In Search of the Perfect Cup

It is not always the right or perfect cup, in the absolute sense, but the right cup for the moment. After a bone-chilling carriage ride to Ocean Beach (San Francisco), Mark Twain writes: “That coffee did the business for us . . . . As the generous beverage flowed down our frigid throats, our blood grew warm again, our muscles relaxed, our torpid bodies awoke to life and feeling, anger and uncharitableness departed from us, and we were cheerful once more.” (Early Rising as Regards Excursions to the Cliff House)  

I can relate.  The U.S.S. Hornet Museum, a former navy aircraft carrier, anchored in Alameda, California, offers overnight group visits.  I joined one a few years ago.  As expected, the sleeping accommodations were spartan: endless rows of tightly packed triple bunk beds, perfect perhaps for the average sailor in the 1940s’, but not for my nearly six foot tall frame.  Needless to say, the vat coffee, technically swill, hit the spot. So did the greasy breakfast in the mess hall. 

Likewise, early morning Southwest Airline flights from SFO are tempered by a cup of Major Dickason’s Blend from the Peet’s Coffee concession in Terminal One.  Major Dickason’s is a dark roast, with all of the subtlety of a sledgehammer.  However, with enough milk and coupled with a blueberry scone, it is the perfect cup to clear the cobwebs of the previous night and to help make sure you get on the right plane.

Sometimes, a coffee beverage misses the mark, but, usually, it is a function of (unreasonable) expectations.  In a Starbucks in Shinkuju, Tokyo, I recall a customer, an expat it seemed, complaining about his beverage containing too much milk (again).  It was my first morning in Japan, and I was happy to enjoy a familiar cup of nondescript coffee and a local pastry.  Our next stop is Peoria, Illinois.  I was enjoying (perhaps too strong of a word) my complimentary breakfast at a budget business hotel, before another day of negotiations with a potential customer, when my European client took a sip of the local dark roast and remarked, correctly: “This is not strong at all.”  Lastly, closer to home, and at the risk of digressing slightly, I had been enjoying a nice, pre-pandemic meal at a local pizzeria, known for terrific thin crust pizza, when a patron sitting at a nearby table asked the waiter to recommend a good red wine.  The waiter responded: “This one is popular.” In turn, the patron quipped: “I asked for what is good, not for what is popular.” It seems the customer had mistaken the waiter for a sommelier, and the pizzeria for Le Taillevent. 

I could write at length on this topic, but when you boil it down, coffee (a metaphor for life perhaps) is about serendipity, finding the right cup at the right time, or just a cup so sublime that it leaves a lasting impression, an iridescence of sorts.  On a visit to Washington, D.C. a few years ago as part of a delegation of California intellectual property lawyers, in between meetings at The White House and the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, I had the pleasure of grabbing a cup of coffee and croissant at a local coffee shop.  There, I discovered Counterculture Coffee (Durham, North Carolina) and most likely enjoyed Buziraguhindra (Bayanza, Burundi), a natural sundried coffee with notes of date, strawberry, and spice.  Upon arriving home, I ordered a bag or two, for my Jura A1, and the rest is history.  Some other of my favorite roasters and purveyors are Blue Bottle, Verve, Stumptown, and Cartel Coffee Lab. 

Comments and coffee suggestions welcomed.