@adders Ugh. Importing the absolute worst features of american consumer culture into an already perfect coffee consumption environment just smacks of entitlement and presumption.
Italy's culture is affordable, equal, simple. The bastardised american variant is the opposite, and deserves neither praise nor emulation.
@dgold It’s also a cultural homogenisation issue - must coffee culture be identical worldwide? How utterly dull.
@dgold I spent twelve months of 1989-90 in Turin. A cappuccino was 1200 lire, or about 60p (around 45-50 US cents, probably) at the time.
And it was delicious. The growth of Starbucks and the other chains came after that, and I've been looking for coffee as good ever since. I've never found it. The closest in London was Costa in its early days, but nothing matches my memory of Torinese cappuccino, despite being six times the price.
@devilgate It does seem really odd to write a piece about international coffee culture coming to Italy - but spend so much time denigrating existing coffee. Surely there would have been enough material about the clash between the two worlds?
@adders Indeed. And from my experience it seems that international coffee culture was inspired by Italian coffee culture in the first place.
Or at least the coffee, if not all of the culture. Cappuccino, obviously, and lattes are based on “latte macchiato,” or "stained milk”: a frothy milk with a shot of coffee in it.
@adders weirdly, whomever is behind that piece appears to have paid a lot of money for it. A search for the headline shows it being used as churnalism in all kinds of places. Really rather pathetic in all kinds of ways.
@devilgate and let's not forget the speed! I can't imagine the scene if an Italian barista took as long as those in the US. It would be hilarious. Also, violent. 😅
@dgold That isn’t churnalism, those are splogs and other pirate sites copy/paste ripping off the original. If the WP’s Rome bureau chief is accepting money to write something like that it’s astonishing ethical failure. Far more likely it’s just what it seems: cultural arrogance.
@adders Amen to all of this. Just back from three weeks of undrinkable "coffee" and this morning my barista gave me a cheery greeting and a delicious cappuccino for the usual 1.10€ As long as that bar remains on my corner, I don't care what happens in Turin. For now.