The Cold Drip

I used to have a cup of coffee ready in about five minutes. The process was simple. Pour ground coffee into a filter, add water, press a button. Five minutes later presto - I had hot coffee. It was sufficient in the sense that it gave me a caffeine buzz. But as I went out and started experiencing other blends of coffee and different preparation methods I soon discovered that my knowledge of coffee was limited at best. And here I thought I was making a good cup of Joe - how naive of me. 

The next logical step was to try other blends. There were subtle taste differences and began to enjoy a vast variety of different blends, excited for each new sip. Soon I brought or rather my girlfriend Gillian brought a grinder into my life. What a joy. Beans ground fresh every morning. The aroma in the morning was so intoxicating that I would want to stay in my kitchen the entire morning. The coffee was better again. Another step in the right direction and then I tasted a Chemex pour over. My world came crashing down. 

Sure grinding coffee every morning was a lot better and brewing premium coffee proved to make a vast difference but now I felt that my preparation was a travesty against the beans I bought every day. As if I was spitting on the faces of the coffee farmers and saying, “Thank you for all your hard work, now if you don’t mind me I’m going to go ahead and make it taste like shit.” 

Today, I am brewing all of my coffee with a Hario cold water dripper. The prep alone takes about 7-10 minutes and the brewing takes anywhere from 3 to 5 hours. That’s right. If I want a cup of Joe I now wait 3 to 5 hours. Okay, you got me. I usually do it overnight and get to drinking it the next morning but still, it takes a lot longer than it used to. 

So what’s the point? Why am I sharing this madness with you? It’s not because of my psycho crazed coffee obsession. It’s because although I could have a cup of coffee in 5 minutes now that I know it wouldn’t pay any respect to those aromatic little beans or the farmers that grew them there is no other way to enjoy coffee. The same goes for anything else. 

If you’re looking to create a new game, write a short story, start a start up, or simply want to make a cup of coffee the most important thing isn’t just to learn. It’s to apply what you have learned on a daily basis. It’s easy to cut corners, shave a bit off your workload, but then you’re just making glorified shit and there are a lot of farmers that worked really hard so you could have the potential to create something really great you ungrateful schmuck. So go create something magnificent.