I am simply amazed at the variety of coffee lovers’ gift baskets that are available today. One of my real coffee-loving friends had an upcoming birthday, and I had determined that I would send him a gift basket made up of coffee and coffee items. We had shared many cups of coffee over the years, and it seemed like an appropriate and thoughtful gift for my old friend.

The idea sounded simple enough, I thought. I would just go online, find a nice coffee gift basket and have it sent to him. Problem solved! That was before I discovered how many choices there were available. It was a mind-boggling array.

I had the option of choosing a gift basket that was already made up and consisted of a variety of gourmet coffees. I had the option of choosing a gift basket that I could determine which coffees would be included. I could give my friend a membership in one of many “coffee-of-the-month” clubs that would provide him with a different gourmet coffee each month of the year.

I could choose coffee gift baskets with coffee that was already ground, or I could choose a coffee gift basket that consisted of a variety of coffee beans and a coffee grinder so he could grind the coffee himself. There were even coffee gift baskets that included an espresso coffee maker and espresso coffee cups along with the coffee. What to choose, what to choose? I had thought this coffee gift basket idea was going to be easy! Well, ordering was easy, but deciding WHAT to order was anything but easy.

I finally made a choice. I chose a coffee gift basket that had a variety of gourmet coffees in single serving packages so that he would enjoy trying different coffees from around the world and now I have a long list of future gift ideas for my friend.

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I have friends who merely like coffee, and then I have friends who are true coffee lovers but are stuck on only one kind of coffee. I also have a few friends who are real coffee lovers and who also have adventuresome taste buds. They are the ones who go to Starbucks and order a different coffee every time. This last group is the one that I send gourmet coffee gifts to.

Coffee, you see, is a universal beverage. Coffee is served in some form in almost every country on this planet. Coffee that is served in different parts of the world bear little resemblance to one another, and yet they are all coffee. Coffees made from coffee beans that are grown in different regions of the world have tastes that are unique. For example, a Jamaican Blue coffee bears no resemblance to Turkish coffee.

Those who are real coffee lovers are much like wine tasters. They can take a taste of coffee and tell you where the beans were grown. Only real coffee lovers who have adventuresome taste buds can appreciate a gift of gourmet coffee, and they will not only appreciate it, they will love it!

Gourmet coffee gifts can be purchased at real brick-and-mortar specialty coffee shops in most large cities around the world. Gourmet coffee gifts can also be purchased online and then delivered to the recipient that you name. Gifts of gourmet coffees make wonderful gifts for coffee lovers for Christmas, birthdays, Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, or for any gift-giving occasion.

Choosing gourmet coffee lists can even be an interesting experience for the gift giver. He or she is likely to find gourmet coffees that they will want to try for themselves as well as give as gifts to their coffee-loving friends.

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I have a dotty old uncle who lives alone and drinks his coffee right out of the coffee pot. He doesn’t bother to pour his coffee into a cup…maybe washing a coffee cup just makes more work…who knows?

Most people, however, prefer to drink their coffee out of a coffee cup or a coffee mug. It is the civilized thing to do.

When people buy place settings of fine china of just a set of everyday dishes, the thing that determines their choice is the shape and size of the cup. After all, plates, bread plates, soup or cereal bowls, saucers, and other pieces in a place setting or set of dishes are all pretty much the same. They may come in varying sizes and the patterns are different, but still they are all basically the same design. Only the cups are different. The size and shape of the cup and the handles on the cups is most often the determining factor is the selection of dinner ware.

There are different coffee cups for serving different coffees, as well. Most “regular” coffee cups hold between 6 and 8 ounces of coffee. But there are demitasse cups that only hold between 2 and 4 ounces and big coffee mugs that hold up to 20 ounces. Latte coffee cups must be large enough to hold the frothy milk.

Coffee cups can be purchased separately, or as part of a set of dishes or a piece in a place setting of china. Coffee cups don’t all have handles either. There are double-walled cups without handles that are used to serve espresso or cappuccino.

The thickness of the wall of the coffee cup is the determining factor of how long coffee will stay hot in a coffee cup. Remember those old thick-walled white cups of roadside coffee house fame? Coffee would stay hot in those things all the way through the eating of a meal and beyond. On the other hand, coffee in a delicate fine china cup will only stay hot a very few minutes.

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I love my coffee mug! I use it everyday. There isn’t anything particularly fancy or special about my coffee mug, except that is my coffee mug and it holds enough coffee to actually do some good, unlike those itty bitty cups with the tiny little handles that my wife prefers. I hate those cups. My fingers get stuck in the handles and they don’t hold enough coffee.

Not that I have ever paid a lot of attention to my coffee mug. It is just there every morning. I fill it up with coffee and carry it around with me from room to room as I prepare to go to work, or it sits within easy reach as I read my newspaper. It keeps the coffee hot for awhile, and I don’t have to refill it but just occasionally.

Anyway, I got to thinking about the coffee mug and wondered who thought up the perfect design. I never did find out who the inventor of the coffee mug was, but it seems that the coffee mug is actually a “take-off” of the old beer stein. When you think about the two designs, they are certainly similar.

Coffee mugs are man-sized. The smallest ones hold 12 ounces, and there are coffee mugs that hold as much as 20 ounces. Coffee mugs have also been modernized. Old coffee mugs were either made of tin or ceramic. Today, there are plastic and stainless steel coffee mugs, and coffee mugs that are insulated. There are coffee mugs that are made for travel, too. There is a top that prevents the coffee from spilling even when the coffee mug is tipped over. That sounds like a good idea.

Maybe I’ll go buy one that is insulted and made of space-age plastic with a top that prevents spills.

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That wonderful aroma is likely one of the reasons that so many people now own coffee bean grinders and grind their own beans to make every pot of coffee.

Grinding coffee isn’t a new thing. In the old days, people actually used a bowl and pestle to grind coffee as well as wheat and corn. Using a bowl and a pestle to grind coffee required muscle power and time…a lot of time. As mankind got smarter, hand grinders were invented that made the task of grinding coffee much less physically challenging as well as quicker.

Manual coffee grinders were used for many, many years. In most of the old western shoot-em-ups, if you look closely at the general-store scenes you will be able to spot an old-fashioned manual coffee grinder.

Mankind continued to progress. Electricity was harnessed and, of course, coffee grinders became electrified. The old-fashioned hand grinders and the more modern electric grinders operated on basically the same principle. There are two plates. One plate is stationary while the other plate is movable. Coffee beans are routed between the plates and crushed or ground.

The best of the modern coffee grinders still operate on that same basic principle, but now the plates have burrs, which make the coffee grounds uniform in size. Burr coffee grinders are the best kind to buy, but they aren’t the only choice today.

There are coffee grinders that use blades that chop and re-chop coffee beans until they are chopped fine. The burr coffee grinders produce coffee that is more uniform than the blade coffee grinders.

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Coffee is named many times for the region in which the beans are grown; Blue Jamaican Coffee, for example. Sometimes, though, coffee is named for the country or area that brews it; Turkish coffee, Italian coffee, etc. Coffees are varied, and so are the methods used for brewing it.

Turkish Briki: The coffee that is used in the Briki is powdered. It takes between 7 and 11 minutes to make a cup of coffee using the Briki. The coffee is very strong but clear.

Espresso Machine: Very fine coffee grounds are used in an espresso machine. It takes between 12 and 17 minutes to make 5 cups (4 oz) of coffee using an espresso machine. The coffee is very strong and muddy.

French Press Plunger: This coffee pot does not use any paper or cloth filter so there will be grinds and a white powder in the finished coffee. It takes between 5 and 8 minutes to brew 4 cups of coffee. Either regular or coarse ground coffee is used in a French press plunger.

Automatic Drip Coffee Maker: The coffee that is made in an automatic drip coffee maker is not as hot. It is clear, though. Fine ground coffee is most often used in automatic drip coffee makers. It takes between 6 and 10 minutes to make 6 cups of coffee using an automatic drip coffee maker.

Percolator: An electric percolator uses regular grind coffee. It takes between 13 and 18 minutes to brew 6 cups. The coffee made in an electric percolator is hot, clear, and has a lot of taste.

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Do you love espresso coffee so much that you thought about trying to claim Starbucks as a dependent on your income tax this year? Okay, maybe it is time for you to consider buying your own espresso maker so that you can make espresso at home and save yourself a lot of money in the process.

Granted, the price of an espresso machine is going to put a dent in your wallet but it really won’t take very long for you recover the investment when you start making your own delicious coffee at home rather than buying it already made for you at those big chain coffee shops.

The first thing that you will need to decide about the espresso coffee maker that you will buy is what size machine will best serve your needs. Espresso machines are sized by the number of cups of coffee that can be made at a time. For example, there are 4-cup espresso coffee makers and there are 12-cup espresso coffee makers. A word of information: the cup size of an espresso coffee maker is of the 4-ounce variety and not the larger regular coffee cup size of 7-8 ounces.

Your next consideration before purchasing your own espresso coffee maker is whether you want the machine to be manual, semiautomatic, or fully automatic, and also you will need to decide how many “added features” you want or need. There are a lot of choices out there. You will need to know exactly what your espresso coffee maker will and will not do before you buy.

Additionally, there are a lot of different brands. A good way to determine which espresso coffee maker will best serve your particular needs is to talk to your friends who already own them and see what they like and/or dislike about their own machines.

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Those who love espresso coffee also love their espresso coffee makers. When you happen to overhear them discussing their espresso coffee makers, you would think they were debating the advantage one sports car has over another rather than coffee makers.

There are espresso coffee machine owners who believe that nothing can possibly compare to the coffee that a manual espresso coffee maker brews. There are those who swear that only the semiautomatic variety will make really, REALLY good coffee. Then there are those who wouldn’t dream of owning anything other than a fully automatic espresso coffee maker.

According to them, only the fully automatic espresso coffee maker can make perfect coffee every time. And so, the debate rages on!

The manual espresso coffee machine owners tell you (and anybody else who will listen) that their manual machines give them full control of the coffee-making process, and they wouldn’t want it any other way. They add the water so they have control of quantity to the drop. They add the coffee grounds so they have control to the grain. They have control down to the split second of when to start the frother.

The semiautomatic espresso coffee maker owner will tell you that their machines do everything but turn themselves on and off, which is true. The only thing that the owner of a semiautomatic espresso coffee maker must do is flip the switch on and off, but according to them that is all that is necessary to obtain the perfect cup of espresso.

Those who own fully automatic espresso coffee makers don’t have to do anything at all, and that is precisely how they want it. Full automation, they say, is simply the only way to go. Set it and forget it!

And the espresso coffee maker owners haven’t even started to debate the advantage one brand might have over all others.

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Such an overnight camping trip was where I had my very first cup of coffee. Dad would pour water out of a jug into a pot, put the pot over the open fire, and bring it to a boil. Then he would pour in some coarse ground coffee and let the pot sit for a few minutes. Then he would drop cold water into it to make the grounds sink to the bottom before we drank the coffee. I’ve never had coffee that tasted any better in my life.

Now you might be asking what all of this has to do with a French press coffee maker. Well, the principles of making the coffee are exactly the same in the French press coffee maker and the river coffee that my dad made those many years ago. Of course, the French press coffee maker is much more civilized. French press coffee makers can be purchased that are electric. Still, the coffee-making principle is the same.

To make coffee in a French press coffee maker, you put hot water into the pot, add coarse ground coffee, and let the coffee heat for three or four minutes. Then you push the plunger down and the grounds are “pressed” to the bottom of the pot. French press coffee, like river coffee, is very strong. A little goes a long way and the measurements of French press coffee makers are based on four-ounce coffee cups.

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The earliest version of coffee grinding was done with a bowl and a pestle. The beans were roasted first, then they were placed in a bowl and crushed or ground with a pestle. Then things got mechanized, and changed quickly when coffee grinders that were hand-cranked came into being. If you have ever watched old western movies, there is always a hand-cranked coffee grinder in the local general store.

Then along came electricity, and things just got easier. The first electrified coffee grinders actually operated on the same principle as the hand-cranked version. There were basically two flat plates (one stationary and the other moving) that the coffee beans were crushed between. Things have gotten better since then although the principle remains basically unchanged — only improved upon.

Today, you can buy coffee grinders with blades that simply chop the beans into fine particles.  However, these particles are not of identical size. These blade-type coffee grinders can be bought for as little as $20, but they are not the best choice.

The best choice for a coffee grinder is a “burr” grinder. The burr coffee grinders operate on the same basic principle as the old hand-cranked coffee grinders in that there are two plates. However, these plates have burrs on them, and the coffee particles of beans that have been ground in a burr grinder are all of identical size. Burr grinders are, of course, more expensive, but they are much better coffee grinders.

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