Coffee Civil Wars: When Preferences Clash at Home

In this episode, I dive into what I call the "Civil War" of coffee brewing at home - when your partner, family members, or housemates don't share the same coffee obsession or preferences as you. I share my personal experience with my wife, who initially got me into coffee but hasn't gone as deep down the rabbit hole as I have. While she's content with creamer in her coffee brewed from a regular machine, I've become obsessed with pour-overs, specialty beans, distilled water with added minerals, and precision grinders.

I explore the tensions that arise when coffee preferences clash within a household, comparing it to how I keep my thoughts to myself about her wine obsession. Listeners will learn how to navigate these "coffee civil wars" while respecting each other's journeys and preferences, understanding that at the end of the day, your coffee journey is personal - even when shared with others who may not fully appreciate your level of dedication.

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Chapters

• 0:00 Intro
• 1:45 Defining the Coffee Civil War Concept
• 3:20 My Wife's Coffee Preferences vs. Mine
• 5:30 The Water Quality Disagreement
• 7:20 Comparing Coffee Obsession to Wine Obsession
• 8:40 Creating Separate Coffee Routines
• 10:30 Finding Common Ground in Coffee Differences
• 12:00 Your Coffee Journey is Personal
• 13:45 Questions for Listeners About Their Coffee Wars

Transcript

[00:00] Today is February 11th, my brother's birthday, 2025. And we're doing pretty good right now. I think we're doing pretty good right now. I have to set everything up today. And I will get into the topic soon, but it's been a long day already.

[00:30] What are we going to talk about today? I had the title of it. But let's call this Civil War. Let's call this Civil War.

[00:45] If you don't know, Civil War is something that's more so done internally. Like fighting amongst each other, like my kids, for instance, they have civil wars almost every day. So, we have fights within every day, something like that. It happens internally. It doesn't happen so much outside of the situation.

[01:15] But I'm talking about Civil War and coffee. And more particularly, when you, your partner, your kids or whoever drinks coffee inside of your house, don't have the same type of view or obsession with coffee.

[01:45] I think that's interesting because she got me into coffee. But even if somebody gets you into coffee, that doesn't mean that you guys are doing the same thing.

[02:15] I wouldn't say that her coffee game has evolved since we've met and been together for so many years. I'm not saying that it has evolved because of me. Because the coffees that I look into and roast and kind of get an idea what she likes and all that good stuff.

[02:45] But it's one of those things to where you think about it when things are not in harmony. And that's what has happened. I've been deep into this rabbit hole. I bought all the gear, roasters, gone down this whole business side of coffee. I'm deep into the rabbit hole. And I wouldn't say that she's on the surface, but let's just say that she is on the surface compared to where I am in this whole thing.

[03:30] The situation that happened was about the perspective of things that we feel that we need to do in order to get what we think is great. I don't think this is the case all the time. But in our case, she is a 100% creamer coffee drinker. No problem with that. I'm just stating who she is.

[04:00] So even though she can taste different things in the coffee with the creamer, she's a creamer type of gal. She knows what she likes. She doesn't give a thought about the light roast. She likes a medium and dark roast, something that takes and carries her coffee in the morning. Sometimes she's a two cup drinker. Sometimes she has acid reflux, she's a half cup drinker.

[04:30] I am, for the most part, a black coffee drinker. I like my coffee black. And I think majority of people that probably come onto this podcast probably do too. But it doesn't matter. You like what you like, right?

[05:00] Here's the situation. It was Saturday, today's Tuesday, couple days after the whole situation. I was about to make a cup of coffee because she wanted another cup of coffee. And I'm doing my whole light roast thing right now.

[05:30] If you don't know already, I'm going really deep into this rabbit hole about water and clarity and tasting different elements of what coffee is. I buy distilled water now so then I can put minerals back into the cup. So she saw the whole process. And she was like, "What are you doing? This is too much."

[06:00] I said, "Taste the difference." She replied, "Barely." But that's the barely that I need. That's like the nine yard touchdown that I need. I need that little bit more in order to get the full essence of what this coffee is.

[06:30] And she's a wine drinker. I bring this up mainly because I don't care about wine. It's not appealing to me. I'm not that big of a drinker anyway. But I guess what I'm saying is that I keep my thoughts to myself when it comes to her obsession with wine and drinking a whole bottle of wine in a setting or getting down the three liter bottles of wine. I think it's obsessive. But, to each their own. She's a grown woman. I'm a grown man. So I do what I need to do.

[07:15] So I told her that this is what I do. She was kind of just put off about it. We looked at each other with a little smirking and fighting and all that good stuff. Fine. No problem. I said, "Whenever I make coffee for you, I will make it out of the Mr. Coffee Machine." She said, "Okay. You don't care." I said, "I don't care. Actually, I care. I care a lot."

[07:45] I can have one or two cups from the Mr. Coffee Machine. But I need to do my ritual, my pour overs and all that. I need to do all that with my third wave water and precision grinder or the EK 43 or hand grinder. I got to do all that. That's my thing. Sometimes you just need a perfect cup of coffee.

[08:15] So I said fine. No problem. Just for you. So lately, especially over the weekend, I've been just pouring her coffee in the Mr. Coffee Machine and then pouring it and keep it moving. I can play that game too.

[08:45] But I guess what I'm saying here is that we all go through that too. No two people are the same. You have some type of degree of variations with your partner with even people at work. You drink coffee in a way that is interesting. It makes it who you are.

[09:15] So what do you do about that? I don't know. I'm still trying to figure my situation out. I think we're going to probably be in this civil war for a while because she thinks this whole thing is just crazy and I'm just going too far down the rabbit hole. But I don't know what else I can do anyway. I already bought all the stuff. I got this YouTube and podcast channel. I am experimenting from time to time. I am doing a lot.

[10:00] But when it gets to the nitty gritty of understanding what coffee is and how it matters to me, I think this matters to you too. Because at times we have our fights. We have our situations where we're with people. We're trying to understand them and we're trying to understand ourselves in this whole thing. We're trying to accommodate their beliefs. We're trying to understand what they're coming from.

[10:45] But sometimes you don't want to care about that. That's them. They can figure it out for themselves. Sometimes you just want to be on this journey on your own.

[11:15] But that's the thing about it. That's more so how I'm thinking about it. Kind of seeing how things are and seeing if there is a common ground in this. There is a common ground in it. It really is. But that looks different for everybody.

[11:45] I'm fighting this war internally. And sometimes we can't really understand why we are truly fighting this war with people. When it comes to coffee. A nice simple beverage. What we like, what we don't like and how we like to drink it.

[12:15] That's more so the situation. And we all go through it. And I guess I just needed to go through it a little bit more. Because in our case, a lot of times, it's not a big issue. Do I get mad that I'm actually wasting my water on her? Yeah. She doesn't care. She's not going to taste that degree of difference in a cup of coffee with the third wave water and all that stuff. She wants the creamer, she wants the chocolate milk, which is fine.

[13:00] And that's more so the situation. Those are some of the things that we have to ponder and think about and try to understand as much as we can.

[13:15] But at the end of the day, it's your journey. It's your journey, even as I talk a lot and you are on the journey with other people and all that good stuff. It's your journey. Even if I give you advice or don't give you advice, you're gonna do what you want to, which is perfectly great. I'm gonna do the same thing.

[13:45] So it's your path. Figure out what you want to do. It's automatically your path and don't let others dictate it in a way to where you're compromised. Because at the end of the day, it's your journey. It's your life. It's your coffee.

[14:15] So what kind of things do you go through when you're drinking coffee? Are you that much different compared to your partner or housemates or even your kids that drink coffee? How do you go about that? Do you guys get in fights all the time? Do you take some of this information to work? How does that work for you? How do we get past these civil wars or you don't have them? Maybe your significant other likes the exact same thing that you do. Like the same brew ratio, same light roast.

[14:45] Let's talk about it. I want to know. I really do. Well, that's me talking. This is me. Everyday Beans signing out. Talk to you later. Bye.