The baloney of coffee

First it was the introduction of the frothy drinks, complete with an explanatory wheel. Then it was the supersizing. Can there be any doubt? The venerable Tim Hortons franchise is slowly transforming itself into a Starbucks.

Personally, I’ve always disliked the bitter taste of Starbucks’s coffee, and disdained the contrived Italian names they came up with. You can’t ask for a medium (unless they have an in-house spiritualist): you have to choose among an 8 oz “short,” a 12 oz “tall,” a 16 oz “grande” and a 20 oz “venti.” I once had a multi-page “Starbucks language guide” slipped into my mailbox, explaining how to talk like a Starbucks insider. Do they really think I’m going to humiliate myself by asking for a “grande”? No way! I want to talk to Starbucks in my language, not theirs. In fact, my language is fairly clear. Starbucks, back off.

Tim Hortons is now offering latte—but it’s not just any latte, it’s a “perfect blend of premium espresso made from 100 per cent arabica beans and warm frothy milk”—all with a genuine smiley face powdered in to the top. Note the buzz words: “perfect,” “premium” and “100 per cent.” I can have it sweetened or unsweetened, to my taste. Or I can have it with one of their “irresistible caramel, vanilla, hazelnut or milk chocolate” flavours. I can have a mocha latte, blended with “rich cocoa” and topped with a “chocolate drizzle.” Or better still, I can graduate to a “flavoured latte supreme,” with a “decadent drizzle” on top. If I don’t like any of those, I can go for more coffee in my latte and call it a cappuccino, a shot of espresso—single or double—or have them water down my espresso and call it Americano. The next thing you know, they’ll be giving me sugar choices—white, brown, coarse or fine or cubed, estate grown, or fair trade; and milk choices—skim or whole or two per cent, dairy or non-dairy, range fed or regular, moon jumped or grounded. Being second in line beside someone making a choice will become an agonizing wait: I’ll need to drink a coffee to calm my nerves while I wait to order one and contemplate my bewildering choices. And another inevitable development, of course, will be for Tim’s to start calling its new cup sizes by exotic names. Small, medium, large and extra large still sound a little plain. The concept of large, extra large, extra extra large, and extra extra extra large has already been spoken for by male contraceptive devices. So my bet is that Tim’s will also go for an exotic language, and given its quest for world domination, even though it has just shut up shop in Afghanistan, I am thinking it will go for a universal language like Latin. So a small will be a “brevis,” a big would be a “magnus” and so on. There is a precedent for this, of course. Wayne and Schuster (gosh, that seems like eons ago) used to have a routine in which they asked for a single martini— a martinus. And their schtick wasn’t particularly funny either.

It was bad enough when Tim’s phased out the cherry crueller donut, for which I have never quite forgiven them. But now I despair of ever being able to walk into an outlet again and say “I’ll have a coffee.” If I am bold enough, when they ask me what size, what kind and what flavour, I’ll say “I’m not telling: I just want a coffee.” I suspect I am not alone in having this urge.

So for all those of you who like the idea of risking your life savings, here’s the proposal. Let’s start a franchise called “Just Coffee.” There’s no consumer choice involved. You get your coffee in a uniformsized mug, and you put your own cream and sugar in it. Never mind the vente splendido decadent drizzle hocus pocus. And, of course, we’ll serve donuts—especially cherry cruellers. And they’d all be the same size: if one wasn’t enough, you’d just order two.

David Simmonds’s writing is also available at www.grubstreet.ca.