Reusable coffee cups

[Hot Pepsi]

WTF? Who walks around a big box store with a cup of coffee? Are these people going there for a day out?

I, for one, am tired all the time and could use a cup pretty much all the time.

[Hot Pepsi]

I started drinking tea around middle school and then got into coffee in late high school.

I have a whole bunch of travel-mugs/reusable cups. Most of them are ones I got by paying $5-6 for a cup of coffee or hot chocolate at a Penn State hockey, football, or baseball game. The coffee is shit, but the cups are actually very handy. And then if you want a refill, it's $3. (Yeah, that's way too much for shit coffee, but that's not so bad by the standards of in-game concessions at US sporting events). I save them and sometimes have picked up some that other people leave (I wash them before using again of course.) I also save some of the durable plastic cups from beer or Diet Coke that I get at baseball games, movies, etc.

I splurged on a Yeti stainless steel coffee mug. It's extremely well insulated, but the top comes off a bit too easily so it's not good for taking out when I walk the dog.

I looked at buying the big version of the Yeti, but they're $50.

[WOM]

Well, most of our Costcos all have the food courts outside, not inside (I can understand why that's not practical in Canada), but I don't think any of them here sell coffee.

Ours do coffee, cappuccino, lattes, the works. Maybe even hot chocolate, but that's none of my concern.

[Sits]

Last year there was a three-part doco run by the ABC (our Beeb equivalent) called War On Waste. It was only since watching this we've been saving all soft plastics, cellophane etc. as it can go in the supermarkets' plastic bag recycling bins. Yes, we have plastic bags in some states of Australia.

This was also the first time I realised disposable coffee cups aren't practically recyclable so thought I should do the right thing. I went straight to Coles supermarket and bought the only one they had which was this, for $10:



It's not actually that big (sorry, don't know how to adjust) in fact it's too small, plus I can't drink through the oh-so-clever no-spill lid without dribbling coffee down my chin and shirt front. And it's a pain to clean. The only thing stopping me buying a new one is guilt that it will be ecologically "wrong".

It's my birthday in June; I can legitimately ask for one then.

[Patrick Thistle]

WTF? Who walks around a big box store with a cup of coffee? Are these people going there for a day out?

I've seen abandoned coffee cups in my local Asda. Costa and Starbucks are on the same retail park.

[Jah Womble]

Oh, you're closer than you realize. According to family lore, my grandparents put coffee in my bottle once when I was two months old. I ordered coffee with dinner in restaurants from the time I was 5 until I discovered soda around the age of 13.

...and they readily served it to you? Toronto is a weirder place than I thought.

As for this 'not liking the smell of coffee'-gubbins, well, one might as well abandon the Western world. Anything that masks the early-morning-transportation aromas of wet clothes, breakfast and twunts that haven't yet learned how to shower before leaving for work has to be encouraged, frankly.

[Gerontophile]

I've seen abandoned coffee cups in my local Asda. Costa and Starbucks are on the same retail park.

One of the delightful parts of my job is wondering when I will find a discarded, not-quite-empty, coffee cup somewhere amongst the children's t-shirts, and it's always the children's t-shirts. If I find the fucker...

[Eggchaser]

My wife bought one this morning. Since I only drink coffee I have made myself at work, or sitting in a coffee shop, I didn't get one, but I would were I a takeaway type.

[WOM]

...and they readily served it to you? Toronto is a weirder place than I thought.

Toronto...Florida...extensive road trips throughout the US. It's quite possible I've eaten at every HoJo, Sambos and Dennys in the continental US.

As for Costa, is that a thing? We only see that brand at Shell stations over here. They have a big white 3D 'cup' on the boulevard to advertise they sell it, but it's (to the best of my knowledge) totally unknown here.

[Benjm]

Since I only drink coffee I have made myself at work, or sitting in a coffee shop, I didn't get one, but I would were I a takeaway type.

There are tempting Ramones or Joy Division options, but taking up drinking coffee on the hoof for the merch would be a bit silly, I've convinced myself. Just about.

[MsD]

Suzy is a caffeine-crazed headbanger.

[Benjm]

You cry out in your sleep,
All my failings exposed,
And there's a taste in my mouth,
Of piping hot coffee with minimal damage to the environment.

[ursus arctos]

WOM, Costa has more than 2,000 shops in the UK (where it is bigger than Starbucks)

I'm not sure the GTA version is the same company.

[Mr Cogito]

You cry out in your sleep,
All my failings exposed,
And there's a taste in my mouth,
Of piping hot coffee with minimal damage to the environment.

Landfills will tear us apart, indeed

[Jah Womble]

Surely the most obvious 'band/coffee-cup' tie-in would be Flat White Family?

[Incandenza]

WOM, Costa has more than 2,000 shops in the UK (where it is bigger than Starbucks)

I'm not sure the GTA version is the same company.

I saw a Costa Coffee in Barcelona. The only Starbucks I saw when we were in Spain/France (not that I was looking out for one specifically) was in Sevilla, smack dab in the tourist district, right across from the cathedral. I admit that we did get breakfast there one morning because by that point I was really jonesing for a big cup of American-style drip coffee, not just a small cafe con leche.

[Benjm]

Surely the most obvious 'band/coffee-cup' tie-in would be Flat White Family?

The Macc-hiato Lads?

They could happily share a bill with Flat White Family. The Shot And Shock Tour.

[treibeis]

Last year, a friend of mine and her son came over to visit me, i.e. to see The Human League and sleep at my gaff for free. Because I'm nothing if not a good host, I showed them around the city centre, because that's what they said they wanted to do.

After an hour of walking around and them going, "What's that museum?" and me going, "Don't know, never been there" and them going, "When was that building built, more or less?" and me going, "Don't know. Ages ago, probably", they decided they wanted a coffee. We went into this typical modern coffee place, where all the staff looked like a younger version of Mr and Mrs Paolo Maldini and I asked them what they wanted.

Now, I very rarely buy coffee, so I've got no idea what anything is that isn't called "Coffee", "Espresso" or "Cappuccino". So when the son ordered a "flat white" - something I'd heard of, but didn't actually know what it was - I asked for exactly that.

The Maldinis looked at me as though I'd said something about spitting out somebody else's body fluids. After recovering, they asked me to repeat what I'd said, which I duly did. They looked at each other, smirked and then indulged in a a bout of shoulder-shrugging, the extremity of which I'd last seen at a psychobilly consert in the mid-1980s.

I then asked the son to explain to me what a flat white is. Because he was a surly 20-year-old oaf who had taken an instant dislike to me anyway, he said, " A flat white? A flat white's a flat white."

I would have asked him to elaborate, but I didn't want him swearing in front of his mum, so I ordered the nearest equivalent to what I thought a flat white might be (which was a normal coffee with milk).

When we sat down, I asked him whether what I'd ordered approximated in any way, shape or form to a "flat white". He said "No". When I once again asked him what a "flat white" was, he said, "A flat white's a flat white. This isn't a flat white." It was like Lou and Andy off of Little Britain.

And I still don't know exactly what a flat white is. And the Maldinis clearly don't, either.

[ursus arctos]

It’s Australian

No one here knew what it was five years ago, either.

[MsD]

The Flat White Family has been used by Costa, I posted a pic of it last week.

[MsD]

Well, being a mature sort I drew a knob on it and posted it on the band’s page.

[Moonlight Shadow]

Flat white is what i order when I visit Java at the train station (rarely)...and i now have a gizmo to prep the milk at home if needed (although i currently have my coffees black at home, double pods mind...)

[San Bernardhinault]

I almost always order espressos, because milk in coffee is for weaklings and freaks.

But on Saturdays when I cycle, the coffee shops are swamped with people ordering the most frou frou blended desserts and the coffee shops are staffed with indolent teenagers who take 5 minutes to make one of these things. Which means that my espresso, even if it's only third in the queue, will take ten minutes to arrive. So I've taken to ordering cold-brew which is at least pre-brewed and just needs to be poured into a cup. This still seems to take a couple of minutes, but it's better than the alternative. And cold brew without cream in it is a bit weird. I have no idea what a flat white is, and how it differs from a latte, despite having been told multiple times.

[ursus arctos]

A flat white is an espresso-based coffee drink. It is prepared by pouring microfoam (steamed milk with small, fine bubbles with a glossy or velvety consistency) into a single or double shot of espresso. It is somewhat similar to the caffè latte although smaller in volume and less microfoam, therefore having a higher proportion of coffee to milk, and milk that is more velvety in consistency – allowing the espresso to dominate the flavour, while being supported by the milk.

The whole Wiki is unintentionally amusing

[San Bernardhinault]

So, you could serve someone a latte and they wouldn't know?