9 Comments

Of course your writing is interesting but I am very happy to give coffee a skip! I'm probably one of the few in the world who just doesn't like it! (But I do like the smell.)

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I think you are not alone. I had a colleague who did not drink coffee, but, like you, she loved the smell of coffee. I must admit that sometimes the smell is better than the coffee. Enjoy your tea. I presume you drink tea instead? I am not a big tea drinker, but lately I have been able to enjoy green tea.

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What a great article about coffee. I'm surprised neither Germany nor Austria are on this list since we do have a long coffee tradition (with cake, of course).

I remember, when I lived in England, being asked how I liked the English coffee and my answer was: you get used to everything. Everybody laughed. Not only did they drink only instant but often poured milk on the granules and then added the hot water. I started drinking black coffee then. ;)

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Thank you Marianne, glad you enjoyed it. Yes, quite surprising, but I think you have another tradition of going out to a coffee house to drink. In the Nordic countries we drink a lot of coffee at home, and at work. However, today with all the international coffee chains we even drink coffee outside of the home. Well, the English, I can imagine how horrible it must have been.

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Well, the coffee house tradition is probably based on the tradition to have guests over for coffee, that is very important. I can't remember a Sunday where my mother wouldn't bake a cake and serve coffee to anyone who passed by. And we did not belong to the rich part of the community.

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I agree with you. I think it was an informal way for, especially, women to meet and discuss life. Not so many cakes available to buy in those days, so women mostly baked themselves. I remember my grandmother who always drank the coffee from the plate, with a lump of sugar on it.

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I've never seen that, maybe that was a Swedish thing. Or maybe it happened here before people had enough money to buy cups, no idea.

And it is still quite common here that people bake their own cakes, personally, I don't know anyone who buys cake when they have visitors, unless you don't know in advance.

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I think it was just to get a little bit of extra sweetness. They would drink from the cup and at the end put the sugar on the plate and pour over the coffee. I remember being fascinated by it. Sometimes when you eat something from a plate that is juicy and you try to get the last drops from the plate, it does taste different. Maybe that is what it is?

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Quite possible. I just never heard of it.

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