Jeai-cArlos Cl. Tee

For all you coffee addicts out there! Here’s a programmer’s 411 on a home brew without that expensive espresso machinery, for your all night coding marathons.

Personally, I don’t have anything against bitter tasting coffee. I even prefer going black for those special brews when I don’t want the creamer or milk smothering its taste. In fact, I’m enjoying a cup now! ;) But, sometimes I gotta admit, I want that sugary, creamy taste for my sweet tooth, so here’s the ca7l0s.9 recipe for that.

Y’all will definitely need coffee, not instant, ground coffee that you need to brew using a coffee maker or plain stove and boiling pot. Why so? Well, you get to feel special because you aren’t drinking cheap coffee. :D Okay okay, seriously, the taste and aroma is way better for brewed coffee. Trust me, I know. Right now, I enjoy Maxwell House, Colombian Supreme, medium-dark roast — really good and strong coffee! :D¹

The next thing you need to have is sugar. I recommend brown sugar.² There is a slight difference in taste which I prefer, plus it’s healthier than white/processed sugar. For y’all diabetics out there, you should settle for artificial sweeteners or honey. Go as your doc!

Next, you can either go for creamer or milk. The best tasting creamer I ever tried is Coffee-mate but so far, you’ll end up with something that tastes rather normal. :S If you want to have coffee that tastes like a Latté from Starbucks, use milk instead. I use powdered Bear Brand milk but you can use fresh milk³ if you’re feelin’ fancy.

Lastly, you need water, purified if you don’t trust the one coming out of your faucet.

Okay, so you got the main ingredients, here’s how to brew you’re ca7l0s.9 coffee. :D

1. First, put two teaspoon of ground coffee into the coffee maker. Follow that with a cup of water. I use whatever amount of water that fits into my mug. If you’re using fresh milk, don’t use a full cup of water here. Set the maker to brew.⁴
2. While waiting for the coffee to finish brewing, get three or four slightly heaping teaspoons of sugar⁵ and four also slightly heaping teaspoons of powdered milk into your mug. If you’re using fresh milk, don’t put it yet. Now, why not into the coffee after it’s brewed. Well, whenever I put the sugar or powdered milk after putting in the coffee, I usually end up with hard to dissolve clumps of material floating on top. I then need to crush them using a teaspoon against the mug wall. Waste of time.
3. Now, with the coffee done brewing and still hot⁶, slowly pour it into your mug while stirring it with the sugar and powdered milk. Doing this keeps the sugar and powdered milk from sticking on the bottom of your mug. Keep stirring until the sugar and powdered milk are completely dissolved.
4. If you have fresh milk instead, pour it in after the coffee. How much milk? Well, it depends. Of course, if the cup’s already full then STOP! But seriously, I usually tell how much milk by how light-colored the coffee is getting while slowly pouring it in. If it’s light enough, I stop.

Yey! Now you have that cup of ca7l0s.9 coffee you’ve been craving wanting for. You can enjoy it hot or you can put it in the fridge and let it chill if you’re feelin’ like having iced coffee later. Just don’t forget to clean up after. ;)

1. I used ground coffee for this recipe, but, if you gonna settle for instant coffee, go for Nescafé, they’ve got a great slew of products where Nescafé Gold is my favorite. Don’t go for cheap Great Taste coffee. I say it doesn’t taste great, not even good. [↩]
2. Please do be careful when selecting your brown sugar, sometimes you get bits and pieces of stuff I don’t ever want to know about in there. [↩]
3. Fresh milk’s not an option for me because right now, we don’t have a fridge in the apartment. We’re so poor. :( [↩]
4. Read your coffee maker’s manual if you don’t know where to put either the ground coffee or water. [↩]
5. Brown sugar isn’t exactly that sweet so if you’re using white/processed sugar, use just two slightly heaping teaspoons. [↩]
6. If you happen to forget that you’re making coffee and the brew got cold, reheat it. Cold coffee won’t do as good when you mix it in with the powdered milk. [↩]