, Starbucks screwed up my order so often.
The number of shots always comes first, then the size, the type of milk, the type of drink then the additions... By far the standard classic is the double tall latte... since 'latte' is understood, it's always just called a "double tall". (2 shots of espresso, in 12 oz of steamed milk with foam on top). Now that can quickly become a "double tall decaf no foam vanilla latte". You get the point.
A shot is about one fluid ounce of espresso – that is, coffee created by es-pressing very high pressure steam through thick ground dark coffee. This is the true traditional Sicilian coffee that this all evolved from. In Sicily one shot of espresso in a tiny cup accompanied by a glass of water; usually the shot is drunk in a single gulp. But in Latteland the shots are mixed with a large cup of milk and sipped slowly all day long. The number of shots automatically included varies with the size of the cup and the location. Single, double, triple, quad, even quint, sextuple and i once heard octuple! One shot of good espresso has about 90 mg of caffeine, 8 oz good drip coffee has about 200 mg.
Next is the size of the cup – 8, 12, 16 or 20 oz, but in never called by numbers, always: short, tall, grande. The 20 oz is not as widely offered. Starbucks calls it a Venti, i once saw it called a fantico. I think we should settle on humongus, but i don't think i'm going to win that one.
You can also specify type of milk. This time of year big signs go up advertising the arrival of eggnog. "I'll have a double tall eggnog latte with whip". There are a variety of other milk choices... 2%, non-fat, breve' (half & half), soy milk. Pretty much every place has those. Some places have rice milk and i have seen goats milk in one or two places. A soy latte is a common order. From the mid 90s until a couple of years ago 2% became the DEFAULT milk, and if you didn't ask for something different, that's what you got. Luckily that has changed, but i am still in the habit of asking for whole milk. (I went through breve' faze for a couple of years, but i am not bicycling enough to justify that now!) I usually choose my espresso stand based on what kind of milk they use -- many are now using a local semi-organic brand, rather than the big national nasty brands. I prefer that.
Now add your flavoring, if you like. Most espresso bars have a wide variety, but the common ones are: vanilla, walnut, almond, caramel and hazelnut. These are really just an excuse to put more sugar in the drink, in my opinion. So now you could have a "single tall peach latte". Hazelnut and vanilla are the only ones popular enough to be part of a 'standard' order. Chocolate is a flavor you can add, but that is a special exception which will be covered in a later paragraph and again at the end.
Now append the base drink -- choices are: latte, mocha, americano, cappuccino, espresso & steamer. Steamers, or steamed milk, often with flavorings, do not seem as popular as they once were. NO ONE EVER orders a cappuccino!! An americano is a shot (or more) of espresso in hot water -- actually quite similar to weak drip coffee. ("double tall americano, please"). The one way to really raise your barista's pierced & plucked eyebrows is to order an espresso at an espresso stand. I think i have seen that happen maybe 4 times in 15 years. Many places actually cannot provide it! We call it espresso, the stands are called espresso and often have espresso in their name, but don't try to order it in Seattle! This is Latteland!
No, in Seattle everyone drinks lattes almost exclusively. In fact, i tend to believe that the caffeine addiction is really secondary, and warm milk, the true childhood comfort food, is what we are really after!! A latte and cappuccino differ by a technical ratio of foam to milk – i don't know the exact details. Of course the mocha is a type of latte – latte with chocolate syrup. And hot chocolate, or cocoa is a variant of a steamer (or of a mocha i suppose).
There are other special things that some people ask for. Sometimes people specify the temperature, some like it really hot and ask for that. Since the espresso machines have a thermometer, it is easy to ask for a temperature if you know what you like. 165 or so seems popular. I heard someone order a 180 once. I find it impossible to drink anything over 150 and my cup insulates well enough that it will never be cool enough to drink if i don't ask for it not-so hot (about 147 seems best). Most people don't specify. Because of the hot drinks, some people ask for a double cup in the order. "triple tall extra hot mocha no foam with an extra cup". Of course, many ecologically aware Seattlites have their own insulated cup which they use for their drinks. The iced latte, still not really accepted as legit, is a variant of this.
Of course you can ask for decaffeinated espresso, and many people do (helping to prove my warm milk theory!). There are a couple of standard orders based on this. The classic "double tall low-fat decaf latte" is called a "double tall no-fun" or a "double tall why-bother". I have OFTEN seen people order these with whipped cream!! Some people also ask for extra, or light syrup when ordering one, as most shops are VERY liberal with the syrup. A latte has a thick foam on the top and some people ask for extra foam, others for no foam, and every barista is an artist, making designs in the foam on top of a drink!
Finally there are all kinds of things that go ON TOP of a drink, depending on what kind of drink it is: there is whipped cream, chocolate powder, chocolate shavings, chocolate sprinkles, chocolate chips, cinnamon powder, nutmeg powder and more. Often the person who MAKES the drink (not the person who takes your order) will ask if you want whip –- kind of as an after thought. (You get a little less drink if you add whip!) SBC actually puts a chocolate bar across the top of many drinks!!
Most people are very polite and friendly when they order, but i once saw a guy demanding soy milk and really being a jerk about it. "It MUST be soy milk!!" A few minutes later the barista asked him if he wanted whipped cream and he said, "yeah, sure..."
Of course almost every espresso bar has a station where you can make your own additions and changes, usually with pitchers of 2% milk and half & half. Some places have shakers at this station that you can put on the various goodies. I find it useful to add some half & half to both cool down the drink and to make the syrup less overpowering.
Back in the mid 1990s i wrote a computer program which generated a humorous but not entirely imaginary random coffee order. I'll run it a few times here:
- double whole-milk hazelnut extra foam 150° latte no whip
- quad tall breve 165° mocha
- double grande whole-milk carmal decaf extra foam with whip
- quad grande 2% almond double cup mocha with chocolate sprinkles
- single 150° latte no whip
- breve extra hot double cup cocoa no whip
- quad tall breve vanilla mocha with whip
- grande low-fat vanilla iced latte with whip
- double grande eggnog latte with whip
- octuple grande carmal decaf latte with whip & cinnamon
- triple really amazingly big breve hazelnut latte with whip & chocolate sprinkles
Finally i should talk about my own order!
tall whole milk 147 degree hot chocolate, no foam, easy on the chocolate. I have had long discussions with baristas on just exactly what to call a hot chocolate, or Cocoa. I like "Mocha hold the coffee", but i have never actually tried that. Many places just use Hershey's syrup, which is awful -- i avoid that and will get a steamed milk instead. A lot of places (including Starbucks!) have a finer quality and darker chocolate which i usually request – they still almost always put too much in. For awhile there was a trend of putting vanilla syrup in a hot chocolate, sometimes without asking. That was just plain NASTY! The best place i have found, is a place called
611 Supreme which makes a hot chocolate with fine 100% cocoa powder and NO SUGAR. It is fantastic.
As i get older, i find i am needing to avoid having my cocoa near bed time. Of course
chocolate does not have caffeine, but the theobromine is strong and even in the tiny amounts in a hot chocolate it can keep me awake. For example, it's 10pm and i would really like a hot chocolate now -- but i want to be able to sleep.
