What's the deal with crappy restaurant coffee?

[Fogducker]

Effectively, a "Mr Coffee" type brewer just heats the water up to go up and drip through the basket of decent coffee. So the best cup is the first one out, the rest are good too but the first cup is the primo one!

Fog

[Ludere]

Originally Posted by Haasome

Not my problem. I have the good fortune of living in an area with an abundance of great small restaurants and we have many local coffee roasters that supply coffee to these venues. So it’s easy to order food and coffee that is consistently fresh & outstanding.

I miss that ^ ... grew up in NYC ...

The OP’s lament is one of the reasons I have Keurig machines both at work and at home (the work machine is a group effort).
Brewed one cup at a time, I consistently enjoy a very good cup of coffee and about 25% of the time I get a “great” cup ... although I’m beginning to believe the great cup is as contingent on my taste buds at that moment as anything else ...

I’m aware that coffee press and high end gourmet types may scoff, but for me it’s consistent and more than acceptable stuff ...

Restaurant coffee? The only place I order coffee out is either a breakfast place or Starbucks ... and Starbucks is fine - but not worth the price.

~ Paul

...

[agfsteve]

Originally Posted by Guitars+gems

I'm just curious, do you drink your coffee black? I drink black coffee, no sugar, and I think I'm more picky about coffee because I can't improve the flavor of it with cream or sweeteners.

If I get served coffee that tastes like it's been sitting for a while, I just ask for fresh. The servers never seem offended.

What must have coffee tasted like back in the diner days, 1940's, 1950's, 1960's? It was made in huge urns and kept hot all day. I grew up on percolated coffee, lightened with whole fat milk and sweetened with sugar. The coffee came in one pound cans, pre-ground; the water came from the tap. I remember that coffee being utterly delicious, but tastes change. For years now I've been buying beans and grinding them fresh for each cup I make in an Aeropress or a Chemex, with filtered water. And drinking the coffee black, no sweetener.

I think Starbucks has changed the American taste in coffee. I like Starbucks but not their dripped coffee, so I ask for a pour-over.

No, I drink my coffee with cream, no sugar. I use about one of those little tubs of creamer per mug in restaurants.

[rokdog49]

Originally Posted by agfsteve

Every restaurant I go to has really bad coffee. It's almost always old, tasting like it's been sitting on the burner for an hour or more.

McDonald's makes surprisingly good coffee, and it's much cheaper than restaurant coffee, so if they can do it, then why can't anywhere else?

Well, McDonalds buys just a bit more coffee than your local restaurants and their requirements are very demanding. I would suspect their growers are among the best in the world. You can get that when you purchase millions of pounds of coffee vs a few hundred pounds per year.

BTW, Walmart's Columbian Arabica House Brand is as good or better than anything out there if you brew a pot at home. It's also more affordable.
They also have some serious buying power.

[agfsteve]

(OP again here).

The big mystery to me is how on earth McDonald's does it. If they didn't make such good coffee, I probably would not be quite so offended by restaurant coffee, simply assuming that it's cost-prohibitive to keep making fresh pots. But McDonald's does it, somehow, at less than half the price of typical restaurant coffee.

[oldwasichu]

I find the same thing to be the case - bad coffee at many places. The local Harley diner is pretty good, however. They serve enough that its always freshly made. Used to love Burger King's coffee when it was supplied by Douwe Egbert's (sp?).

For the past 1.5 years, I've been buying green beans and roasting. Gonna retire from the corporate world soon and this will be my hobby business. PM me if anybody is interested. Generally, I stock beans from Colombia, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Papua New Guinea, Ethiopia, Rwanda, and Mexico. Should be able to please your taste buds.

For those of you wanting to look into home roasting, let me know and I will be happy to give you some recommendations. If you love really good coffee and variety, you will not regret it.

Keep playing in good health!

[agfsteve]

Originally Posted by rokdog49

Well, McDonalds buys just a bit more coffee than your local restaurants and their requirements are very demanding. I would suspect their growers are among the best in the world. You can get that when you purchase millions of pounds of coffee vs a few hundred pounds per year.

BTW, Walmart's Columbian Arabica House Brand is as good or better than anything out there if you brew a pot at home.
They also have some serious buying power.

Yes, I guess McDonald's clout might play a part. But that should be the answer to why their coffee is cheaper, not why it is better, e.g. McDonald's makes good coffee for a dollar a cup, and restaurants make good coffee for two dollars a cup, but that's not the case: restaurants don't make good coffee at any price.

[rokdog49]

Originally Posted by agfsteve

Yes, I guess McDonald's clout might play a part. But that should be the answer to why their coffee is cheaper, not why it is better, e.g. McDonald's makes good coffee for a dollar a cup, and restaurants make good coffee for two dollars a cup, but that's not the case: restaurants don't make good coffee at any price.

I believe I answered why it's better.
McDonalds has their own growers and they spec the beans and the roasting process to meet very specific criteria.
There was a story about it a few years back on one of those news shows, 20-20 or some such.

[Tenzin]

Among many of the things I've done, I've waited tables here in the States (where tips were pretty much your salary). It's easy to have a busy shift on a Friday/Saturday/Sunday. The trick is to have regulars that will come during the week.

The last thing that happens in a restaurant is often what is remembered. (I worked in one place where there was metered parking and I often went out to feed the meters of my customers. Having a meal and walking out to a ticket can leave a bad taste in one's mouth.

That's where the coffee came in. I bet that I dumped more coffee than a lot of Starbucks make. I never had someone be angry when I'd tell them that their coffee 'would take a few minutes' because I was making a fresh pot.

<shrug> That's just me.

[Paddy1951]

Originally Posted by agfsteve

Every restaurant I go to has really bad coffee. It's almost always old, tasting like it's been sitting on the burner for an hour or more.



McDonald's makes surprisingly good coffee, and it's much cheaper than restaurant coffee, so if they can do it, then why can't anywhere else?

It IS old coffee. That is especially true if it is a slower time of day. If there is 3/4 of a pot on the warming burner, they don't want to make a fresh pot unless they have to. So, yes complain. Ask for fresh.

I think McDonald's, at least some of them, now have the single cup makers. Plus they move much coffee.

I used to go to an old fashioned plate lunch special kind of place that had the best coffee. It was long before all the coffee places came to be.
They served fresh Kona coffee which you just wanted more of. I don't know how they did that since Kona is expensive. Breakfast early, then enjoy the Kona for an hour or so.

I guess life was simpler then.

[agfsteve]

Originally Posted by rokdog49

I believe I answered why it's better.
McDonalds has their own growers and they spec the beans and the roasting process to meet very specific criteria.
There was a story about it a few years back on one of those news shows, 20-20 or some such.

OK, thanks. I'm surprised that McDonald's would dedicate so much effort to just making good, basic coffee.

So the question remains: why do restaurants in general make such bad coffee? Why do we tolerate it? Is it just coffee that is so commonly bad across so many restaurants? It seems like it to me. Everything else is what I'd expect: good apple pie here / not so good over there, good fries here / not so good over there, etc. But coffee just seems to be bad in approximately 93.7% of restaurants.

[hairpuller]

I brew almost all my coffee at home and prefer Pete’s over Fivebucks (I actually have a T-shirt that says that) everyday.
Scott

[ManyMartinMan]

Taking the chance of being accosted for good taste............ Why are you eating at McDonalds and restaurants serving bad fare? My belief is that if you stay with quality dining locations, you will receive quality from the appetizer to the dessert / coffee. Alternatively, choose better eating locations. I have never found that "why do all" statements have any validity. Or, in other words, I believe crappy restaurants serve crappy.......

[rokdog49]

Originally Posted by agfsteve

OK, thanks. I'm surprised that McDonald's would dedicate so much effort to just making good, basic coffee.

So the question remains: why do restaurants in general make such bad coffee? Why do we tolerate it? Is it just coffee that is so commonly bad across so many restaurants? It seems like it to me. Everything else is what I'd expect: good apple pie here / not so good over there, good fries here / not so good over there, etc. But coffee just seems to be bad in approximately 93.7% of restaurants.

MacDonalds got fanatical years ago about their coffee because a lot of road warriors in the sales game leave town early in the A.M. and grabbed coffee at Mickey D's either on their way out of town,or at the nearest exit off the highway.
I was one of those "road warriors".
Breakfast on the run became a big profit potential and thus, the emphasis on the coffee. McDonalds lead the way in pushing breakfast on the run and with all their locations, they took that segment by storm.
Most privately owned restaurants grudgingly offer coffee especially if they aren't open for breakfast and a lot of them aren't. I'll be willing to bet the number of folks who drink coffee after lunch is relatively low. Like I said, McDonalds and the rest of the fast food places own that business. In the bigger cities you will find breakfast joints and greasy spoons who have good coffee. How many and where they are situated depends on how each area of these cities lends itself to foot traffic from working people and tourists.

[agfsteve]

Originally Posted by ManyMartinMan

Taking the chance of being accosted for good taste............ Why are you eating at McDonalds and restaurants serving bad fare? My belief is that if you stay with quality dining locations, you will receive quality from the appetizer to the dessert / coffee. Alternatively, choose better eating locations. I have never found that "why do all" statements have any validity. Or, in other words, I believe crappy restaurants serve crappy.......

I don't eat at McDonald's.

It's not true, in my experience, that quality restaurants serve quality coffee. Maybe they make quality coffee, but they leave it on the burner too long and serve crappy coffee.

Also, I couldn't eat at what some would consider a quality restaurant around here even if I wanted to, because there aren't any. I'm happy to eat at low-cost restaurants any way (I love Denny's, IHOP, Waffle House, etc.), but I don't understand how they can make such good food, and in comparison, such bad coffee.

Finally, If I used the phrase, "Why do all" earlier (couldn't be bothered to check), then I should have said, "Why do so many", but I assumed you would understand that.