Damien at the Speed of Life

This post is from a series here called Coffee Vocab Tuesdays

After learning pizza secrets working at Pizza Hut through college, I also worked in a coffee shop through my graduate degree where I learned secrets and coffee recipes . The place I worked was called “The Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf.” It’s a trendy place in Orange County, California (the OC) to be sure! People come in wanting their “ice blended mochas” just so and if you want good tips as a barista(o) you learn to make fresh coffee the way they they want it!

I must have made thousands of these coffee recipes drinks. Mall rats would come in on their lunch hours and rich Santa Ana denizens would swipe their card for 20 dollars or more to get these bewitching concoctions. The way this fresh coffee are made is now a part of my permanent psyche! There are also a lot of tips now I really want to share with people about coffee. The biggest coffee secret is at the end of this post.

First, you put a cup of ice into the blender. Then milk, chocolate powder and the patented coffee syrup. Run the blender a bit and then “voila” you have it! The perfect Ice Blended mocha. As you sell it to the customer you stamp their card and they go on their merry caffeinated way.

There were also the signature coffee drinks: the red eye (my drink of choice) mild coffee with a shot of espresso. These were great when my eyelids were heavy from studying.

I learned a lot about OC people working at the Coffee Bean. They love shopping and they are very particular about things like coffee drinks. The clientele I had in Santa Ana were mostly middle upper class so they weren’t millionaires for the most part. Since they probably had no control to order a maid around, it was as if getting their drinks just so was their method of feeling powerful. What did we care as long as they tipped? Usually they did.

Another thing I learned I have mentioned in my ongoing “Coffee Vocabulary” series started a few months back but I will say it again because it is such valuable information.  In fact, when you buy coffee, I think it is among the biggest coffee secrets out there:

STRONG coffee is roasted longer and has LESS caffeine. MILD coffee has more caffeine. To this day it cracks me up when people come in to a coffee place and say: GIVE ME A STRONG thinking they are getting more caffeine.

No OC event or workday is complete without the ritual we go through to buy coffee. These can be hot or ice blended, but the fixture in hand is a curious OC must.