In my last year of college, I was in a creative writing class. It was definitely one of my favorite classes. (Actually, it might be my favorite.)
Anyway, the first unit of this class was *shudders in fear* poetry. I am not a poet. But one of the poems that I wrote for this class (which I will not be sharing here because it was quite bad) was called “70% Coffee.” It was about how I felt that everyone who drinks coffee talks about it like it’s some miracle liquid, and they drink it so quickly that they might as well have it injected into their veins. So they would be 70% coffee instead of 70% water.
Well.
Two years later and I am on my way to being 70% coffee. It’s been two (??) weeks since I got my espresso machine, and I don’t think a day has gone by where I haven’t had an iced latte. I used to almost die if I drank coffee, and now I might almost die if I don’t.
My, how the tables have turned.
My life revolves around coffee these days. A few people at my Starbucks location quit, so I’ve been working a lot. I practically live at the kiosk. Last week I worked eight days in a row.
I was getting flashbacks to my Disney days.
On my (rare) days off, I’ve been experimenting with my espresso machine. I can consistently pull good shots on it now (hooray) but I’m still using pre-ground beans (not hooray).
Still, I’m having fun trying new recipes and flavors. I got a lavender flavored syrup from the store that was actually disgusting, so now it’s just sitting on the counter. But I’ve got some good caramel and vanilla syrups. My favorite thing to make is an iced salted caramel latte with salted caramel cold foam:
I’ve also made an iced brown sugar shaken espresso:
a somewhat-okay cappuccino:
and did I mention lots and lots of cold foam:
On top of this, I have also been making a lot of blonde caramel lattes for my mom. She likes hot lattes, so this gives me a chance to practice my latte art (right now they just look like vaguely circular blobs). One time I tried to make a heart, and instead I think I invented a new geometric shape. My mom did say it kind of looked like a planet with a ring around it.
So there’s that.
Maybe I’ve invented a new kind of Rorschach test: “What do you see in the milk blobs?”
Yesterday, I made a hot chocolate for Joanna. Which doesn’t involve espresso, but I did get to practice milk steaming.
And she liked it! There’s really not that many ways to mess up hot chocolate, thankfully.
I think my favorite thing about coffee is that it’s creative, but it’s also scientific. I like experimenting with different flavor combinations and milk-to-coffee ratios, but also if I don’t tamp the 18 grams of grounds exactly right my espresso machine will betray me. (I’ve tasted a lot of under-extracted espresso lately).
This morning, I created a “chocolate covered strawberry” latte. I am sure that this is not original, but it turned out super pretty:
Overall, I love being a barista. I know I still have a lot to learn, but it’s a very fun kind of learning so I am not burnt out (yet–we’ll see how I’m doing after another straight week of closing shifts).
Actually, I do have a deadline for my learning now. My family on my mom’s side is getting together for Thanksgiving this year in Missouri (none of us live in Missouri–well, except Rachel–it just happens to be a great midpoint between Colorado and Alabama), and it has been requested that I bring my espresso machine. So hopefully I can stop under-extracting my shots by November. And maybe I’ll also be able to make some decipherable hearts on lattes.
A girl can dream.
Otherwise, there’s not much else on the update front. In a couple of weeks, some of my family is going to California for a few days. There’s some kind of court reporter/legal videographer conference that my dad is attending, so we get to come along. The downside is that we are flying, so I will not be bringing my espresso machine. Will I survive five days without coffee? I guess we’ll find out.
Also, I took a dialect quiz yesterday and got California, so I’m sure I’ll fit right in.
My other non-coffee update this week is that I made a comment on one of Dropout’s Instagram posts, and it now has over 300 likes. So I’m famous now 😎
Anyway, I really haven’t had much time to write this week, so I’m not surprised that this post has turned into just a lot of stuff about coffee. (Seriously, I live at that kiosk now.)
Maybe next week I’ll have something more to write about. I just saw the trailer for the new Harry Potter series, and I’m developing Thoughts™ about that as we speak. If there’s one constant in the universe, it’s that I will have opinions about TV shows.
See you next week!
