The Red Herring

Coffee On Campus: Where to Hook Up Your IV

Since Red Bull costs $2.99 a can, and cocaine costs $80 a gram, coffee is the stimulant of choice for the poor and rich alike. With my keen powers of observation, I have noticed that McGill students consume the black gold at a staggering pace, whether it be real black coffee or the increasingly abundant non-fat caramel lattes favoured by McGill’s resident Carrie Bradshaw wannabes and our ever increasing metrosexual population. So with that in mind, I have decided to sample a variety of coffees available to McGill students within walking distance. The formula is simple. I ordered a medium coffee, just the way I like it: 7 sugars (diabetes, here I come) and cream (milk is for wimps). I did not test Caramel Mocha Macchiato Non-Fat Soy Lattes because I am Middle Eastern and we do not drink liquid frivolity. It’s like planning a review of bungee jumping and instead opting to report on what it was like to jump off a diving board.
Redpath Basement: The Mecca of delicious day-old meals invitingly offers up its coffee to the consumer via vending machine. It’s a rich black colour, much like that of volcanic ash. However, the aroma leaves much to be desired. It has that airport coffee scent: rejected coffee beans mixed with 115-octane jet fuel. The taste isn’t much better. After dumping in five sugars, I was still swallowing a mouthful of scalding horseradish. Two more packets did absolutely nothing. The only reason it garners points is because it’s fair trade and the lady with the hairnet behind the counter smiled at me (I feel beautiful on the outside now).
Score: 2/10
Starbucks: The purveyor of the whole “coffee shop” culture should technically make the best coffee, correct? Incorrect. Their coffee tastes as if their beans were roasted using a WWII era SS-issue flamethrower. Even with the coma inducing amount of sugar I shoveled in, I couldn’t escape the “over-roasted” flavour. Their coffee is the most expensive and their sizing nomenclature is irritatingly pretentious (a small coffee is called a “tall”). Their sub-par beverages were served to me by a neanderthal 16-year-old cashier with a dirt ‘stache who had the nerve to scowl at me after I asked him where the all-important sugar was. Listen buddy, my tax dollars are going to the Student Job Grant that is paying your salary, so you better direct me to the sugar before I fire an extra shot of soy milk through your urethra. Starbucks also pipes a variety of musicians through their well-concealed speakers, and sells CDs in stores. It sounds like puppies being kicked through industrial air-conditioning units. Score: 3/10 for the free newspapers
Second Cup: Drinking Second Cup’s coffee is the same as listening to an NDP MP deliver a speech to the House of Commons about global warming. You know it’s crap, but somehow it’s compelling enough to listen to. Similarly, their coffee has no real flavor and is so utterly unremarkable I can’t even remember how I would describe it. It’s as bland as uncooked tofu on white paper and can be summed up in one word: meh. Score: 5/10
Tim Horton’s: When you walk into Timmy Ho’s the floors are often dirty and unwashed. The line stretches as far as the eye can see and is filled with bleary-eyed striped-shirt-and-chino-wearing office workers and vapid low-rent Mischa Barton look a-likes from nearby private schools. They don’t take debit cards either, yet they make the best coffee. No less than 5 seconds after you place your order, your coffee materializes in a paper cup, scalding hot – so hot, in fact that it melts through the cup to burn your hand. But once you take a sip, and get over the pain of having seared your tongue, it is nothing short of magical. The coffee is just strong enough, and after my sugar doctoring, it’s sweet and pleasant-tasting. This, ladies, gentlemen and half-grown freshmen, is what coffee should be. Score: 10/10 I love it so much I actually donate my spare change to their charities.

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• Posted on October 31st, 2008
• Written by editorial staff
• Articles, Eli Keshet