The Pursuit of Coffee

“I write this sitting in the kitchen sink.” Thus Cassandra, narrator of Dodie Smith’s I Capture the Castle, begins her story.

I am not sitting in the kitchen sink, but my location is strange enough. And strangely inspiring. I am sitting on a bench in the middle of St Giles. The sun is shining, the autumn leaves are falling and Sunday afternoon traffic is swooshing by me like the deadlines my journal editors like to ignore. I am drinking an enormous latte, which is part and parcel of how I like to enjoy my weekends. The pursuit of good coffee is fast becoming a hobby – not to mention a necessity.

The coffee culture in Sweden is, famously, strong. Not only do we like to drink a lot of it, we like it strong. The “latte” culture which has emerged in the last decade has added a new dimension to coffee drinking, and increased the milk consumption considerably. As a teenager growing into café culture at the same time as the latte culture gained a foothold, I have become a fervent drinker of the stuff. And have been puzzled and dismayed at the dully weak stuff that is served over here. At work I am given the choice between instant coffee (a cheap kind with a distinct aftertaste of soy sauce) and the concoction offered by our coffee machine: a weak brew the same colour as tea. (In an Arthur Dent-like fashion I have tried to persuade it to make coffee; my failure, however, did not result in the mother ship breaking down.) As I don’t drink coffee in the evening (after work), I have two days a week of proper coffee. And yesterday I had an epiphany. I ordered a latte and was able to see the milk carton used by the sweet girl who made it. It was semi-skimmed milk. Aha!

Now, in Sweden clever marketing people have managed to create a new “brand” of milk – “barista-milk” – which is, and this is its sole purpose of existence, to go into lattes and cappuccinos. There is nothing special about this milk, except that it contains a little more fat than the normal whole milk, thus lending the finished coffee product a bit more flavour and creaminess. Not only, then, do the English make the actual coffee weaker – the milk is (due to dieting culture?) weaker too. End result? Weak and watery coffee. But, and this is the point, some places use whole milk and can be persuaded to make the coffee nice and strong. And I am in the process of making a map. The name of this blog may gain another layer of meaning.

Tea culture is, predictably, a lot more sophisticated. When my friend G was here, we treated ourselves to a proper traditional afternoon tea at the Randolph. Not only were the tea, scones and fruitcake and cream great. Essentially it is all about procedure and the right fittings. I decided a while ago that I should really get a tea pot, in order to be able to drink a whole pot of the stuff while reading a Sunday paper. This proved comically difficult. I went to a variety of shops, some specialising in tea and coffee, and simply did not find anything that I liked. At least not in a price range that I deemed reasonable. Finally, I found a little iron monger’s on a side street close to home – an old fashioned one, run by father (mid to late 80s, shaky hands but good at doing sums) and his son and containing everything. Missing a screw? It may have crawled over to this shop to be with its tribe. And there I finally bought a tea pot. It’s not great, but at least it was not expensive. And it is a pleasant and relaxing shade of brown.

The best tea pots I have seen so far were the silver ones at N College, which were specially designed to be fitted onto a device in order to keep their content hot. No expenses saved, apparently. Again, it’s all about the fittings. I had been invited to a board meeting, which was accompanied by tea (in beautiful cups) and marvellous fruit cake. After debating future journal issues for a few hours, we moved to an even nicer room (oak panelling, naturally) where we were served dinner. And what a dinner. This, I realised, is where the money is in Oxford, in the cellars of colleges. There it lies, snuggled up next to the best port you could ever wish for. I tried to stay sober enough to talk intelligently with the professor next to me about things I only have a vague notion of and simultaneously attempted to do justice to, and fully enjoy the flavours of, the food. Predictably, I only half managed any of it. Professor J will not have been entirely convinced by my accounts of the Swedish education system, I never managed to finish everything on my plate before it was taken away to make way for the next dish (I lost count of them) and by the time a different professor had filled my port glass for the second time I was not quite sober anymore. I suppose the many dishes necessitated a certain swiftness, but it seemed sacrilegious to race through it. I was also surprised at the lack of toasting ceremonies. Professor H, a well travelled man, was aware of our Swedish traditions and demanded that I teach at least our side of the table of it was done. I readily complied. Professor J seemed delighted about being lectured on table manners by a Swede; I didn’t have the heart to tell him that, at least in Sweden, he really should have moved my chair for me as we sat down to dinner. That might have taken the lecturing too far.

Throughout the dinner, in the candle lit room with its fine table covered in the finest of plates, glasses and silver, I had to suppress a mischievous giggle. It was like a fairy tale, but one with a comedy element straight out of “Yes, Minister”. You know the episode when Sir Humphrey invites the minister to Balliol College in order to get him drunk (on port among other things) and agree to something? Not sure what I agreed to in the end, but it transpired that one of the gentlemen present was, in fact, a latter-day Sir Humphrey. Sort of.

Oh, and the after-dinner coffee was great.