Wow your coffee date! Step up to the counter at Starbucks and order one of the following:
- Doppio ristretto con panna with a shot of valencia
- Tall breve latte with cinnamon
- Iced venti vanilla soy chai latte
Yeah yeah yeah. So I'm doing Starbucks marketing work for them. But just why is that a bad thing? As I've stated before here, I believe in Starbucks.
Here's why. Once again.
There you are, at a dungeon party in some strange city and you need a wee pick me up before you flog into the night. There are the choices, the local coffee bar or Big Bad Corporate Starbucks. I'll go to Starbucks. Why? Because you have no idea what you're gonna find in your cup at the local place. Sure, it might be good. But maybe the fledgling teenager working the espresso machine is still finding his way around the doppios. Maybe he's been weened on Coca-Cola and doesn't really give a damn. At Starbucks, you know what you're getting.
And the same goes for atmosphere. I've been in enough of them so that at this point, it feels like my living room. So if I need a moment to collect myself before the dungeon party in the strange city, forty five minutes in Starbucks will do the trick. My home away from home.
Now what about geo-politics? Isn't Starbucks all about creeping globalization? What will I say to my radical liberal friends when they see me with the tell-tale white and green paper cup with the sip lid? Just look them in the eye and say, "Starbucks is the reason that East Timor is free." Y'see, East Timor is a region where some of the best coffee in the world is grown. Because of this valuable natural resource, East Timor was annexed by Indonesia. Their harsh indonesian overlords nationalized all the coffee plantations, and reduced the growers to poverty. All the profits went to Djakarta. Enter Starbucks. Starbucks has a policy of only dealing directly with the coffee growers. They wouldn't buy from the indonesians, only the growers in East Timor. And in doing so, they allowed the growers to get a little bit of capital of their own. And soon, those growers were thinking, "Why do we need to be ruled by a foreign people who skim all the profits off the top and keep us at subsistence level?" And revolution began to foment. And the growers started taking those checks they got from Starbucks and put it towards the cause of economic and political self-determination. And the people rose up and threw off the indonesians. So let's give a cheer for Starbucks, spreading liberal democracy and free-market capitalism! (If Iraq had cool, damp coffee-growing mountain uplands instead of oil, the Iraqi people would probably be welcoming their first democratically elected president into office about now if Starbucks had anything to do with it.) Not quite believing all of this? Well then go here for confirmation.
Here's what you'd be getting in your cup with the orders above...
Doppio ristretto con panna with a shot of valencia You get two shots of espresso 'pulled short,' meaning you're not getting the dregs in your cup, which tend to be bitter. There's a dollop of whipped cream on top, and one shot of orange syrup.
Tall breve latte with cinnamon It's two shots of espresso combined with steamed half-and-half, and one shot of cinnamon syrup to perk things up.
Iced venti vanilla soy chai latte On a hot summer day, this rocks. It's the really really big drink you get at Starbucks, their venti size. Made with soy milk, rather than cow's milk, with chai flavoring and sweetened with a shot of vanilla syrup.
Enjoy!
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